The FBI's latest gang threat? Juggalos.

[Video Link]. Fucking gangs, how do they work? Spencer Ackerman at Wired's Danger Room blog: "The FBI considers the fans of shticky rap group Insane Clown Posse to represent a threat on par with the Crips, Bloods, and Aryan Brotherhood, according to its annual report on gang activity." (thanks, Noah Shachtman)

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

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vonbobo

More like a threat to good taste.
- http://www.facebook.com/aaron.klayer Aaron Klayer
  
  ZING!
http://www.mrericsir.com MrEricSir

From ICP’s song, “What is a Juggalo?”

What is a juggalo?
A dead body
Well, he ain’t really dead, but he ain’t like
Anybody that you’ve ever met before
He’ll eat monopoly and shit out connect four
- C W
  
  “He’ll eat monopoly”
  
  Sounds like SOCIALIST talk to me, no wonder those brave patriots at the FBI are protecting the corporations that make this country great from antitrust legislation.
- lewis_stoole
  
  i have no idea what that means, and yet i love it
http://twitter.com/mcgroarty McGroarty

I’m clueless about Juggalos, but the public perception of those other groups is waaaaay out of whack. They’re full of criminal idiots, sure. But they’re hardly as active or menacing as what’s portrayed on TV and in the movies.
- C W
  
  “public perception of those other groups is waaaaay out of whack. They’re full of criminal idiots, sure. But they’re hardly as active or menacing as what’s portrayed on TV and in the movies.”
  
  Reality doesn’t get federal funding for the prison industrials and agencies, menace does.
Cowicide

A million Juggalos everywhere rejoice in their new FBI status and street creed. So, did someone within the FBI get a kickback from the ICP for this great public relations campaign, or what?

Meanwhile, we still don’t have a single payer system for health care and 44,000 Americans will die this year because they couldn’t afford our corrupt, privatized system based upon LIES.

Someone please educate me… Just how many Americans are killed every year from Juggalo attacks?
http://twitter.com/doggo doggo

It’s like… It’s like… a parody of Nixon era hippie paranoia. It’s… It’s like the Quincy punk rock episode.
- http://www.xradiograph.com/ OtherMichael
  
  More like Law & Order ICP episode .
- WreckTheTapeDeck
  
  Quincy Punx!!!
jamiethehutt

Maybe they have a point?

We know that Insane Clown Posse were trying to acquire potentially classified information about technologies key to the west’s success: It’s possible that while you read this they are planing an imminent attack against magnets.
OldBrownSquirrel

Next, they’ll be going after the Society for Creative Anachronism, due to either an inability to distinguish between anachronism and anarchism or a false perception that they’re dyed-in-the-wool monarchists.
- Mark Dow
  
  Wool-dyeing archers could be a threat.
vaked

My mom is in a group that does Yoga. I can’t help but think they might be gang affiliated
- C W
  
  La Leche League’s paramilitary-guerrilla warfare is well-known to the FBI.
Lobster

Fear the subjuggalators.
- http://mordicai.livejournal.com Mordicai
  
  …h0nk…
  
  …SUCKERS…
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_HXAIYHQKEUZERAIHKULT7GKU64 Gold Man-Sacks

Well, they’re definitely a menace, and have a history of violent activity. As to being a threat though, these people choose to hang out and party in Cave-in-Rock, Illinois…
Mona Morgan

Can we now expect a Branch Davidian-style raid on the next gathering?
- cymk
  
  Yep; I can see it now. Juggalos armed with Faygo and magnets standing off with the FBI/DEA.
Bucket

First they came for the Juggalos and I didn’t speak out, because, you know, I mean, seriously, Juggalos? really? Come on, you’ve got to be kidding me. That’s like coming for the “My Little Pony” fans over the age of 12.

Actually, that one might make sense.
Teller

The FBI is not investigating, it’s recruiting for a beta called the GBI whose mission statement says”…the infiltration of domestic gangs..” The Juggalos were on the short list until the mission statement added “…for intelligence gathering.”
Jenonymous

Why am I strangely reminded of that scene from “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” where Hunter is sitting in on the speech about drugs given by the DA “expert?”

And yes to whomever said that if you follow the money, there’s even odds that ICP PLANTED this as a PR stunt. If they in fact DID, they need to quit the music industry immediatley and start a PR firm, and I will work for them for free until their IPO. It doesn’t get more brilliant.

PS FWIW I thought the whole Juggalos thing was craptarded when it first STARTED, the fact that the FBI only decided to notice it now is even more craptarded. What are they g0nna do, beat the cops to death with their skateboards? Smear greasepaint on their riot shields?
Jenonymous

Because I love you all, here is the link. Watch and LAUGH.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObbLapUaZd4
Nightflyer

Our tax dollars at work. *sigh*
semiotix

To be fair, the average Juggalo considers him or herself to be far MORE dangerous than the Crips, Bloods, and Aryan Brotherhood put together.
Guest

I ~knew~ Tia Tequilla was a fed.
Alvis

It’s one thing when the source is bad-quality, as in cellphone video of a breaking news event, but come ON.

Can we, as the Internet, collectively agree that, when a good-quality copy of a video does exist somewhere, posting a poor-quality one (aspect ratio ignored, interlacing artifacts, etc) is WORSE than posting none at all?

Anybody with me?
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_G75I447HIDV45RLAZXTMDVZFVE Ryan
  
  Except when it’s owned copyrighted material belonging to the king of copyright violation, FOX. This is pretty much the only way it can be done that won’t get it pulled right away or end up with a C&D order.
- http://www.xradiograph.com/ OtherMichael
  
  Can we, as the Internet, collectively agree that, when a good-quality copy of a video does exist somewhere, posting a poor-quality one (aspect ratio ignored, interlacing artifacts, etc) is WORSE than posting none at all?
  
  hells, no.
  
  Bad Generation Copies reveal the hidden hand of the Dreaming Digital G-d.
  
  Witness the holy artifacts, listen to Its Electronic Voice Phenomena.
jeligula

It’s all a freakin’ miracle, don’t you think? Scientists cannot explain it, even when they do.
bardfinn

Next on the FBI list: Goths and Norwegian Black Metal fans. Also Gene Simmons, and anyone who has ever performed in the Commedia del’Arte.

Oh wait.
Spud Cheezwhiz

Wow, it just gets better…
On page 41, there’s a sidebar identifying Second Life as a serious threat: “Because of its anonymity and versatility, gang members could potentially use Second Life to recruit, spread propaganda, commit other crimes such as drug trafficking, and receive training for real-world criminal operations.”
Really?!?
Mister44

See – everyone worries the gov has some huge conspiracy to control our lives. No – they are just fucking clueless. Someone like Hitler could use the Patriot Act to seize power. Our gov. is full of bumbling bureaucrats. This FBI report reads like my great grandmother trying to explain how a DVD player works.
Daemonworks

FBI… officially the only people on the planet who take ICP or their fans seriously.
That_Anonymous_Coward

I thought Juggalos were only dangerous to Tila Tequila.
Frank W

If the FBI can’t come up with plausible threats,they’ll have to go with implausible ones. How else are they going to get to put your tax dollars to work?
professor

I’m confused: I thought “Insane Clown Posse” referred to the current Republican Presidential candidates…
Mark Pitcavage

In the past five years there have been increasing numbers of violent incidents involving Juggaloes. To me, one of the more disturbing ones was the 2006 incident in which white supremacist Juggalo (a small subset of the Juggalos) Jacob Robida engaged in a knifing attack at a gay bar in Massachusetts, then fled the scene. He picked up a woman in West Virginia and they headed west until they were stopped by a police officer in Arkansas. Robida shot and killed the officer. Following a chase, when they were finally cornered, Robida turned and killed his female companion, then shot himself.
- Mister44
  
  I just think this is retarded to call Juggalos a ‘gang’. They are a group of people with a few things in common. You could say the same about people into gangster rap, death metal, and Barry Manilow. Especially Barry Manilow. You can stereotype goths, ‘thugs’, guidos, people who live in trailer parts, etc, but it would be just that – a caricature of reality.
  
  But just because some guy goes and skull fucks his mother to the tune of Coppa Cabana doesn’t mean he has anything in common with the other fans or that any other fan will have a similar propensity for heinous acts.
CSBD

I read the Robida entry in wiki… He does not seem to be a super Juggalo. Just someone who listens to their crappy music. If he had some mug shots in clown paint or his drivers license had clown paint… then I might belive he was “Totally Down with da Clown”

I think he was just some stupid psycho who went out in a blaze of stupid glory.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_D._Robida

As for the FBI and the Juggalo gang theory… the idiots that prepared the report should be fired or prosecuted for theft. Yes, theft. They are obviously stealing money from tax payers by wasting time producing reports like this.

The only law enforcement press release or report that is more idiotic/retarded is/was:

BUTT HASH
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butt_hash
Halloween_Jack

If the FBI had any hope of repairing its reputation after numerous public fiascos and abuses of power, this effectively ended them. Their elevating Juggalos to an official national menace will rank with jenkem and the supposed pedophile-Trekkie connection in the annals of law enforcement gullibility and hysteria. Yes, you can find any number of crimes, mostly minor, that were committed byJuggalos… also fans of Bruce Springsteen, Sarah McLachlan, Justin Bieber, and Beethoven. Maybe it’s the feds that should start dressing up as clowns.
John Hirleman

Here is a great short film that goes into the reality of what it means to be a juggalo:
http://www.americanjuggalo.com/
SonOfSamSeaborn

Every day, another report of this ilk. I find it hard to understand why the US hasn’t either imploded or been laughed out of the galaxy by people with brains yet. How does shit like this and Occupy happen and the federal government remain in charge?!

Not saying it’s just the US either, mind. We’re dicking things up at a slower rate in the UK but it’s still happening. Either that or it gets less exposure.