Response to “STOP FREE KEENE!!!” Misinformation

Local hater group, “STOP FREE KEENE!!!” received press today from the Sentinel and rather than speak to reporter Kyle Jarvis they released the following statement, according to a comment on the Sentinel’s site by group founder Andrea Parkhurst Whitcomb.  In this article, I respond to their statement which appears in-full, in the block quotes below:

“Stop Free Keene is a loosely organized group or 200+ Keene/Monadnock residents who are concerned and alarmed by the goals and tactics of Free Keene and it’s affiliate organizations. This includes the desire for the abolishment or privatization of all government agencies and services like police, fire, and judicial systems as well as the complete dismantling of public education and regulatory oversight of food, medicine, and the environment.

Free Keene is a website – it has no tactics as it’s only a wordpress site. The purpose of the site is to share news, activism, and opinion in the hopes of advancing society to a consensual order rather than one based on institutionalized coercion. Please see our “About” page for details. Each person that blogs for Free Keene has their own tactics and they may not all agree on the best way to go about achieving their goals. Personally, I don’t support privatizing police, fire, and justice. I just want the markets open to competition and have the state agencies no longer funded by the threat of force. I support education, good food, health care, and a clean environment. I just don’t think a monopoly is the best way to provide those services. If you want to know what other Free Keene bloggers think, feel free to ask them.

Free Keene and its affiliates have made it a priority to harass, intimidate, or otherwise silence their critics and those they perceive as “enemies of liberty”.

The idea that critics have been silenced, harassed, and intimidated by liberty activists in Keene is ridiculous. Anyone can post a comment on any article here. So long as the comments are not racist, bigoted, or advocating violence, they are allowed here. I also personally run a national radio show where we have open phones every night – anyone is welcome to call and we encourage dissenting opinions.

They have attempted to push their political agenda on to school children and paraded about Central Square topless and promoted it as a venue for their avocation of public drug consumption.

Actually, the school outreach events have been focused on young people knowing their rights with the police and understanding the ideas of liberty. None of that is politics. Do STOP FREE KEENE!!! members not believe in people knowing their rights, especially young people, who are the most vulnerable against police aggression?

Also, do members of STOP FREE KEENE!!! smoke cigarettes or drink caffeinated beverages? If so, they are also public drug consumers. I support responsible drug use, regardless of whether it is in public or not.

Their latest action has been the initiation of a coordinated harassment campaign against city parking enforcers where FK/RH members have gone as far as calling one “a killer of brown babies” in reference to his years of service to our country and causing another to seek medical attention for stress-related symptoms and anxiety.

As has been pointed out countless times, if there was harassment happening against parking enforcers, surely the city’s fancy, high-priced private attorneys would have shown evidence of that in court. They did not. Robin Hooders are peaceful in their interactions with the enforcers, and even peaceful in interactions with people who have used violence against them.

Free Keene/Robin Hood/ AKPF are not what they claim to be. They do not feed meters to help those in “need” – they do it as a means to undermine government structure; gain attention for their cause; and exercise their desire to perform acts of “civil disobedience” in order to further promote their agenda.

Robin Hood of Keene agents have multiple goals. The number one goal is to save people from tickets. It’s the icing on the cake that we are helping keep the people of Keene’s money in their pockets rather than the city’s coffers. It was thanks to the city suing us that we got the bulk of the media attention we have received. Thanks, “City of Keene”! Also, Robin Hooding is not civil disobedience – civ dis means purposely breaking laws. If anything, it’s civil *obedience*.

Unfortunately, the PEO’s are easy targets because they work outdoors in public spaces. But they are also human and do not deserve to be followed, video-taped or treated poorly because someone does not believe in the parking system.

Sorry, but if one works for “the state” or “the city”, one is subject to being held accountable for one’s actions. If government workers don’t like being recorded and talked-to, they are in the wrong job. They should quit and go work for a private company.

We started the flier campaign and outreach activities to inform the public of the truth and to send a message to FK that their “peaceful revolution” histrionics and bullying will no longer be tolerated.

If you’re going to oppose Free Keene, then at least take the time to look at the title of the website. Free Keene advocates peaceful EVOLUTION. I don’t want society to revolve, or go around to the beginning again. I want to see us evolve to where coercive threats are not the basis of society. Bullying? Again, please provide the evidence for the claim.

The fact that a FK member has created a duplicate of our Facebook page in an impotent attempt to misrepresent our group and distort this message proves to us that we have struck more than a few nerves over on Leverett St.”

From what I’ve seen, the “STOP FREE KEENE” facebook page features excerpts from posts in the original “STOP FREE KEENE!!!” facebook group. I’m not sure what makes them so sure it was a “FK member” who created the page.

Regardless, I can’t speak for others, but I’m elated that STOP FREE KEENE!!! has been so diligent at promoting the ideas of liberty for us. Their existence will only bring more attention to our movement and allow people to make up their own minds. Hopefully this response will assist in those ends.  Stay tuned here for the latest!

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