You don't have to be crazy, but it helps

Most of us, I suspect, believe we live in civilized countries. We may grumble from time to time about high taxes or too much unnecessary regulation; but, in general, we accept and obey the law and live happy, if sometimes mundane, lives.

This is three image combo of stills taken from CCTV issued by the Metropolitan Police in London on Monday Feb. 23, 2015, Kadiza Sultana, 16, left, Shamima Begum,15, centre and and 15-year-old Amira Abase going through security at Gatwick airport, before they caught their flight to Turkey on Tuesday Feb 17, 2015. The three teenage girls left the country in a suspected bid to travel to Syria to join the Islamic State extremist group.

It never occurs to the vast majority to rebel to the extent of advocating sedition within their own country. There is a minority, however, who do; and, in the United States, some officials are saying home-grown terrorists are becoming a highly significant threat.

In a number of countries, there are movements involving people so disenchanted that they drop out of society. Rather than simply becoming loners, however, some try to set up their own counter-culture. They call themselves "Freemen" or sometimes "Sovereign Citizens" and they consider society's rules simply don't apply to them.

They don't have a driver's license, don't pay their taxes, don't send their children to school, and so on. Of course, they are perfectly willing to accept the benefits of the society they despise as long as there's no "heavy-lifting" involved.

This might be alright if these people could simply be dismissed as a minority of crackpots who are a nuisance and little more and, really, most fall into that category. They don't have the moral resolve to either leave the country or try to work within the system to fix what they see is wrong; they just ignore laws they don't like, bitch a lot, and are content to fly under the radar.

However, the actions of a few have aroused the attention and concern of the authorities. Violent attacks against the establishment are not new, but they seem to be on the increase, particularly in the U.S.

In many cases these individuals are so crazy that they come to the attention of law-enforcement authorities before they can do something violent. In Canada, a few years ago, a young man and his friends tried to oust an elderly lady from her home and turn it into some sort of "Sovereign Citizen Embassy" and the matter ended up in court.

The notoriety generated by that incident helped to focus police attention on a slowly growing anti-government movement, although not yet at the terrorist level.

The Canadian Freemen surfaced as a spin-off of the Montana Freemen in the U.S. who declared themselves years ago as no longer under the authority of any government. Ironically, the movement's very success has been one of its biggest problems because, while an individual rebel is difficult to detect, an organized group of people who kite bad cheques, amass stashes of arms and try to attract other like-minded fools is easy for the authorities to watch.