Kevin “The Angry Vet” Soper continued in his self-appointed role as disruptor of the first amendment community on Thursday as he interrupted Manuel Mata’s livestream in order to derail Mata’s planned updates on the efforts to stop the change of punishment for interference with public duties in Texas.
If passed, house bill 3565 would change interfering in public duties from a Class B misdemeanor to a state jail felony. The maximum penalty of 180 days in jail and a $2,000.00 fine would now become a maximum penalty of two years in jail and a $10,000.00 fine.
Most of the Texas-based first amendment auditors and cop watchers have come against these changes as the bill sits in a committee and the public discusses the changes. Instead of curtailing their behavior in order to diminish the negative attention they get from interaction with police, Mata and others have actually increased their activities in recent days.
Texas police have been emboldened by the change of presidential administrations to help crack down on laws that were deemed too weak under the previous administration. As part of that, certain laws are being revisited and things like state-wide identification checks have been implemented.
The change to HB 3565 is part of these efforts and is aimed at stopping what is seen as harassment of police officers and first responders by first amendment auditors. Those auditors say they’re testing the first amendment by often insulting and degrading police officers and others in their course of their duties and disrupting crime and accident scenes with their antics.
Lawmakers and police officials have seen the punishment for interference with public duties as too weak as auditors wrack up minor punishments and have monetized breaking the existing law and have been rewarded in clicks and views on YouTube, along with financial gains.
A good video by Mata, for example, has been said to offset whatever fines he will receive in the unlikely event he’ll be convicted of interfering along with a nice profit from breaking the law.
Soper, a Maryland based cop watcher and first amendment auditor, has been at odds with Mata and other Texas based first amendment auditors since last summer, when most mocked his involvement with his The Servicemen and Citizens for American Rights Society (SCARS) non-profit organization.
The YouTuber has served as a disruptor since then, invading side chats of those who have criticized his SCARS organization and stated that it was a scam. If not blocked by channel owner or the moderators working a live stream, Soper has the ability to quickly dominate side chats and disrupt the entire broadcast.
This was on display on Thursday as Soper managed to throw Mata off of his planned comments attacking the proposed changes brought by HB 3565, that he devoted the majority of his time explaining who Soper was and insulting the YouTuber.
He said that Soper once tried to turn him against his friends such as Carolina in Fort Worth, CJ Grisham and Harvey Freebird, but the joke was on Soper as he rarely hung out with Carolina, Freebird was no longer in his area, and he only saw Grisham at court hearings.
Mata’s rage, however, was apparent as he singled out Soper’s SCARS organization as a “scam” and continued to be easily thrown off track by the Maryland based YouTuber. As Mata insulted Soper, Soper countered that Mata and his friends were “the food” for police to toy with and eat.
The return of Mata to the “scam” remarks and insults encouraged Soper to continue to type all caps accusations against Mata in the livestream’s side chat, resulting in Mata screaming back at Soper via video and…
Whatever messaging Mata was set to bring on Thursday’s stream was lost, as both men let petty disputes and insults overshadow a serious issue that they both agreed on and have spoken out against. In the end, it resulted in another lost day in the fight against change to the Texas law.
With so much at stake in Texas, and serious jail time in the future for auditors if the punishment for the law changes, will Mata and others allow the actions of one man in Maryland continue to sideline them in the pursuit of freedom?
We’ll continue to monitor the situation in Fort Worth with new details on the controversy surrounding HB 3565 as we receive them.
I don’t see the problem
1A push the boundaries of what is free speech
the state and police push back with new laws
the 1a community gets arrested under the new laws, sent to jail and appeals.
The courts then establish even further guidelines on what is permissible and what is not
And if the 1A community is wrong, What is two years in jail for standing up to the man.
What?
You say that is just horsesh-t?
they are just doing this for the money, clicks and view and really don’t give a fcuk about the 1A and they are just grifters looking for a pay day from morons who send them money to see them insult cops.
Yes, that probable right. Oh well, where Texas goes, the other 49 states are sure to follow…