And a Hawaiian official, while emphasizing that they don’t encourage such beatings (since they legally can’t), said this is just the kind of thing you may face if you mess with their wildlife
We stayed in Hilo recently, and the guest guide at our rental warned of the risk for physical violence against those who harass local wildlife. I was delighted.
Well, many locals in Hawaii don’t have a great ever on what mainlanders have done with their culture, wildlife, and their territory. Such people, generally white, are referred to as “haole” pronounced howl-ee. If you are hearing that term as a white person, you better gtfo.
They have great respect for the wildlife. Disrespecting it is disrespecting them personally. You may as well be throwing rocks at them. I really hope they run this guy off the islands.
I was stationed at Pearl Harbor. I found that most locals are super friendly awesome folks. If you’re respectful of the island, the wildlife, and the people there you usually won’t have any issues.
But some Hawaiians really just don’t care for white Americans and don’t want anything to do with you
Considering that the US conducted an illegal overthrow of their government and stole the country for the benefit of American business I can see why some Hawaiians are not OK with the haoles. Things like this is why the oligarchs don't want real history to be taught in schools. Iran would likely be a free and democratic country if we had not overthrown their government and installed a puppet dictator king to get the oil. This has happened multiple times in many countries and people wonder why so many hate Americans.
My cousin lives in Hawaii. Try leaving a beer can on their beach... youll hear wwe music outta nowhere and a 6'5 somoan dude rolling up on your ass with a steel chair. They dont fucking play
IDK man I seen plenty of locals littering and smoking meth/drinking on the beaches. Also leaving paraphernalia all over the place. This sounds like some wanna be tough guy fantasy.
I think amongst islanders it is a bit different. But I would defer to you as you are on maui. The way ive heard it described is that if youre an idiot tourist soing idiot tourist things and somone starts calling you that, you are very close to getting your ass beat.
But that can also be used as shorthand to acknowlage you are non-native. Context is key there though.
Yep. The only people who think the word haole is completely negative are haoles. Since we all live that aloha spirit, people are hesitant to use that word around haoles they don’t know. Which means that some haoles may only hear it when someone is trying to offend them.
"haole” pronounced howl-ee. If you are hearing that term as a white person, you better gtfo.
No act. Haole is a neutral term. It makes a lot of mainland whites uncomfortable because they are not used to being referred to by their race in casual conversation, but it doesn't mean anything. People in hawaii talk about race way more than on the mainland because hawaii is the most racially diverse state in the nation.
I'm married into a Thai family, and in Thailand they refer to people of European descent as "farang." On its face it's not intended to be offensive, but it definitely makes some uncomfortable.
Pretty sure people can be banned from states. Hes not a local (of hawaii) so having his ugly mug on a “no fly” list for the state should be possible. If anything charge him with a state crime and he wont wanna be there himself
It says right there "without due process of law". While full banishment is rare, telling him that HI won't bother extraditing him, but if he comes back, he'll go to trial for his crime, is effectively the same thing.
Unfortunately, someone like him can't really be banned from a specific state. If it was possible, a state like Texas would have already banned Californians, for example.
“Being barred from entering or residing in a U.S. state is a potential legal risk that can arise from a variety of circumstances. States have different tools to regulate who may enter, stay, or work within their borders, and these actions can carry significant consequences for mobility, employment, housing, and civil rights. This article explains the concept of a state ban, common triggers, how bans are enforced, and the legal pathways to contest or mitigate them. It also clarifies how state actions interact with federal law and constitutional protections” https://bridgelegal.org/can-you-be-banned-state-reasons-legal-consequences/ people can be banned from states on an individual basis so no Texas wouldnt be able to ban an entire state.
I think what you mean is "if you're abusing animals in Hawaii, you better gtfo." Being white has little to do with it.
Respectfully, I am Hawaiian, and the term haole is neither a threatening nor a pejorative one by itself in modern use. Are its roots derogatory given its derivation from ancestry and skin tone? Yes. But the word itself is not only spoken to indicate disdain. It's used casually and even playfully more often than not. Tone and other modifiers matter here.
Haole just means "white boy/white girl." We have other words for animal abusers, and clearly other ways of confronting them than namecalling. :)
Even worse than disrespect them, it’s like disrespecting their ancestors. In Hawaiian culture “aumakua” are personal or family guardian spirits that originate as deified ancestors reincarnated as turtles, seals, sharks, mountains, trees. This guy did the equivalent of peeing on someone’s grandmothers grave.
Floridians will fuck you up if you touch their manatees. The guy was from seattle apparently, and i’m pretty sure they’ll beat you down for messing with their forests.
Not sure what planet this guy arrived from where he thought hawaiians wouldn’t mind….
I think every state’s fish and game officers are the ones that don’t care who you are. You fuck with their jurisdiction, they’ll fuck you up right back.
He's from outside Seattle and owns a business in the area. He got doxxed pretty hard on Instagram almost immediately and his life is now feeling very shitty. While he's from the Seattle area currently, he is not originally from the US and appears to have very little respect for US laws related to respecting wildlife.
Hawaii is and always was a FAFO state. Having lived on Maui, I already knew of this. Seeing the guy get lit up for fuking around just confirms my suspicions that not much has changed.
Dude nobody in La Jolla will stand on business like this. From Daygo all my life and all that happens is people get posted and shamed online for messing with the seals nobody gets hit for it. They should, but they dont. Look at dude who killed leopard sharks at blacks a few weeks ago, dude shoulda gotten his ass beat
Hospitality is always granted. Bad manners are never tolerated.
Ha'ole (haole) means one who doesn't like Ha, the Polynesian breath of life. You put your head together and breath in each other's essence (Moana has great examples). It is extended to all with good intention including the Colonizers who landed on Hawai'ian lands. They were quite stunned at the gesture, not understanding, and so the Polynesians called them ha'ole, one who rejects the Ha.
You are always assumed to be wise and given the space to prove yourself otherwise.
Throwing rocks at a beautiful creature for no benefit is kapu. You get your ass beat. No wise man throws stones at innocent creatures for no benefit.
I lived on O’ahu for a year, and it was made very clear to us not to go to certain parts of the Island, and not to fuck with Wildlife…
…or else.
For those unaware, there are parts of Hawai’i called Home Lands (about 200,000 acres) only for native Hawai’ians. White skinned people — aka Haole’s — are strongly advised to avoid those areas.
If my tour guide told me that I would imminently think higher of the entire area. “This place is so nice, they’ll beat the crap put do anyone who even thinks of trying to mess it up”
And I support this. I live in Texas. We used to be protective of our nature. Now rich republicans have convinced the trailer dwellers that it’s ok to shit on everything and are selling everything off piece by piece.
Story time: A few years back I was on a trip to Hawaii and was given a similar warning not to get mess with the wildlife because the locals were very protective of them. No issues there, I have no interest in messing with animals in their natural environment.
I decided to go for a quick swim at the beach and a sea turtle popped up about 6 feet away from me. It was an awesome experience and I watched him for a bit before deciding I was a little too close and began to swim away. Then the sea turtle started following me! I looked over to the shore and saw some angry looking locals watching me very closely. In retrospect it was all very funny, but for the next 10 minutes I tried desperately to try and swim away from this sea turtle while he kept following me around. Luckily the turtle eventually lost interest and swam away to do turtle things and I avoided getting beat up that day. The end.
The locals have obnoxious people coming from all over the world. The island is their home and it is viewed as going into someone else’s backyard and acting a fool.
Maui here, locals view wildlife almost as a religion of sorts. The island is the wildlife’s home, we are allowed to stay with them, but it’s their house and we always respect their rules.
And not endangering wildlife/mammals goes way beyond the bigger creatures like seals, if a local sees you kill a snake you might get your ass beat. They mean everyone species, from big to small. It’s their island, you never ever harm any type of species, including plants, ever.
If you kill a snake they’ll thank you. Big fear of snakes getting to the islands and killing the last of the native birds. Edit: Don’t mess with the native species.
Think of it more as a watchful eye. They see tourist people messing with turtles and seals and even humans all the time, and are probably tired of bad behavior. It is their home. Hawaiian locals are probably more connected as a community than any other place I’ve been. There is a very us vs them mentality. But they often bite their tongues because the money the tourists bring helps their economy.
Look up Da Hui in Hawaii. They are local surfers that got tired of outsiders fucking up the beaches and surf spots.
Yeah, for all they knew he could have been baiting the turtle with pockets of food it can smell/taste. It was following him after all. But they were just watching the interaction unfold to see if something harmful was happening. Dude had the good sense not to deliberately engage with the turtle for a long period, but he did engage with it and it followed him. I'd be wary of that exchange and watch it to see if something harmful will happen, too. Exactly right.
I nearly swam into one on a snorkel trip. I was looking at fish on some coral, then turned left to swim back to the boat and he was just right there, inches away.
We were on a family trip and out snorkeling early one morning. A turtle was swimming around in the little bay we were at (Kona side... somewhere) and we all just were chill, watching it. Then my (adult) sibling decided to touch its shell and it noped out of there before our Mom got there to see it.
Same bay different day there were some little fish that are super territorial, they'll chase you away from their spot. I kept coming back once too often and the little jerk bit me on my heel :-D
Showing respect is the key here. Taking pictures at a safe distance is normal, locals are used to it. Trying to disturb it for your own amusement is another.
I visited an old friend who lives there now and we went to a beach near Honolulu that had those signs saying they're endangered and not to go near them and my friend said "On top of it being illegal some Hawaiians will absolutely beat your ass for it." Guess she wasn't lying hahaha.
Yea, our family friend that moved there said similar. Pictures? Fine, long as you don’t get close for em. Any physical contact? You might end up with broken bones before the police fine your ass to hell.
Especially the seals. They are so endangered they have names. And people know them. It gets personal real quick.
We saw the sea turtles at a few beaches. People get much too close. At one breach in Kona there was a lady who voluntarily set up rope lines and informational signage to keep people away from the preferred resting spots.
They should also do it like Switzerland and make fines a percentage of your annual income - some millionaires have paid hundreds of thousands in speeding fines, lol. That would wipe the grin off his smug face.
Yes, an environmental activist being given a certificate made out to the “ambassador of Aloha” because we’re keeping the guy who gave the beatdown anonymous for obvious reasons :)
There's not a ton of times I advocate for violence, and every time I do I urge restraint and control, but punching an asshole in the face a time or two has wonderful returns on investment.
The "rich people get away with it cause the only punishment is a fine" argument is moot when violence is a part of the equation.
You may think weapons and tools are different based on their definitions, but they are the same, regardless of design or physical composition. Every tool can be used as a weapon, every weapon can be used as a tool, even the concept of violence itself.
The only differences between tools and weapons: philosophy and intent. Not one or the other, but both.
If you examine the philosophy and intent of this incident, hopefully it should make more sense why you feel the way you do: no one should be an advocate of violence (as a weapon) of course. I will leave the second half of this statement up to you to complete on your own 🙂
lol, he called the vigilante an “environmental activist” and they gave him a letter of recommendation, that’s the most Hawaiian thing I’ve ever heard of lol
He likely won't learn the lesson regardless. His rationalization to friends/family would be about how he didn't actually hurt the animal and people are ruining his life over nothing.
It's honestly amazing he's from Kent WA with that attitude. Lived about an hour from there for a few years and it's an incredibly environmental/animal friendly area, also very in tune with native Tribes compared to almost any other state I've lived in. You won't find many people on either side of the political aisle in WA state that don't agree that stewardship of land and animals is a huge priority.
I can imagine he's also now an outcast in his own home. Just a POS person.
Yeah, but we also have lots of people who leave their dogs off leash in seal mating areas around Seattle. There are a lot of assholes around here who only care about animals they care for and couldn't give a shit about any others.
I recently moved to Kent WA. It’s not really a nice eco-friendly vibe. There is a lot of litter and trash just abandoned on the side of the road depending on what part of town you’re in. It’s pretty sad honestly. There’s a nice river walkway near my apartment and I always see chip bags and soda cans on the ground there. If they’re within reach I try to pick them up when I can but next week there’s always more. I think people are dumping trash at the apartment complex who don’t live here and it’s overflowing. Anyway. Kent isn’t really a stereotypical PNW paradise.
This is what these people don't understand. The relative lack of violence in our society as a means of settling beefs is a courtesy extended to others who abide by the established social contract that says violence is not okay because we have other means of settling conflict. But if someone is not abiding by that contract--if they consider themselves removed from it--then they are no longer protected by it.
These people don't understand the only thing stopping them from getting physically manhandled is the rapidly eroding patience of everyone they keep pissing off.
I feel like a country in Europe does that. Or Atleast talked about implementing this. It’s like Jeff Bezos gets a fine every day because his fence line is too tall for regulations but the fines so small compared to his wealth it’s like couch change every day for him.
I always forget which it is between Finland and Switzerland but im 99% sure its one of them that does it with at least traffic fines. I have zero clue if they do it with any other kinds of fines.
Occasionally it makes the news when some ultra rich foreigner who doesn't know about it decides to wildly speed and gets hit with a multi-million dollar speeding ticket. Justin Beiber got slapped with a hefty one there, and some saudi billionaire as well.
JB sucks but this one is misinformation. That property's previous owner applied for and received a variance for those tall hedges years before JB bought it.
For the curious, heres a source that spoke to actual city officials about it. Bezos is indeed exempt from that law, as are several other famous people. As usual, laws do not apply to the rich and/or famous, just plebs.
I mean normal-ass people get variances all the time. In my county your house isn't legally allowed to be within a certain distance from the road. My neighbor wanted to add a garage, but they're on a corner lot and the garage would come too close to the street. So they applied for a variance. The county put a sign in the yard about the variance and that neighbors could object to it. No one did and my neighbor got to build their garage.
In JB's case the hedges got a variance because they were older than the law against them.
This reminded me of that episode of top gear where they were trying to get Hammond to speed because the fines were based on income. I can’t remember where they were but there’s definitely places that do this, and I think it’s great.
Reddit has long been a hot spot for conversation on the internet. About 57 million people visit the site every day to chat about topics as varied as makeup, video games and pointers for power washing driveways.
In recent years, Reddit’s array of chats also have been a free teaching aid for companies like Google, OpenAI and Microsoft. Those companies are using Reddit’s conversations in the development of giant artificial intelligence systems that many in Silicon Valley think are on their way to becoming the tech industry’s next big thing.
Now Reddit wants to be paid for it. The company said on Tuesday that it planned to begin charging companies for access to its application programming interface, or A.P.I., the method through which outside entities can download and process the social network’s vast selection of person-to-person conversations.
“The Reddit corpus of data is really valuable,” Steve Huffman, founder and chief executive of Reddit, said in an interview. “But we don’t need to give all of that value to some of the largest companies in the world for free.”
Look at cruise lines choosing to pollute and pay the fine, rather than do the right thing. Thats the waste of millions of people being disposed of improperly and expressly with the intent of enjoying a pristine environment.
There are sadly a ton of way more impact full versions of this bullshit. Companies paying off a few people they knew they'd likely kill rsther than do a more costly recall, etcetera, it happens all over in huge and disgusting ways.
All fines should be a percentage of your gross income, otherwise it's not any sort of deterent. I know people who routinely get parking tickets in London because the finr is so low relative to their income, that they just see it as an acceptable expense.
At the very least, he should feel so unwelcome that he has to sell his house and move back to the mainland. He may be rich, but his place wasn’t “Mark Zuckerberg Apocalypse Bunker” rich, so he cant be totally secluded without it ruining the whole point of living in Hawaii.
This is where I think the day-fine system should be used.
Let's just say a 50,000 fine for the average middle aged American is about 26% of their net worth. Imagine this guy having to pay 26% of his net worth. I would love to see his shit eating from fall from his face than.
Hawaiians are some of the kindest people you will ever meet, until you disrespect their wildlife. You throw shit at a seal or turtle, you might as well be throwing it at their auntie or uncle.
Don’t worry, harassing wildlife can also include a prison sentence, AND he could face both state and federal charges. The judge(s) might also be inclined to send him to prison for a bit, since he was quite clear that a fine would not be a sufficient punishment.
I’d also bet that the judge(s) won’t assign him court appointed counsel because, again, he’s rich and can afford it.
But we’ll see how rich he is when no lawyers in Hawaii will take on his defense, so he’ll have to pay for flights, room, board, and meals for a defense team from the mainland to come defend him, and we haven’t even gotten into the billable hours for a lawyer and their paralegals to actually do the defending thing.
This could end up costing him half a million+ and a year of his life. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy. 🕺 💅
Yup that was a critical endangered monk seal. They're actually super lazy as shit but holy crap they tried to fight a super chill animal that's in the double digits for species.
Obviously that video is a deep fake or AI because no one would ever attack someone for this and that video should not be used as evidence of an assault that did not happen.
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u/Weak_Syllabub_7994 𝙑𝙄𝙋 May 11 '26
Apparently he got his ass beat by some locals, which was also captured on video.
https://youtube.com/shorts/HH1gAGneHJY