The New York Observer [NYC weekly], August 28, 1995. "Off The Grid: Non-Slaves of New York. 'Sovereign citizenship' isn't just for the power line-tapping, compound-dwelling white supremacists anymore. A guide to getting The System off your back, New York-style." They do not run around in military fatigues, they are not holed up in Central Park, and for the most part, they do not fall into the fringes of the extreme right or the extreme left. Yet here they are, in the center of the Center, going about their daily lives with nary an A.T.M. or credit card in their name, without a Social Security or voter registration card, without insurance or bank accounts and driving with licenses they themselves have rescinded. And one more thing: They do not pay any income taxes. What was made clear by Oklahoma City and Waco and Ruby Ridge, Idaho, and by Ross Perot and the Unabomber and most recently, Bill Bradley, is that dissatisfaction with "the system" is pervasive in this country. Living off the grid is the most personal way of expressing that discontent. But, says Sharon Biggs, who teaches a three-phase, 40 week course out of her Washington Heights home on how to successfully remove oneself from the system, "the complexion is no longer that of the wronged individual or visionary. It has moved into the mainstream -- people who suspect that there is something wrong." DYS_sys (17kb)