I've been posting on this board a lot longer than you so I know the "tone" of nearly everyone here -- with the exception of the Rosa, no one here that I know of has ever tried to justify violent or criminal behavior by Antifa, BLM, or any other "left-wing" organization.
In fact, even now you see more people on "the left" speaking out against it than promoting it.
Some of us might debate whether Cap (or Antifa) is right to "punch Nazis" (like Richard Spencer), but outside of that few on "the left" argue that criminal behavior from the "radical left" is acceptable, and certainly not on the scale as we see from the "right wing" who often murder or abuse innocents to promote their political viewpoints.
To be honest, I see even arguing this as a waste of time in the wake of the recent spate of right-wing white supremacist shootings, so I'm moving on.
Last edited by aja_christopher; 07-29-2019 at 05:55 PM.
Im merely judging the last dozen pages. You'll have to forgive my unwillingness to review it all. Plus, politics on the spectrum are always shifting. Im more curious about how trends now portrend the future.
I'd prefer the justifying trend get quite clearly denounced.
It was in response to this part.
The right will complain about the left regardless of antifa's actions or existence. That's not a condoning of their behavior, only that they are largely irrelevant to the far-right's problem.And, worse yet, it actually feeds the right wing complaints. The easiest way to kill the right wing's boogeyman about it is to acknowledge these guys are fighting a problem the right way.
The part of the post you quoted is where I say it's possible to think that right-wing terrorism is a much bigger problem than Antifa, so I've hardly deflected that view.
I think the argument that the way to stop antifa is to address its concerns is flawed. This incentivizes violence and threats of violence by rewarding it, which gives others including racists and fascists the idea that they may get their way on the issues they care about through masked threats of violence.
The first amendment provides a freedom of assembly, so how would we go about preventing racists and fascists from marching in the streets? The power to stop people we don't like is prone to be abused.
Trump has a habit of going after his critics. He's mocked Nancy Pelosi's San Francisco on twitter as well.
https://www.aol.com/article/news/201...rict/23780791/
There is also a strategy in going after figures who would be unpopular in the nation, and then having Democrats go and defend them.
https://hotair.com/archives/********...y-al-sharpton/
The authorities do go after far-right terrorists so the idea that they have enablers/ supporters is a stretch. Democrats do also control the House of Representatives, as well as many local and state governments, so it's not as if they're powerless.
This is an odd comparison.
A good chunk of the people hurt and killed by cops are endangering others, including the guy in the Gilroy Garlic festival.
There are about 18,000 law enforcement agencies, so there are a lot of full-time cops out there (looking at figures for federal law enforcement as well as state and local enforcement agencies, it seems there are approximately 900,000 Americans with general arrest powers.) It's likely that the number of people in Antifa is a fraction of that, and their activities are more part-time.
Chemo can also be excessive if someone isn't facing an existential threat.
Sincerely,
Thomas Mets
Last edited by Rosa Luxemburg; 07-29-2019 at 06:04 PM. Reason: I don't know for sure if I'm the only one
By the time you've had a Beer Hall Putsch of any sort, you're already far too late. Fascism needs to be opposed and uprooted early and fast before it has a chance to spread. The reason we had a BEer Hall putsch in Germany at all was because of long-term enabling and coddling of right-wing extremists alongside violent repression of opposition voices to them.
We've already seen the GOP use the threat of violent anti-government extremists here in Oregon. If you think the coddling isn't going to continue, I don't know what to tell you. Pretending that 'Antifa' is 'just as bad' because it wants to punch swastika-wearing murderers, break some windows, and throw milkshakes is just... not... an accurate assessment of things. Want to get rid of 'antifa'? Get rid of the frigging Nazis.
It is -- if you ignore the facts.
Which is why I'd prefer you not reply if you're not going to address the facts I present in my posts in order to deflect to another issue, like avoiding addressing the racist behavior of both your president and your party in order to talk about "Antifa".
You could stop the "rise of Antifa" by not voting for a racist and fascist party you know has no problem committing election fraud and allowing for foreign interference in our democracy while attacking the rights of non-white and LGBT American citizens at nearly every opportunity, but in order to do that you'd have to address the problem directly.
You won't do that because -- based on your replies -- you don't really care about the facts regarding racism, right-wing violence and authoritarian fascism within the Republican party because you aren't the one being targeted by said party -- in fact, you benefit when democracy is subverted and the status quo of inequality is maintained by your political representatives.
This is what Antifa understands, and why they will punch Nazis even if I won't.
Last edited by aja_christopher; 07-29-2019 at 06:25 PM.
Fascists don't care about your 'smarter arguments'.
They'll just kill you.
By all means, we need to have an exit path for people to bring them out of authoritarian fascism, but we can't make a mistake about its violent roots or the danger it poses to everyone involved, and different people can do the different kinds of work involved here.
Last edited by Tendrin; 07-30-2019 at 04:18 AM.
If anything, I think the more right-wing violence and authoritarianism rises to the forefront, the more support you will see for those who take a stand against it and deal with it on it's own terms.
Again, the solution is to stop the rise of the far-right and to hold people like Trump accountable for their actions.
When even Fox is calling Trump out for racism then you know he is racist.
It's equally important to remember most of these attacks were responses to criticism regarding the immigrant detention facilities.
Last edited by aja_christopher; 07-29-2019 at 07:06 PM.
I mean in terms of how those arguments are recieved. The right wing monsters are minds unworthy of any concern, but I think fair and rational responses to their boogeyman bullshit can weaken those arguments in the wider public discourse. Whereas excsing or justifying responses feed their bullshit narrative.