blackjack21 wrote:
As a practical matter, you cannot initiate violence. Antifa routinely initiates violence against people who aren't physically harming others. In fact, their communist equivalents back in the 1920s is why the Nazis developed the SA and later the SS.
You seem *confused* -- why aren't you denouncing the *authoritarianism* of the *far right*?
When Benito Mussolini debuted the Fasci Italiani di Combattimento, the precursor to his fascist party, on Mar. 23, 1919, in Milan, he wasn’t inventing the idea of violent authoritarianism. But he put a name on a new and terrible breed of it. Under his leadership, squads of militants attacked, beat and killed fellow Italians; later, once he had become the authoritarian ruler of Italy, he oversaw brutality in Ethiopia, an alliance with Hitler and the persecution of Italy’s Jewish population and others, among other crimes.
The Descent: Inside Hitler's Bunker
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Yet even a century later, during a new era of strongmen, his idea remains sadly powerful. “Fascism is a disease,” former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright told TIME last year, “and there are symptoms. So I think it’s important to warn about that.”
https://time.com/5556242/what-is-fascism/
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blackjack21 wrote:
Further, such a self-serving license to initiate violence does nothing to address the harms of progressivism itself--the 35M people who died of HIV/AIDS in the promotion of hedonistic sexual licentiousness for example. One only needs to look at cities providing hypodermic needles to drug addicts, rather than addiction treatment, to see the disaster of leftist policies.
Why are you against the 'pursuit of happiness' / 'hedonism', as a *political* matter?
What do you consider to be 'addiction treatment', instead of simply providing clean needles to those who use hard drugs?
blackjack21 wrote:
In many cases, yes. A friend of mine is a police officer, and they have cut quite a few programs that impact the community and impact him financially.
Where was that? (What city?)
blackjack21 wrote:
The police are not organized to oppose fascism. They are organized to protect people and maintain order by arresting perpetrators after the fact. They cannot arrest people simply because they have nasty ideas running around in their heads. Antifa similarly cannot go around assaulting people, because it thinks a person has nasty ideas running around in their heads.
Thank you for acknowledging that there's a power void -- if police are unable to address fascist threats, beginning with the group displays of their hatred in public, then why are you objecting to Antifa *filling* that power void? Why are you defending the "civil rights" of *fascists*?
And do you really think that the Antifa violence is *baseless*? This very thread has been covering the details of the Dolloff event, and Keltner was 'a participant in a “Patriot Rally” in downtown Denver', according to prosecutors.
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ckaihatsu wrote:
Anti-fascism is an important task, for the sake of society.
blackjack21 wrote:
That's a factional position.
Anti-fascism is *not* a 'faction' within *fascism*. Anti-fascism is *opposed* to fascism.
blackjack21 wrote:
Fascists similarly think anti-communism is an important task for the sake of society. Do you think it's okay for fascists to run around attacking communists on the very same premise?
Do *you*?
blackjack21 wrote:
Initiating violence is not defense.
In the criminal law of many nations, necessity may be either a possible justification or an exculpation for breaking the law. Defendants seeking to rely on this defense argue that they should not be held liable for their actions as a crime because their conduct was necessary to prevent some greater harm and when that conduct is not excused under some other more specific provision of law such as self defense. Except for a few statutory exemptions and in some medical cases[1] there is no corresponding defense in English law for murder.[2]
For example, a drunk driver might contend that they drove their car to get away from being kidnapped (cf. North by Northwest). Most common law and civil law jurisdictions recognize this defense, but only under limited circumstances. Generally, the defendant must affirmatively show (i.e., introduce some evidence) that (a) the harm they sought to avoid outweighs the danger of the prohibited conduct they are charged with; (b) they had no reasonable alternative; (c) they ceased to engage in the prohibited conduct as soon as the danger passed; and (d) they themselves did not create the danger they sought to avoid. Thus, with the "drunk driver" example cited above, the necessity defense will not be recognized if the defendant drove further than was reasonably necessary to get away from the kidnapper, or if some other reasonable alternative was available to them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necessity_(criminal_law)
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blackjack21 wrote:
NYPD has already disbanded their crime prevention unit. This is already happening. Defunding doesn't necessarily mean shutting down the police completely.
Also in Nigeria, though, at this point, I think *community* policing and oversight is more appropriate, given that *government*-controlled policing is looking to be unreformable:
The Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) was a Nigerian Police Force unit created in late 1992 to deal with crimes associated with robbery, motor vehicle theft, kidnapping, cattle rustling, and firearms. It was part of the Force Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (FCIID), headed by Deputy Inspector General of Police Anthony Ogbizi.[1]
SARS was controversial for its links to extrajudicial killings, extortion, torture, framing, blackmail, kidnapping, illegal organ trade, armed robbery, home invasions, rape of men and women, child arrests, the invasion of privacy, and polluting bodies of water by illegally disposing of human remains. After widespread protests in Nigeria and worldwide under the motto "End SARS",[2][3] the unit was disbanded on 11 October 2020. Inspector General of Police M.A. Adamu said that a new unit, the Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT), would replace the SARS.[4] He said that SARS personnel would report to police headquarters for debriefing and examination. Within hours of the announcement, some Nigerians took to Twitter with the hashtag #EndSWAT,[5] and demonstrations continued amid fears that police reform will not materialize.[6]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_A ... bery_Squad
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blackjack21 wrote:
Are communists criminals when they steal your property and they are in power? No. It's no longer considered theft.
Oh, you mean *Stalinists* who have state power.
blackjack21 wrote:
Similarly, if the fascists are in power, are they violating your rights? No. You no longer have rights. It's remarkable frankly how many people are okay with emergency powers exercised by our nation's governors right now. They willingly forsake their own rights if they think the party that's doing it is their friend. Yet, there is plenty of that happening already.
blackjack21 wrote:
The NSDAP was very particular and did quite a few things that weren't nearly the case in Mussolini's Italy, or Franco's Spain. It's no surprise that the Nuremberg Trials were all about trying Nazi Party members specifically.
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ckaihatsu wrote:
Then do me a favor, and stop *defending* the "civil rights" of fascists to say and do things that promote their hatred and violence against others.
blackjack21 wrote:
They are not civil rights. They are constitutional rights. The state has no authority to abgrogate them.
Well, this, then, is the *crux* of the problem -- the *bourgeois* approach to civil society is obviously too linear and *reductionist* in its politicization. There's that caption on the graphic from one of the articles I included previously -- it says, speaking from the position of the cops, that 'Personally, I don't support racist stabbings, but I will defend to the death your right to recruit for them.'
blackjack21 wrote:
The constitution wasn't intended to cover everyone. It was intended to cover free born white men. It has since expanded that role to include blacks, women, native Americans, people in unincorporated territories, homosexuals, etc. A lot of that expansion happened by ultra vires use of SCOTUS powers.
blackjack21 wrote:
Whitmer has far exceeded her authority under the constitution and laws of Michigan, and behaved in a thoroughly arbitrary and capricious manner. The kidnap plot is likely criminal, but given her abuse of power, it's understandable why such plots would get hatched in the first place.
So, what, according to you, was *laudable* about the kidnap plot?
blackjack21 wrote:
Accusations aren't necessarily dispositive of fact. Trump criticizes her arbitrary and capricious behavior in imposing statewide lockdowns--not allowing people to go to a secondary residence (except her husband), not allowing people to buy paint, so they can paint their walls why locked down, etc.
What was Whitmer's 'arbitrary and capricious behavior', according to you?
blackjack21 wrote:
Well Whitmer's behavior is hyperbole too, and her actions have been declared unconstitutional.
Who declared Whitmer's actions to be unconstitutional, and what were those actions?
blackjack21 wrote:
I already addressed that before. Muslim extremists are not neo-Nazis or racialists. They are religionists.
Do you mean 'ISIS', specifically? (You should *say* 'ISIS', instead of the broader 'Muslims'. Also try 'Islamists'.)
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blackjack21 wrote:
Most violent crime is committed by Democrats.
ckaihatsu wrote:
And *what kind* of violence is that, exactly? To stop killer cops? To defund the police? To criminalize fascists?
You're just being party-politics *partisan* here, and *de-politicizing* 'violence', as though it's all happening on some tit-for-tat basis only, as if these were rival sports teams, or something.
blackjack21 wrote:
Standard gun violence, standard assaults, standard gang violence, standard property crimes, etc. It's mostly Democrats who do these things when you get right down to it.
Oh, okay, what you're doing is *politicizing* acts that are primarily *economic* -- it's a preoccupation with *demographics*, that just because those doing street crime happen to be *Democrats*, you're *overgeneralizing*, to indict Democrat Party politics for these actions which are *economic*, and *not* political at all in anyone's intentions.
blackjack21 wrote:
That's what makes Trump so effective, and yet keeps his approval ratings down. Most people know what Trump is saying is true, but they disagree with him for saying it.
*I* happen to disagree with Trump for his anti-immigrant policies, sanctions on other countries, and support of fascist provocations.
blackjack21 wrote:
I spent many years of my life as a Republican, and I frankly got tired of lily-livered people like Jeff Flake and even George W. Bush simply taking it on the chin constantly and never delivering a counter punch. Trump delivers a counter punch, and I'm not even a big fan of his position on health care or spending. Yet, it shouldn't be hard to point this stuff out and yet for most Republicans they just can't seem to do it. Where are all these fascist cops killing people? In big cities, directed and controlled by the Democrat party and their labor unions. Where is most of the violent crime taking place, in big cities populated by Democrat voters. This is not rocket science. It's just that we finally have one person pointing it out that is in elected office.
Allow me to point out that simply being *contrarian* really isn't *sufficient* for a cohesive politics.
You may not like how extra-legal politics is playing out at the moment (BLM, Antifa, etc.), but that's happening that way only because the *legal* system isn't addressing any of the actual problems / issues themselves, like killer cops, fascist public events, Trumpian authoritarianism, etc.
Extending this line to *geopolitics*, there's *no way forward* out there right now, and I don't support simplistically *separatist* actions or movements just because they're anti-China (Uighurs, Hong Kong, Taiwan), or anti-Russia (Ukraine). The world's development is at an *impasse*, and going *backwards*, to *reaction*, is no better than staying at the status quo.