The Gaming Den

Yeah, that's completely different, in case you think slavery and oppression is some how the same as this. Unless your advocating for a full on armed revolution, what is this supposed to accomplish?

Wiseman wrote:Yeah, that's completely different, in case you think slavery and oppression is some how the same as this. Unless your advocating for a full on armed revolution, what is this supposed to accomplish?

I doubt hitting Nazis would result in greater oppression of minorities, and my evidence is all of recorded human history. Do you have evidence that beating up asshole causes more people to become assholes?

Note: If humans are so broken that wailing on Nazis (NOT JUST PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT LEFTISTS) makes more people become Nazis we should probably get right to nuclear war already. There is no winning when the Nazis multiply when you fight them.

Wiseman wrote:Yeah, that's completely different, in case you think slavery and oppression is some how the same as this. Unless your advocating for a full on armed revolution, what is this supposed to accomplish?

1) Yeah, slavery and oppression is in some ways really pretty much this, since we are talking about fighting nazis, and also wage slavery.

2) More specifically, the gains made by black people in the 50s and 60s also required violent resistance to be accomplished. And that's really similar to what we are talking about here. In specific, they didn't have a full on armed revolution, but with no violence, there is every reason to believe things like the civil rights act would have never been passed.

This doesn't mean that every dumb car burning is a good idea. Objectively, it's not. But the greater fact is that some specific dumb poorly thought out car burning is significantly less destructive to the movement than Arlen Specter and Joe Lieberman killing the public option on the ACA, but we don't actually advocate instituting martial law to hunt to down and fill Joe Lieberman full of holes.

It's not about that. My worry is about where this ends. I mean, armed revolution isn't a bad thing in itself, but I'm not sure it's justified.

Edit: Mostly ninja'd by kaelik. Thanks for clarification.

Wiseman wrote:It's not about that. My worry is about where this ends.

Well it ends with passing legislation that doesn't suck, which actually calms down the protesters, and solves the problem, unlike you know, instituting nazi crackdowns suspending democracy, and killing all the brown people like darkmaster wants.

It ends the same way as it did for the Civil Rights movement, or Vietnam protests, or literally anything else.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/07/u ... 53012.html

Ha. Ha. Haaaaaaaaaaa.

Pseudo Stupidity wrote:

Wiseman wrote:Yeah, that's completely different, in case you think slavery and oppression is some how the same as this. Unless your advocating for a full on armed revolution, what is this supposed to accomplish?

I doubt hitting Nazis would result in greater oppression of minorities, and my evidence is all of recorded human history.

Historically, it did.

Before the Nazis actually obtained any political power, back when they were just a bunch of yahoos plotting to overthrow the government, the SS would stage pro-Nazi rallies in predominately Communist communities. Which of course led to communists trying to beat them up. The big brawls between the SS and the Roter Frontkämpferbund did not hurt the Nazis politically, they only helped.

That's not to say that violence couldn't have prevented it Nazi Party's rise to power. It could have if it were sufficient. Punching SS fighters isn't sufficient. Shooting Hitler and his inner circle until they were all dead would have been sufficient.

Hitting Nazis makes Nazis look like the good guys. They become politically stronger, you become politically weaker. Killing Nazis makes them dead, and it doesn't matter if they look more sympathetic because they'd be dead. This should be simple to understand.

This is not something that the extreme left is likely to do. As a general rule, the number of leftists who are actually willing to murder people because of their political beliefs is small and their organization is non-existent. This is usually a good thing because murdering people is usually bad. But if you're willing to use violence to neutralize a genocidal political movement, then you absolutely have to be willing to kill your targets and you hve to succeed, you can't half-ass it.


Lesser degrees of violence, including the threat of racial civil war, worked to push the government into listening to the non-violent civil rights groups because the American government was not willing to commit genocide. They were awful, they were horrible, but they weren't Nazi horrible. There was never any thought to the simple solution of just marching every Black person in the country into a gas chamber.

The Non-Violent civil rights protestors + violent (but not too violent) revolutionaries 1, 2 punch does not work against Nazis, because the Nazis' actual solution, the one that they actually, successfully, implemented, is to just kill both.

This is the problem with the Punch a Nazi meme. It should, instead, be kill a Nazi. And if you aren't willing to fire a bullet at someone's face, then you shouldn't be swinging your fist at their face either.

Not that I'm advocating murder. But we do need some perspective here.

When facing people who are willing to exterminate you, punching them doesn't help. They get up and then they shoot you, round up your family, and send them to the gas chamber. That's exactly what happened in Germany. The threat of violence only works against people who don't want violence. It's ineffective against those who are simply waiting for an excuse to kill you.

hyzmarca wrote:Hitting Nazis makes Nazis look like the good guys. They become politically stronger, you become politically weaker. Killing Nazis makes them dead, and it doesn't matter if they look more sympathetic because they'd be dead. This should be simple to understand.

This should become my new sig.

hyzmarca wrote:This is not something that the extreme left is likely to do. As a general rule, the number of leftists who are actually willing to murder people because of their political beliefs is small and their organization is non-existent.

That's still perfectly okay. "Injustice" is never equal to revolution, not by itself. You need injustice + weapons + instigators. Now, while I don't expect much from even the worst extremists in the authoritarian left, we do have the ethnic minorities in the country (who have actual reasons to fear for their lives, let alone their civil rights), so all you need for a revolution is weapons (a non-issue in the US) and instigators.

Granted, revolutions are NEVER "for the people by the people," and as soon as the revolution ended, the country would spend the next ten years overthrowing the inevitable would-be tyrant that used to be "the people's hero" and then struggling to finish cleaning house, but it still beats the alternative of letting the current filth take root, consolidate its power, and break the people's spirit, reaching the point of no return.

hyzmarca wrote:This is usually a good thing because murdering people is usually bad. But if you're willing to use violence to neutralize a genocidal political movement, then you absolutely have to be willing to kill your targets and you hve to succeed, you can't half-ass it.

"If injury has to be done to a man, it should be so severe that his vengeance needs not be feared." --Machiavelli

The idea that beating people up makes them stronger is pretty much bullshit. Gandhi wasn't made stronger by being beaten up, he won in spite of being beaten up.

Protest works. Violent protest works. Sometimes your opponents are better at violence than you are, and they are able to win. But that doesn't mean that violence doesn't help, it means that your violence wasn't good enough.

When white supremacists in the south beat the crap out of black protesters during the civil rights movement, that didn't strengthen the black protesters. The black protesters were still injured and lots of people did in fact put their heads back down in fear.

The fact that Trump's selection as president has emboldened racists, mysogynists, and homophobes across the country to commit hundreds of terrorist attacks against women and minorities has not strengthened the hand of women or minorities. Violence hurts the people that it is targeted against and weakens the movements supported by its victims. Because fucking obviously.

Sympathy and $2.10 will get you a cup of coffee at Starbucks.

-Username17

hyzmarca wrote:Shooting Hitler and his inner circle until they were all dead would have been sufficient.

They did try that. Multiple times. Even blew up a bomb right under his nose during a meeting with said inner circle. There's even a movie about it. But Hitler time and time again showed to have some kind of unholy luck keeping him alive.

hyzmarca wrote: When facing people who are willing to exterminate you, punching them doesn't help. They get up and then they shoot you, round up your family, and send them to the gas chamber. That's exactly what happened in Germany. The threat of violence only works against people who don't want violence. It's ineffective against those who are simply waiting for an excuse to kill you.

When the Russians marched inside Berlin, the germans who had tried so hard to kill said russians surrendered exceptionally quickly without any need of the russians shooting every last one of them. Even Hitler was a good chap and shot himself out of his own volition, saving everybody a lot of work. And the germans never attacked Russia again.

Heck, the german scientists and engineers mostly found themselves working for some of the people they were trying to kill just a month ago or so, and I don't think they were even punched or anything.

An eye for an eye only leaves the whole world blind.

Okay, European Denners: What in the actual *fuck* is going on in Poland? It sounds like some serious shit is going down in a hurry, and the EU is getting mighty upset about it.

Yeah, what little news there is about it leads one to the picture of poland trying desperately to not become a right wing fascist hellhole and only just managing it. Kinda sorta. Their right wingers are actually in power, but there are still some laws and rules stopping them from doing what they want it seems.

Well, the current regime basically wants to do everything Orban did, but lack the majority he had to do it in any way even resembling legal.

So, they started of by crippling the constitutional court - without getting into details, at this point it basically doesn't function, and even if it did, more than half the judges were appointed by the current government.

Then they passed some legislation that allowed them to replace every single civilian officer who held a slightly higher position and nominate new ones in their place (it automatically made them lose their jobs if they didn't get a new contract). The new law also removed any requirements for holding such a position and made it so that people are appointed for it (before several people could enter what was called a "contest" and the one with the best qualifications was supposed to win).

The most recent mess was about three laws making all the courts subservient to the Public Prosecutor General (who is also the Minister of Justice) and the government.

The first one allows him to remove the directors (and vice-directors) of every court in the country on a whim, while getting to choose their replacements. Said directors will be ablee to freely move lesser judges between courts. In both cases, giving any reasons for said decisions is optional.

The second one was about getting the Supreme Court firmly under the heel of the government by allowing it to replace any and all of the current judges.

The third dealt with the National Council of the Judiciary (a body responsible for nominating judges and reviewing complaints against them), making it so that 15 out of the 25 members would be elected every four years by the parliament (when currently they are chosen by judges associations) - that would be alongside the 6 members already being chosen by the parliament.

The planned laws made thousands of people go out onto the streets and protest, but that didn't mean anything to the ruling party. After all, why would it?

The president raised some complaints about the latter two, claiming that he won't sign them unless some changes are implemented. While they were made, he still decided to veto the two. Almost certainly it was a case of being butthurt over losing some of his existing prerogatives in favor of the Prosecutor General.

The regime already says they WILL make their changes pass one way or the other, and their plans for the fall include dealing with the media (decentralization and "making them polish once again" as they call it) and forming a new unit to oversee the police, firefighters, BOR (the equivalent of the US Secret Service and the Border Guard, which will answer only to the Minister (they ensured the members can't be trialed over the things they do while on duty) and have extremely broad privilages.

hyzmarca wrote: Before the Nazis actually obtained any political power, back when they were just a bunch of yahoos plotting to overthrow the government, the SS would stage pro-Nazi rallies in predominately Communist communities. Which of course led to communists trying to beat them up. The big brawls between the SS and the Roter Frontkämpferbund did not hurt the Nazis politically, they only helped.

That's not to say that violence couldn't have prevented it Nazi Party's rise to power. It could have if it were sufficient. Punching SS fighters isn't sufficient. Shooting Hitler and his inner circle until they were all dead would have been sufficient.

Hitting Nazis makes Nazis look like the good guys. They become politically stronger, you become politically weaker. Killing Nazis makes them dead, and it doesn't matter if they look more sympathetic because they'd be dead. This should be simple to understand.

This is not something that the extreme left is likely to do. As a general rule, the number of leftists who are actually willing to murder people because of their political beliefs is small and their organization is non-existent. This is usually a good thing because murdering people is usually bad. But if you're willing to use violence to neutralize a genocidal political movement, then you absolutely have to be willing to kill your targets and you hve to succeed, you can't half-ass it.


Lesser degrees of violence, including the threat of racial civil war, worked to push the government into listening to the non-violent civil rights groups because the American government was not willing to commit genocide. They were awful, they were horrible, but they weren't Nazi horrible. There was never any thought to the simple solution of just marching every Black person in the country into a gas chamber.

The Non-Violent civil rights protestors + violent (but not too violent) revolutionaries 1, 2 punch does not work against Nazis, because the Nazis' actual solution, the one that they actually, successfully, implemented, is to just kill both.

This is the problem with the Punch a Nazi meme. It should, instead, be kill a Nazi. And if you aren't willing to fire a bullet at someone's face, then you shouldn't be swinging your fist at their face either.

Not that I'm advocating murder. But we do need some perspective here.

When facing people who are willing to exterminate you, punching them doesn't help. They get up and then they shoot you, round up your family, and send them to the gas chamber. That's exactly what happened in Germany. The threat of violence only works against people who don't want violence. It's ineffective against those who are simply waiting for an excuse to kill you.

Political movements don't have Saiyan biology and magically get stronger if you beat the shit out of them. The US is not ruled by the BPP, communists, or any other movement that was routinely violently oppressed. You can use lower-level violence against people in a movement to turn away lots of people from that movement. Jail works, beating people works, blacklisting people from society works, there's lots of not-murder you can do to oppress a movement. That's why laws like Germany's speech laws are actually quite good at stopping Nazi movements from popping up. You say something shitty and you get thrown in jail, boom. Nobody weeps for the poor genocidal asshole being put behind bars.

FrankTrollman wrote:When white supremacists in the south beat the crap out of black protesters during the civil rights movement, that didn't strengthen the black protesters. The black protesters were still injured and lots of people did in fact put their heads back down in fear.

When the police attacked protestors in Birmingham and were televised doing so, the civil rights movement got a lot of support all of a sudden, though.

Now, that's not to say that I think attacking Nazis will make them stronger or something, but attacking them and getting the PR wrong by not justifying it to onlookers might. Justifying attacking Nazis shouldn't be too difficult though.

I was under the impression that condemnations of violence against Nazis were most commonly a bullshit lie to condemn people for defending themselves reactively.

Thaluikhain wrote:

FrankTrollman wrote:When white supremacists in the south beat the crap out of black protesters during the civil rights movement, that didn't strengthen the black protesters. The black protesters were still injured and lots of people did in fact put their heads back down in fear.

When the police attacked protestors in Birmingham and were televised doing so, the civil rights movement got a lot of support all of a sudden, though.

It was not support "all of a sudden," it was white people seeing the things other white people did that they didn't like. There was mass black support before and during Birmingham. The overwhelming support from Northern white folks was more "fuck the South" than "let's help black people", because as soon as MLK and the black civil rights movement tried to fix things in the North, they got stonewalled. Daley, a Northern Democrat, had no problems with his forces using force against civil rights protesters in Chicago. When those got televised (with white kids getting assaulted, no less), America voted in Law and Order.

Shit, even the famous nonviolent protesters still had the threat of violence with them. MLK had Malcolm X. Ghandi had a goddamned insurrection of the British Indian Army behind him. Playing the aggrieved and saying the weaker force is bullying a stronger force is mental sleight of hand. It is meant to get you to hate the wrong person, and it is used very effectively by people you should hate. Anyone in a position of power preaching nonviolence is waiting for the chance to use violence on you.

I don't know how much killing Hitler and his inner circle would have done to avoid what came next. There would have still been a huge population of disgruntled Germans with antisemitic tendencies and a grudge against other European nations lost in a political and economical crisis.

So many stories about going back in time to kill Hitler, but so little about going back in time to fix the Versaille treaty, avoid the 1929 crisis and set Europe on the rails for a better future.

Because fixing the Versailles Treaty would not have worked.
There was too much pride and other such nonsense at work.

Anyone in a position of power preaching nonviolence is waiting for the chance to use violence on you.

No.

People in power preaching non-violence often do not want violence. It's actually a pretty good deal to run a thing without having to be violent toward the members of that thing all the time, or ever.

People who want to hurt you may sometimes also preach non-violence, but mostly, if you look up Hitler for instance, Hitler preached genocide and war forever, and totally went rabble rousing and encouraging the murder of his political opponents at all levels of government. They also had a propaganda machine that said Germany was under attack and needed to defend itself, but by "defend" they meant pre-emptively invade and murder a billion people or so such that Germans can colonise the planet unopposed.


Odds are totally best if you bet on the people calling for peace, really. So long as they're not asking the people they are currently oppressing to peacefully continue to get beaten on. Which is not quite as simple.

tussock wrote: People in power preaching non-violence often do not want violence. It's actually a pretty good deal to run a thing without having to be violent toward the members of that thing all the time, or ever.

...

Odds are totally best if you bet on the people calling for peace, really. So long as they're not asking the people they are currently oppressing to peacefully continue to get beaten on. Which is not quite as simple.

People in power preaching non-violence just want you to stop being violent because violence is the thing they're scared of and they would rather have you not be a threat to them. They aren't preaching non-violence because they dislike violence, they're doing it because they already won and want to stop playing the game. People in power also preach non-violence while arresting people, which is definitely a form of violence, so fuck them.

The only way you can change things when the people in charge don't want to is violence. Sometimes it's breaking people's shit, sometimes it's breaking shitty people, but there's always going to be violence involved. You do not overturn the unjust laws of a government that does not want to change them through peace alone, or at least we've never seen that happen in all of recorded history.

Pseudo Stupidity wrote: The only way you can change things when the people in charge don't want to is violence. Sometimes it's breaking people's shit, sometimes it's breaking shitty people, but there's always going to be violence involved. You do not overturn the unjust laws of a government that does not want to change them through peace alone, or at least we've never seen that happen in all of recorded history.

You lack historical perspective, apparently. 'All of recorded history' is a lot of times and places, and in most times and places people mostly got along with their 'in-group' without violence or the threat of it. Laws to help 'keep the peace' were part of it. I think you can find plenty of examples of Vikings making orderly changes without violence... On the other hand, you've created a bit of a tautology 'when the people in charge don't want to' - because people can change their mind without violence. Sometimes it's just a question of 'amount of work involved' or 'amount of expense'.

While the Civil Rights movement may have had a 'violent wing', I think that LGBTQ have seen a significant increase in their rights without violence at all. I don't recall any 'threat of violence' if the supreme court didn't overturn anti-sodomy laws, for instance.

deaddmwalking wrote:While the Civil Rights movement may have had a 'violent wing', I think that LGBTQ have seen a significant increase in their rights without violence at all. I don't recall any 'threat of violence' if the supreme court didn't overturn anti-sodomy laws, for instance.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_riots

deaddmwalking wrote: You lack historical perspective, apparently. 'All of recorded history' is a lot of times and places, and in most times and places people mostly got along with their 'in-group' without violence or the threat of it. Laws to help 'keep the peace' were part of it. I think you can find plenty of examples of Vikings making orderly changes without violence... On the other hand, you've created a bit of a tautology 'when the people in charge don't want to' - because people can change their mind without violence. Sometimes it's just a question of 'amount of work involved' or 'amount of expense'.

While the Civil Rights movement may have had a 'violent wing', I think that LGBTQ have seen a significant increase in their rights without violence at all. I don't recall any 'threat of violence' if the supreme court didn't overturn anti-sodomy laws, for instance.

1. People in power making changes without violence is the people in charge wanting change and then doing it. You'll notice I said "The only way you can change things when the people in charge don't want to is violence" because the people in charge, by virtue of being in charge, can make changes without using violence.

2. Starmaker beat me to it, but the LGBT+ rights movement literally started with a riot that included violently attacking cops for raiding a gay bar.

There might be a historical tidbit where an oppressed group convinced the group in power to change unjust laws without violence, but that would likely be the exception to the rule. I see how you can say it's a tautology for me to want instances where the people in power are not in favor of changing the unjust law, but that's because the solution to these problems is supposed to be democracy (where you change the people in power to get ones who agree with changing the unjust laws), but democracy doesn't work when unjust laws are popular or the people in charge are willing to discard democracy.

Also the fact that ideas and movements can and often do simply outlive the people opposing it.
No need for violence if the successor to the guy who was against you is now of your opinion, because he grew up exposed to it.