Legality of assaults

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Should it be legal for other people to assault you if they disagree with you? This poll is closed.
Yes	183	49.06%
No	190	50.94%
Total:	328 votes

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Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

Gandhi was also OK with violent resistance if you personally weren't capable of the discipline and mental fortitude demanded by his brand of non-violence, and also was of the opinion that people who claimed to be non-violent as an excuse to do nothing in the face of injustice were reprehensible cowards.

# ¿ Jan 25, 2017 23:32

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# ¿ May 15, 2024 06:50

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

free basket of chips posted:

I thought there also had to be no other option for him to be okay with violence? Like straight up self-defense I guess

Well, to let the man speak for himself:

quote:

I have been repeating over and over again that he who cannot protect himself or his nearest and dearest or their honour by non-violently facing death may and ought to do so by violently dealing with the oppressor. He who can do neither of the two is a burden. He has no business to be the head of a family. He must either hide himself, or must rest content to live for ever in helplessness and be prepared to crawl like a worm at the bidding of a bully.
The strength to kill is not essential for self-defence; one ought to have the strength to die. When a man is fully ready to die, he will not even desire to offer violence. Indeed, I may put it down as a self-evident proposition that the desire to kill is in inverse proportion to the desire to die. And history is replete with instances of men who, by dying with courage and compassion on their lips, converted the hearts of their violent opponents.
Nonviolence cannot be taught to a person who fears to die and has no power of resistance. A helpless mouse is not nonviolent because he is always eaten by pussy. He would gladly eat the murderess if he could, but he ever tries to flee from her. We do not call him a coward, because he is made by nature to behave no better than he does.
But a man who, when faced by danger, behaves like a mouse, is rightly called a coward. He harbors violence and hatred in his heart and would kill his enemy if he could without hurting himself. He is a stranger to nonviolence. All sermonizing on it will be lost on him. Bravery is foreign to his nature. Before he can understand nonviolence, he has to be taught to stand his ground and even suffer death, in the attempt to defend himself against the aggressor who bids fair to overwhelm him. To do otherwise would be to confirm his cowardice and take him further away from nonviolence.
Whilst I may not actually help anyone to retaliate, I must not let a coward seek shelter behind nonviolence so-called. Not knowing the stuff of which nonviolence is made, many have honestly believed that running away from danger every time was a virtue compared to offering resistance, especially when it was fraught with danger to one's life. As a teacher of nonviolence I must, so far as it is possible for me, guard against such an unmanly belief.
Self-defence....is the only honourable course where there is unreadiness for self-immolation.
Though violence is not lawful, when it is offered in self-defence or for the defence of the defenceless, it is an act of bravery far better than cowardly submission. The latter befits neither man nor woman. Under violence, there are many stages and varieties of bravery. Every man must judge this for himself. No other person can or has the right.

# ¿ Jan 25, 2017 23:43

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

The last time anybody relied on liberals to peacefully defeat the fash the liberals went on to vote for giving Hitler dictatorial powers, so maybe they're not the very best possible allies here.

So basically if you find yourself on the side of the the nazi getting punched rather than the person doing the punching you might want to take a step back and reexamine what the thell you're doing here.

# ¿ Jan 26, 2017 14:45

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

Keeshhound posted:

This is a five year old's conception of morality. The heroes are perfect and never wrong, the villains are irredemable, evil for it's own sake, always lose and no one ever dies. I'm pretty sure even GI Joe has more nuance than this.

So here's a hot take: Maybe nazis actually are evil and maybe you can't defeat them without actually trying.

# ¿ Jan 27, 2017 12:20

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

Pseudo-God posted:

It's like you people have no sense of nuance or proportion. Like I said, your response to adversity should be proportional to the threat posed. This is why we have BLM protests in the US today, and why it is justified to kill a Nazi when he presents a credible threat to your life. No reasonable person would go and tell the Jews at the Warsaw Uprising that "you guys should just chill, don't you know that killing your enemies is wrong?".

But apparently a reasonable person would ask the jews in the Warsaw Ghetto to just chill up until the very moment the SS kicks in the door and starts shooting?

# ¿ Jan 27, 2017 15:32

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

It's pretty clear that in all successful non-violent resistance movements there has been a definite good cop/bad cop dynamic with more militant groups, if for no other reason than that the militant groups will spring up when oppression becomes sufficiently bad.

But even if we discount that for the sake of assumption it's pretty clear that if your entire resistance movement somehow manages to stay perfectly non-violent no matter what, then you're basically banking on the oppressor to suddenly realize that what they are doing is wrong, and the list of examples where that has happened is even shorter than the list of successful cases of violent resistance.

# ¿ Jan 27, 2017 16:27

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

The point is that if the non-violent resistance keeps failing to achieve its goals and oppression intensifies, people will obviously start turning to violent means. It's the latent threat of militant resistance that generally forces the oppressor to come to the table with the non-violent resistance.

# ¿ Jan 27, 2017 16:32

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

enki42 posted:

There are many, many ways to protest a government without violence. See: most successful protests in the 20th century.

And the point of protest generally isn't for Donald Trump to look out his window and say "man, that sign really made my think about my attitude towards minorities and women", it's to raise awareness of issues among the general public and sway public opinion to your side.

If your opinion is that the point of protests is to actually physically overthrow the oppressors, good luck with that.

Uh, yeah, you're not going to get Trump to change his mind by waving a banner outside the White House. That is not a successful protest, no.

Also the point of non-violent resistance in the historical cases has in fact been to force the oppressors out of the country in Gandhi's case or force them to give concrete concessions in the case of MLK, and not to "raise awareness" Raising awareness is a tactic towards achieving your goal, not a goal in itself.

enki42 posted:

- Maybe the labor movement (obviously an awful lot of violence against labor, but I can't think of much of the opposite)

JFC, you ignoramus. The whole reason why the capitalist class started giving concessions to Labour was the threat posed by socialist revolution. In fact, that was explicitly why Bismarck introduced the first modern welfare systems back in the 19th century.

Cerebral Bore fucked around with this message at 16:43 on Jan 27, 2017

# ¿ Jan 27, 2017 16:40

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

Nazism relies on projecting an image of strength. Antifa forcing the nazis to cower in fear on camera shatters that illusion of strength, and hence hurts the nazi cause. This is good.

Besides that I'm still kinda baffled at the bunch of ignorant liberals who are seriously arguing that punching nazis is somehow going to escalate the level of violence in society, as if nazi ideology isn't explicitly based on using indiscriminate political violence against whoever the target du jour happens to be. The nazi doesn't need a reason to escalate the level of violence and the only reason why the nazis aren't employing violence is because they don't feel strong enough at the moment.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2017 11:58

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

enki42 posted:

Cool, why don't you show me an example of Nazis cowering in fear as a result of this punch, because last time I checked Richard Spencer was still posting / giving interviews / etc.

Why don't you explin why there suddenly is a requirement that all of nazism must be defeated with a single punch in order for said punch to have any effect whatsoever?

# ¿ Jan 30, 2017 12:40

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

enki42 posted:

OK, how about examples of this working in the past?

No, first you answer the question posed to you. I'm not going to waste my time if all you're going to do is shift goalposts and demand that I prove negatives.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2017 13:08

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

enki42 posted:

I'm not asking for Nazism to be defeated. I'm asking for any evidence whatsoever that that punch, or any punch has been effective in combating Nazism. If I was "shifting goalposts", I was shifting them in your favour (from "show me how this was effective against Richard Spencer" to "show me how punches were effective against any Nazi")

Also, how am I asking you to prove a negative? I'm asking you to prove a positive - if you want me to support an extreme act (violent protest), then show me that it can be effective.

World War 2. Now you can explain to me your preferred way of dealing with nazis and why it's effective.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2017 13:28

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

enki42 posted:

Two militaries at war isn't even vaguely comparable to people sucker punching non-state actor Nazis. It's not just scale, it's different in kind.

You asked for an example and you got one. Now you're desperately moving the goalposts.

So to repeat myself, describe your preferred method for handling nazis and explain why it's effective.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2017 15:09

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

enki42 posted:

I've been over this in the thread countless times, but again for good measure - there's countless ways to conduct non-violent, direct action in protest. I'm going to an event to shut down access to a U.S. consulate today. On Saturday I'm attending a rally against Isamophobia and calling on the Canadian government to modify laws to allow all the people you're turning back to come here instead. Both are non-violent, but direct action is accepted (in the first case it's the entire point).

For more examples, open the web page of literally any news organization and see how their total and complete focus is highlighting the (almost entirely?) non-violent protests that are erupting across your country over the weekend and today.

To be fair, all of these are examples of protesting the Trump administration and not Richard Spencer or the alt-right specifically. Personally, I think focusing on people with actual power who are currently enacting racist policies is more important than punching the guy who makes racist frog pictures, but that's just me.

Now you're shifting your own goalposts. We're not talking about Trump right now, we're talking about nazis. Explain exactly how your actions would be effective when it comes to resisting nazis.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2017 15:28

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

enki42 posted:

Wait I thought the reason this was so serious and it's so important to punch Nazis is because they're gaining / have power. I do think Bannon is a white supremacist (if you want to use the word nazi, whatever, fine, the point is he is one), and protesting what he's doing is more important than protesting Nazis that currently do not have power.

Why do you think that resisting policies that ban / deport a group of people based on their ethnicity is not about resisting Nazis?

You don't get to ask me questions while you're refusing to answer mine in an honest manner. So once again, please explain exactly how your actions are effective.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2017 15:38

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# ¿ May 15, 2024 06:50

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

enki42 posted:

Look at the front page of any major news organization today. Read your social media feeds. A wave of non-violent protest captured the attention of the media and the public at large, and cracks are starting to show in the administration's armor. I'm not saying mission accomplished or anything, but sustained direct action over the coming months has a real chance to turn the public's opinion so far against Trump that even getting him out of the white house is possible.

Regular people are posting about the women's march, the protests this weekend, and upcoming protests way more than they posted about Richard Spencer getting punched. Meanwhile, Trump's approval rating is tanking (which I get is not wholly due to protest, but I think it does have a significant effect)

So by your own argument you have, at best, managed to generate headlines, much like the guy who punched the nazi. The rest is speculation.

You keep making these assertions of superiority, but the utter lack of even trying to construct an argument as for why your way is superior betrays that you don't even have a well-defined definition of what you mean by efficiency in this case beyond "this is what I like, therefore it must be more efficient".

enki42 posted:

It's not much better if it serves as a convenient excuse for them to arm themselves.

You buncha dumb liberals would probably make a much more convincing case if you didn't pretend that nazis need an excuse to arm themselves or to inflict violence on others.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2017 21:44

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