the alt-right

Organizations like the KKK and the Westboro Baptist Church affirm our right to free speech.

Affording organizations like the KKK and Westboro Baptist Church platforms normalized their messaging and gave us President Trump. "Free speech" means you are free to criticize the government, not that you are entitled to a platform to disseminate hateful rhetoric.

And, even you do gain a platform to spew bigoted garbage, that doesn't mean that others are disallowed from violently contradicting you or shutting you down.

Can we all agree that the absolute most effective counterprotest tactic was bringing a camera, and documenting the individuals present?

the notion that people who advocate mass murder can express that "peacefully" is...a sketchy idea at best. what they are doing is not peaceful.

Charlottesville was a different situation - they got violent.

They will get violent again. Its pretty naive to think they will not target and kill others and are just around to spread hate as a verbal message and chant.

They must be denied their right to march in the first place. When they march, they deny non-white ppl their space, they make the town where they march unsafe. They must be stopped by whatever means necessary. So yeah, violence against these ppl = good. xps

Can we all agree that the absolute most effective counterprotest tactic was bringing a camera, and documenting the individuals present?

― tactical piñata (Sanpaku), Tuesday, 22 August 2017 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

No agreement from me.

Those individuals belong in a shut coffin, not in the unemployment queue.

Hate speech is protected under the First Amendment. Initiating violence against peaceful protestors, no matter how loathsome and vile their views may be, is not acceptable. Denying their right to march is a very slippery slope.

Change the 1st amendment. By whatever means necessary.

lol Americans are obsessed with that amendment just amend it to add "except nazis" and it's still good

xp!

Change the 1st amendment. By whatever means necessary.

― xyzzzz__, Tuesday, August 22, 2017 3:13 PM (one minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

cuckoo cuckoo

great idea let's give Donald Trump a big old present to legally shut down anything he wants

I think that it's important to remind the xyz that, as of yet, we're not actually in the midst of a civil war and that killing people for what they believe is bad, no matter how vile their beliefs are.

There are plenty of ways to counter extremist rhetoric, and aggressive counter-protesting is oen, but advocating for deadly violence is not ok just because you're angry online

*is one

but its so easy and look at the attention you get for it

Affording organizations like the KKK and Westboro Baptist Church platforms normalized their messaging and gave us President Trump. "Free speech" means you are free to criticize the government, not that you are entitled to a platform to disseminate hateful rhetoric.

― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Tuesday, August 22, 2017 3:07 PM (eight minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

And, even you do gain a platform to spew bigoted garbage, that doesn't mean that others are disallowed from violently contradicting you or shutting you down.

― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Tuesday, August 22, 2017 3:08 PM (seven minutes ago)

1) saying trump resulted from affording the KKK and WBC seems like a stretch. these sorts of organizations have always existed. in fact in the past they've been more popular and influential
2) free speech also means (from the government's POV) you get to march and assemble just like everyone else. it doesn't refer only to criticizing the government. i know you know this but if we're going to debate constitutional rights let's at least keep basic things straight
3) actually violently responding to a peaceful march is illegal, even if it's by the good guys. like what?? lol.

in other words, flappy bird....otm?

who gives a fuck about legal

i mean we can have a (probably dumb) conversation about whether it's good tactics to rough up right-wing marchers, that's fine. but it's probably helpful that we not confuse morality and legality

Noam Chomsky: Antifa is a 'major gift to the right'

Chomsky's also pro-US-intervention in Syria at the moment sooooo

Change the 1st amendment. By whatever means necessary.

you are a ridiculous person

regardless of this silly statement, I do think there's a legit legal argument to be made (and the ACLU would appear to agree on this point) that armed, marching groups chanting hateful rhetoric is an explicit threat of violence that should not be protected by the 1st Amendment.

xxp

jim otm about numbers, which is in its way a warning of potential violence. 'If you choose to get violent again, we will overwhelm' you is a pretty effective tactic.

I do think there's a legit legal argument to be made (and the ACLU would appear to agree on this point) that armed, marching groups chanting hateful rhetoric is an explicit threat of violence

solitary posts that sum up America

stfu, Noam. next he's going to disavow Food Not Bombs.

Chomsky has been copying and pasting that exact sentiment for months (I've seen it in the same words as what the Examiner quoted as new) - I do think it's taken out of context a bit, though. He's not saying don't show up, don't counter-protest, he's saying that letting an undisciplined, tiny group run wild is tactically poor. Hard to disagree with that. 20 years on, all anyone remembers about late '90s opposition to globalization are broken Starbucks windows.

Oh, they don't even remember that.

The anti-globalization movement was much less in the mainstream consciousness iirc. Comparatively speaking it was fairly esoteric to most people

And that they were wearing Adidas trainers when they smashed the window!

Isn't the missing piece of this puzzle, about whether racists should be allowed to march, that for their part they would aggressively clamp down on expression by their enemies the minute they were able to? That they would use violence as soon as they could? They aren't just showing up to give their contribution to a discussion, but the idealistic language about freedom of expression, worthy though it is, seems to lead us into a fog on this point.

shakey, genuinely curious to read the ACLU position on that if you have a link

And that they were wearing Adidas trainers when they smashed the window!

god I have always hated this line of attack

Cf similar ones about how all these protesters go in to chain coffee bars to buy coffee.

xp to self - to be clear what I'm saying is that freedom of expression is clearly v important but that armed racists need to be thought of in terms of threat management rather than as if they were ppl who lie within the accepted spectrum of intent.

well yeah that ACLU statement was important. I agree that armed marches should not be protected

http://thehill.com/homenews/347053-aclu-revises-policy-to-avoid-supporting-hate-groups-protesting-with-firearms

a major difference between Charlottesville and Boston is that the former is in an open-carry state while the latter isn't. the presence of arms makes all these moral calculations a lot more complicated. they embolden the extremists and dramatically increase the chance of violence.

it was smart of the ACLU to draw that line

oh yeah, scanned over the crucial modifier "armed". definitely an important distinction, good for the ACLU

voodoo chili is correct about the presence of weapons. it might or might not be wrong to strike first at people who advocate genocide but when they are all packing very deadly heat, and raising them in front of crowds while advocating for a platform of ethnic cleansing, their behavior verges into assault IMO. they pose an active danger of real harm to the most vulnerable people in the communities they descend upon.

i am still processing all this ethically tbh and i'm not quite ready to say that i'm 100% okay with beating them up before they do something even worse. but yknow i mean we're talking about screaming "you will not replace us!" to black churches while brandishing firearms. it's never simply a matter of speech with these guys - there were cases in charlottesville of nazis going after people - chases, intimidation, bullying, battery. they're trying out their program while they're speaking about it and are always on the verge of being more straightforwardly a lynch mob. might be that without violent antifa we would have seen much worse violence against local queers, PoC, etc. i don't know. i've been thinking myself in circles about this a lot this week. it's fucked.

might be that without violent antifa we would have seen much worse violence against local queers, PoC, etc. i don't know

http://religiondispatches.org/dispatch-from-charlottesville-it-was-a-war-zone-it-felt-like-there-were-a-million-nazis/
"Also, let me make clear that without antifa and anarchists being present in the streets, I may have been killed at the hands of fascists and white supremacists. This is important."

Cornel West (full disclosure: I think he is kind of nuts) said the same thing re: himself and the non-violent clergy he was there with

*Reads this dreck in a grown-up tone of voice*

regardless of this silly statement, I do think there's a legit legal argument to be made (and the ACLU would appear to agree on this point) that armed, marching groups chanting hateful rhetoric is an explicit threat of violence that should not be protected by the 1st Amendment.

I read all your posts in the voice of a 3 yo tbh

Chomsky manages to sound even worse than you - which is saying something.

chomsky is bad now

You guys don't really need to argue with the resident tankie that much

You guys don't really need to argue with the resident tankie that much

Dammit

the resident BF Skinner more like

chomsky is bad now

― k3vin k., Tuesday, 22 August 2017 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

On this occasion, yeah. I expect better from him, but its perhaps the one occasion where you feel there is a thing to the 'ivory tower' crit - too far away from the immediate dangers.