Milo Yiannopoulos and Gavin McInnes were having lunch together — now there’s a lunch date from hell — when someone recognized their villainy, yelled at them, and poured water on them, as one righteously does. The two scumbags just laughed it off, though.
Mr Yiannopoulos said it was
only with water which is so lame.
Well, gosh, I guess there are standards. Next time, use salad oil, or soy sauce, or mayonnaise — those are often handy in restaurants. Raw eggs or an open tin of surströmming would be even better, but you’d have to come prepared. One can always fall back on the old standby of simply puking on them.
I can imagine even worse things, but you have to leave room to escalate for when you encounter Henry Kissinger or Dick Cheney in public.
Sorry Milo, they were fresh out of high-concentration hydrofluoric acid at the bar.
(Kidding!)
I expect surströmming would be considered a war crime.
Milkshakes! The only official, Soros-approved substance to pour on fascists and fellow-travellers!
Only if the people who would have to clean the mess up are right wing asshats too.
Saad:
Only if the people who would have to clean the mess up are right wing asshats too.
Simple solution: throw canned foods. Leave it in the can for easy clean-up.
I don’t like endorsement of these behaviors. Thinking you can physically assault someone just because you think you are right and they are wrong authorizes them to do the same with you.
brain, do you realise you just claimed that such behaviours are authorised if based on reciprocity, right?
(That’s a conditional endorsement by you, meaning that however much you say you dislike it, you endorse it)
You do realize that these people are endorsing the physical assault (if not deportation or extermination) of people who disagree with them, right? They don’t just think it — they advocate it on giant social platforms. Even the leader of their movement, the Big Orange Head, has endorsed it — aloud and explicitly — multiple times in his rallies.
Given that, tossing water or food on them in response is pretty tame.
@nikolai: yes they do, and you think it’s awful. So why do you want to do exactly the same thing?
brain, #9
LOL
Violence is not the answer! I’m amazed that PZ is blind to that fact. Individual insults of the physically violent kind will change no minds and alter no reality. Might get the actor arrested, and that’s no small thing.
@brain(less) — It’s called self-defense.
kitty: It’s called being an asshole. Self-defense would have been if Yiannopoulos or McInnes had reacted to prevent possible further attacks. There is no way to allow this kind of behaviour against some categories of people and not against other, that’s why we have laws that apply to everyone.
Was there ever a less appropriate nym? No, “brain”, it’s not because “you think you are right and they are wrong”, it’s because they are fascist advocates of genocide and you are not.
ain, you are much more overwrought over this than your alleged victim:
So: zero harm caused, zero pain caused, alleged victim brushes it off.
But you are all concerned and call it being “physically assault[ed]” and pontificate about it.
You clearly get WMDKitty less than I do; this is the thing: you decry utterly anti-alt-right actions, but you do not decry the alt-right. Which is informative.
(Also, if you were wondering, since you clearly have no prob with eliding the first part of a commenter’s ‘nym, and you advocate reciprocity, you should accordingly have no prob with me doing likewise)
KG: this is probably a cultural gap. Americans (USA) tend to think that if something is not the way they like it they are authorised to use violence to “fix” it. Very very dangerous: we saw too many US attempts to “export democracy” packing it into drones and missiles and bombs. Or by waterboarding people, or imprisonating them without a process.
Being right does not allow you to do whatever you want, fullstop.
brain,
You’ve just condemned slave revolts, fighting back against a rapist, etc.
brain,
No, it’s not a cultural gap. It’s you being a dishonest asshole by framing this conversation as if we’re talking about us wanting to pour water on someone because they think 2+2 is 5. It’s not about “being right” and it’s definitely not about things not being “the way we like”. Cut the crap and stop trying to hide behind “a cultural gap”. You’re a bigot. Stop being a coward about it.
No, brain(less), it’s about fighting back against people who see disabled people as “useless eaters”.
No, my dear 6 years old kitty who feels the need to make boring jokes on a nickname: it’s not fighting back, it’s assaulting someone. And, for your information, “seeing disabled people as useless eaters” is not a crime, whether you like it or not.
But I see you can’t understand the difference between “I don’t like it” and “I’m authorised to do what I want to stop it”: understandable, since you’re six yo.
Saad: you are acting fascist and you don’t even see it. I do not doubt your good intentions, but as we say here “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”.
Let’s put it this way: PZ, you and all the people here are supporting the idea that it is ok to assault another group for what they say. Even if you were right in the beginning, now you have become, in their view, a group of people for whom is ok to assault another group. Can you understand that they are now legitimated to take actions against you, even if you only go around them an peacefully dissent?
(No, you can’t. That’s the cultural gap).
@7 “brain, do you realise you just claimed that such behaviours are authorised if based on reciprocity, right?”
English may not be my first language, but I think I know it well enought to see a different meaning to what he said. Basically, that either both can or neither can. Anything else is a ridiculous thing to expect.
@15 “So: zero harm caused, zero pain caused, alleged victim brushes it off.”
But brain isn’t talking about that one specific incident, he is talking about PZ (and other’s) endorsement of escalating the violence.
“you decry utterly anti-alt-right actions, but you do not decry the alt-right. Which is informative.”
I do not think your inference was accurate. Decrying actions used by a group amounts to the same thing as decrying that group, if they are the only ones using those actions, as those differences between groups are what make them ‘not us’. Although if both sides endorse assault, then that line is blurred. So, congratulations on blurring the lines between the left and the right by defending (some of) their actions, and suggesting that we become more like them in action.
@17 “You’ve just condemned slave revolts, fighting back against a rapist, etc.”
No he didn’t. Being enslaved, raped, etc means you are the victim of current harm, rather than hypothetical future harm, and can therefore defend yourself.
aramad:
Leaving aside that if there were more than one possible meaning, the claim would perforce be ambiguous, it’s perfectly clear:
The claim:
Rephrased: One is authorised to physically assault someone if that someone thinks they can physically assault someone.
It’s an existence claim (not an universal claim), and the conditional is reciprocal, and asserting that claim is endorsing that claim.
(Or: you are imagining things)
—
Heh. Your logic is peccable.
aramad, I do appreciate futile feistiness.
Four words too many.
Category error; you conflate groups with actions — and unless you have a comprehensive encyclopaedic grasp of all extant groups, rather speculative.
If your premise is flawed, it follows that anything predicated upon it is itself flawed, and thus it is otiose for me to further elaborate.
(Your weak objections have been duly swatted, as befits them)
[I note brain has now learned not to attempt to dispute my truth claims]
Apologies ofr the blockquote fail.
This stupid crap is typical of freeze peachers.
Of course public far-rght rhetoric is current harm. It is intended to intimidate, and cause distress to its targets (whether explicit or implicit), and it does exactly that.
No it fucking well isn’t, numpty. Throwing milkshakes over fascists was pioneered in the UK. It’s proportionate retaliation for deliberate harm to others, intended to make the fascist look ridiculous, not to do them injury. You freeze peachers are such fools: you fetishize “free speech”, which only makes any sense if speech can have actual effects beyond itself, yet refuse to admit that hate speech actually does – and is intended to do – immediate harm to its targets.
aramad, you are wasting your time. Morales is a fucking racist and liar, hiding behind single words to avoid understanding the meaning of a remark he cannot disprove. Waste of time discussing with him. I’m glad you understood what I meant: it’s very difficult to fight against assholes, but becoming assholes is not the way.
KG, just a question: what if fascists came to democrats/socially aware/human rights supporters meetings and started throwing milkshakes on speakers and crowd? Because you know, you just authorised them, and I don’t like it -they’re much better at being jerks, you cannot win on this ground.
@25 “Four words too many.”
My mistake, I will be more direct: your inference was wrong.
“Category error; you conflate groups with actions”
As explained, a political group is defined by what it wants and how it chooses to get that. A person can call themselves feminist and not be feminist (Christina Hoff Summers), a person can be nazi despite calling themselves something else if their political goals and methods place them there. And by adopting their methods, violent aggression, you take a step towards them and become increasingly similar/decreasingly different to them.
“If your premise is flawed-”
The error was not in the premise, but in your understanding of it.
@28 “Of course public far-rght rhetoric is current harm.”
Yes, but is it physical aggression? Because that is the bar that needs to be met before you can physically defend yourself. Lacking that, punching someone is not ‘defending’ but ‘attacking,’ or battery more accurately.
@29 “You freeze peachers are such fools: you fetishize “free speech”, which only makes any sense if speech can have actual effects beyond itself, yet refuse to admit that hate speech actually does – and is intended to do – immediate harm to its targets.”
What a strange sentence. The highlighted segment appears to be skeptical that speech can possibly ‘have actual effects beyond itself’ yet what follows shows you clearly believe speech DOES have effects beyond itself. So as I said in the comment before, the harm of right wing rhetoric needs to be countered by political speech from the left – and remember protests, rallies, demonstrations are a form of speech. (Punching isn’t)
aramad @32, sure, groups and actions are logically equivalent. In your imagination.
<snicker>
But the claim is that adoption of such methods is, at least some of the time, authorised.
You have yet to dispute that evident fact.
(You’re not actually disputing me, despite what you may imagine, you’re actually disputing the lowercase brain’s claim)
—
In passing, it amuses me that not that long ago, the little brain asserted that they would not waste their time responding to my comments. Held bravely until my #26, which elicited #30.
(Squeak!)
@24 “Leaving aside that if there were more than one possible meaning, the claim would perforce be ambiguous, it’s perfectly clear:”
Yes, it’s perfectly clear. I explained the meaning of brain’s phrasing, and he has since agreed that my undesrtanding was the correct one. You are pointedly looking in the other direction.
aramad:
Ahem.
But the claim is that adoption of such methods is, at least some of the time, authorised.
You have yet to dispute that evident fact.
(You can call it “the other” direction all you want, but that’s not even a rebuttal, nevermind a refutation)
@35 “aramad @32, sure, groups and actions are logically equivalent. In your imagination.”
If you read my explanation and understood it to mean “groups and actions are logically equivalent” then I can only point to another thing I said: “The error was not in the premise, but in your understanding of it.”
Either that, or “You are pointedly looking in the other direction.”
@37 “But the claim is that adoption of such methods is, at least some of the time, authorised.
You have yet to dispute that evident fact.”
This is blatantly untrue – I disputed your reading of brain’s post. Successfully, given that he said my reading was the correct one.
@aramad — dude. fuck off. Nazis choose to be Nazis, and can choose to NOT be Nazis.
I can’t choose to not be disabled. Or queer. And I’m tired of being told that I must coddle these Nazi chucklefucks and never ever try to defend myself lest I become “as bad as they are.”
WMD, fuck off. No one is telling you to coddle anyone, least of all nazis. You are simply being dishonest when you say that that is what I am proposing. Dishonest, or incompetent.
Aramad, I don’t play games with words like you do. But a liar would naturally accuse others of lying in order to cover their own dishonesty. I see your game, I refuse to play it. As for competence, you’ve handily demonstrated your own lack thereof.
Get bent, Nazi-lover. I have every right to defend myself against terrorist scumfucks and all your empty hand-wringing and moralizing won’t change that reality.
six years old kitty, I don’t know about Nazis, but in this thread the only fascist behaviour endorsements I saw came from PZ, yourself and some ignorant asshole. It’s not that hard to understand: you support physical assaults on people just because of what they think or say, because “it’s self defence”. No, it’s aggression: self defence is when you act to avoid immediate physical dangers to you or to someone else. But you say hey, it’s not violence, it’s just to ridicolize them: you know who did this? fascists, the actual, original ones from my country, who used castor oil to humiliate and ridicolize political oppositors.
So grew up, dear kitten, and learn what democracy is actually about, the good parts and the difficult ones.
What is “ridicolize”?
It’s a word that means “I’m no native-speaker, I can make mistakes, but unless you want to ignore what I wrote and focus on a single word I’m sure you can figure it out by yourself”.
@42
As usual, you are flouncing from a thread as soon as your ‘arguments’ (I use the term loosely) are shown to be in bad faith. Case in point, you are now pretending that me accusing you of dishonesty is proof that I am the dishonest one. Reminds me of Donald Trump! Oh and another of your usual flounce tactics: accuse someone of the exact thing they accuse you of. Except where the other person (me) makes the case by arguing it, you don’t bother. You just reflexively accuse accuse accuse. Again, very much like Trump.
As for word games, isn’t that John Morales’s thing?
@44
I suspect he meant ridicule.
brain @various
If you need to attempt to diminish someone’s input by using a diminutive of their name, you are admitting that your arguments are so weak you have to resort to insults in an attempt to provoke them, which means you have already lost the argument.
@ brain, #21
“Fascist” doesn’t mean “violent person.” It refers to people with specific political views and goals. Just because fascists use violence doesn’t make every person who uses violence a fascist.
And the thing about fascists, and particularly Nazi scum like the ones mentioned in the post, is that they always use violence. It’s a predictable progression that goes like this:
1.) they talk about the people they want to exterminate
2.) they use that speech to recruit enough people to do what they say they’ll do
3.) commence the extermination
Now there are actually many more things that take place in there, but those three are all that’s really relevant here. That’s because that third thing, the extermination, is only possible because they’re allowed to do the first two things. Therefore, anyone with a functional conscience (or brain) can see that the wisest course of action is to stop them before step 3.
There’s another reason that those three steps are what matter here: we’re in the early stages of step 3 already. Those racist/misogynist mass murders that have taken place in the past couple of years are the direct result of shit-stirring by people like McInnes and Yiannopoulos. And Trump, for that matter.
That’s what makes attacking them self-defense. They’ve basically loudly proclaimed they’re going to kill a bunch of people, pulled out a gun, loaded it, put it in the hands of people with a long history of violence, and you’re arguing that, because the people doing the proclaiming are the same as the people pulling the trigger, the proclaimers are not causing any harm.
It’s ludicrous.
Also? aramad only shows up here to defend Nazis. If they’re on your side, you should really take a long hard look at your life and try to figure out where you went wrong.
@47 Jazzlet
No doubt you meant to say that to WMDKitty as well, right? You omitted references to WMD’s posts 12 and 19 accidentally… right? How about KG @14, which not exactly the same, but is along the same lines?
Of course, I am only assuming that you have any desire to be consistent in your logic. Maybe this is unwarranted. But whether you want to be so or not, if “using a diminutive of their name” means that a person “has already lost the argument”, doesn’t that mean that your side has also lost the argument?
Hey, asterisks cause italics now! that’s new.
Vucodlak @48
“That’s what makes attacking them self-defense.”
Nope! As usual, you’re pulling your Minority Report stunt in assuming that violent rhetoric necessarily means that that person will be violent. Every reasonable person can see that this is not true, therefore your conclusion is based on sand.
“Also? aramad only shows up here to defend Nazis.”
Wrong again! I comment here specifically to oppose calls for violence. That you can’t see the difference between “don’t commit assault, even against nazis” and “I am a nazi” is worrying.
I didn’t flounce, fuckwit. I said my piece, and don’t see the point in further arguing with a gaslighting asshole.
@vucodlak, #48:
Believe me, I know what “fascist” mean. I am from the country where fascism arose, and I work 1km from Piazzale Loreto, where that nice guy called Benito Mussolini was finally hanged upside down. The guilt of fascism is very real in (decent) Italian people, and we are very sensitive to it coming back, in our country or in other.
That said, yes, not every violent person is a fascist, but every fascist uses some kind of violence to his goals. In particular, I call fascist behaviour when a movement/person feels entitled to intimidate and physically assault someone to assess his ideals. But, and this is important, it is totally irrelevant whether those ideals are right or wrong.
About the three point you name: extermination is not required. Fascists here didn’t exterminate (although they helped Nazis against Jews). Fascism is about lack of freedom, suppressing criticism, the “if you don’t agree you are a dangerous enemy and I’m allowed to silence you no matter how”.
And this is exactly what you start when you endorse throwing water -or milkshakes- on political oppositors. Because, and this is what people here does not understand, also fascists think that they are acting to improve society and see left supporters as dangerous assholes. They are wrong, sure they are, but can you see my point?
@51
It sure looked like one, what with the total non-engagement and apparent dismissal of further conversation. Not that you really conversed at any point; the WMDKitty way is to abuse anyone that disagrees with you.
And… gaslighting! My god, words truly have no meaning when you use them.
…
Fuckwit.
Oof, this shit still?
Tolerance is not a moral precept, it is a peace treaty. Those that violate the treaty (milo, il douche, etc.) are subject to sanctions. The greater the violations, the more severe the sanctions. Imposing sanctions is not a violation of the treaty, it is enforcing the treaty.
Aramad, listen closely.
YOU. ARE. NOT. ENTITLED. TO. MY. TIME. MY. ENERGY. OR. A. FUCKING. REPLY.
Now go back to your basement and cuddle your Hitler plushie like a good little boot-licking Nazi.
#54
Peace treaty, sanctions? Are you at war with the world? Your perception of reality is fucking scary and sick, but at least honest.
Disturbing as your opinions sound, they’re more coherent than those of kitty and vucodlak and PZ, who describe an aggression as “self defence”. I don’t know you, but should I act to defend myself or others from what they claim to be the aggression from Yiannopoulos and McInnes (they are preparing a mass extermination, according to vucodlak) I would not limit myself to water throwing: I would kill. The fact that they are not willing to do this is a dead giveaway of their hypocrisy.
@54
A laughable thesis based purely on redefining words and declaring new meaning for them on that basis.
“Tolerance is not a moral precept, it is a peace treaty.”
Oh? You just declared that A is now B, so let’s treat it as B. Completely silly. Punching people is still assault, people.
.
@55
You don’t have to post, neither do I, yet here we are, posting in something called a ‘conversation.’ And you continue to lie about me, because you have nothing else to support your position. Oops, you also have invective. Not logical argument, not reasoning, just bad faith histrionics.
You may continue your flounce.
aramad, quit projecting, it’s not a good look for you.
The link in my last comment lays it out pretty well.
Do you hold a position of absolute tolerance? How do you sustain a position of absolute tolerance in the face of intolerant actors (those who despise your existence for arbitrary reasons and advocate injustice against you. those who outright reject “live and let live” or “justice for all”)? Do you only take action after the loudest of the stochastic terrorists have been speaking and vilifying long enough to build up sufficient support that those inspired to act on that speech no longer face significant legal repercussions?
Hint: we are already there. Cops attacking antifa protesters while ignoring fascists with an arsenal on a rooftop, or fascists in the CBP putting out press releases filled with their jargon/dog whistles that is still on the fucking US government website!
@59 MattP
You don’t get it.
If you really think that your legal system is so messed up by political influences that you cannot rely on it anymore, then go on, do whatever you want. But in this case you are in guerrilla mode: as soon as you start, every single event where a fascist made something wrong becomes acceptable, since you are doing the same. You lose the right to complaint, to expose their behaviour against law, because you are doing exactly the same. Don’t you think that there will be fascists publishing links to your aggression (“feminist assaults two men dining at a restaurant”) to prove that they are under attack and that they are thus entitled to “self defense”?
You don’t fight fascists with fascism. Not if your goal is to win over them.
Eugh, peace-fetishizing libs. Nah. I’m pretty fine with people dumping water on the unhinged leaders of violent neonazi gangs.
@58
I supported my accusations against you by pointing to your text. Which one(s) was projection?
@59 “Do you hold a position of absolute tolerance?”
No, I just don’t play the fool’s game of pretending ‘proactive defense’ is anything other than assault. I guess then you’ll admit that you misapprehended my position… right?
@62
Um… please point out where I have spent time arguing against making nazis damp.
@ aramad, #50
I’m not assuming anything, you noxious wanker. I’ve met these people, and they damn well mean what they say. Let them get even a tiny bit of power over you, and if you’re lucky you won’t have to live with what they do to you.
Shall I discount the evidence of my eyes and ears because the reality clashes with your lofty ideals? Shall I forget the origin of my scars, the genesis of so many of my nightmares, because the truth makes you uncomfortable? Shall I also ignore the lessons of history, or the stories of my grandfather (who served in Europe and saw the death camps firsthand), because theoretically there exists a Nazi somewhere who might not engage in atrocities at every opportunity?
Hmm… let me give the matter the consideration it deserves… yeah, no. Go tongue-wash a jackboot.
You call out violence against Nazis. Exclusively violence against Nazis. Nazi violence? Nah, that’s not really violence, because… well, I’m there are perfectly good reasons to only speak in defense of Nazis, while pretending that their stochastic terrorism isn’t really violence. I can’t think of any, but there’s definitely-probably-maybe something somewhere that would qualify as a not-terrible reason.
But no, I don’t think you’re a Nazi. I think you’re a contemptible fool who carries water for Nazis. You want to play human shield for the Nazis? Don’t be surprised when they shoot you in the back.
From your #57:
Oh, gee whilikers, really? Well, I certainly wouldn’t want to do anything illegal. Gosh no. I’d never want to do anything that’s against the law- I do have such great love for the favorite weapon of the enemy. Just because Nazis and their fellow travelers use the law (and its enforcers) as a cudgel against people like me is no call for me to want to tear it down and set fire to the rubble, shucks no. I respect the law every bit as much as it respects me.
I find it very telling when people piously use the law to back up their moral arguments. It just screams “fascist bootlicker.” They won’t thank you for helping them, you know. Fascism can’t survive without enemies. Once the real opposition is dead and gone, they’ll turn on you too.
@ brain, #52
If you are truly an example of the ‘sensitivity to fascism’ in your nation, then I weep for your people. You have learned nothing, and you are doomed to repeat the same mistakes all over again.
And what does fascism do to its enemies? It tortures and murders them. Fascism cannot survive without enemies. So, yes, there is always extermination under fascism.
THIS IS NOT A MERE POLITICAL DISAGREEMENT YOU DISINGENUOUS JACKASS. This is a very simple matter- either these people are prevented from gaining and holding power, or they will keep killing until their power is broken.
Your point is utterly irrelevant, because you don’t even come close to grasping the stakes here. Nazis believe that “improving society” means murdering (or sometimes enslaving, then murdering) all the people they don’t like. Period. Their fantasy of a perfect white ethnostate can’t be achieved if people of color are still around. And it can’t be perfect if the people aren’t “perfect,” which means that anyone they consider defective- the disabled, the mentally ill, anyone who isn’t straight and cis and Christian, etc.- has to go, too.
All those people have to go away before Nazis will be satisfied, but not just that- even if they could somehow bloodlessly move them to another country, they’d still be a “threat.” Because fascism can’t survive without enemies. So all those people have to die. That’s what the Nazis in this country want, that’s what they’re in the early stages of doing, and that’s why we should treat them like the existential threat that they are.
From your #56:
Where did I ever say I would “limit myself to water throwing?” You’re the one doing all the handwringing over water throwing; I never said I would throw water (or anything else) on or at anyone. Why, that would be illegal, and one should always respect the law.
aramad, ALL of your claims about me are both lies, because they’re untrue, and projection, because you’re attributing your own biases and idiocy to me. And then gaslighting by claiming you didn’t do what you clearly DID do.
Fuck off and die mad, boot-licker.
My right to not be assaulted or killed by Nazis outweighs any rights the Nazis might claim. They are the ones putting me, and others like me, in danger of injury or death, both with their words and their actions. They are also instilling the fear of immediate harm, that is, comitting assault, against minorities. Taking action in self-defense against people who pose an imminent threat to life and safety is not a crime.
@65 “I’m not assuming anything, you noxious wanker.”
Yes you are, you noxious wanker. Unless you have proof that every single nazi goes on to be physically violent, then it is an assumption. If you are sitting on this evidence, you’ve had ample opportunity to present it, but have chosen not to. Now would be a good time.
Also, I should point out another assumption of yours – that by assaulting a nazi, you prevent their future violence. I’m sure you’ll present a compelling case for this one too, any second now…
“I’ve met these people, and they damn well mean what they say.”
Did 100% of them turn to violence? Would randomly being punched on the street earlier in their lives have prevented this? Have you got anything at all beyond anecdata?
“You call out violence against Nazis. Exclusively violence against Nazis.”
I call out violence against anyone and everyone. If this blog endorsed assaulting group X, I would oppose assaulting group X. Currently, this blog exclusively calls for assaulting nazis, which means nazism is exclusively the context in which my opposition to assault arises. Simple.
“Exclusively violence against Nazis. Nazi violence? Nah, that’s not really violence, because… [etc]”
Point out where I have endorsed or defended nazi violence, or withdraw this claim with an admission that it was unfounded. Failing to do either is pretty much an admission that you are arguing in bad faith.
“I find it very telling when people piously use the law to back up their moral arguments.”
Fucking idiot, not once have I resorted to ‘it’s illegal’ as an argument. You are so incredibly irrational, it almost doesn’t matter what I write – you’ll rebut what you think I wrote, which rarely resembles what I actually wrote.
@68 “aramad, ALL of your claims about me are both lies, because they’re untrue, and projection, because you’re attributing your own biases and idiocy to me.”
Every one of my replies to you has specifically addressed your language, your argument, your genuine position. You are now lying.
“Taking action in self-defense against people who pose an imminent threat to life and safety is not a crime.”
I do not think that word means what you think it means.
Fuck off and die sad, moron.
@vucodlak #66
Start weeping for your people, your president, your black people murdered daily, your massacres in high school just because your people is so scared by the world that cannot live without war rifles at hand.
Then, if you want to weep for my people, do it for the damages your asshole of a president is doing to the entire world, Italy included: environment, wars etc.
We have fascists around, but we are better prepared to deal with them. Just to say, we just got rid of Matteo Salvini who was doing huge damages in the Government. You still have Trump there.
And here comes the word juggling to justify the term “extermination” with something that is definetely not extermination. Nice try, didn’t work.
Again, you change the meaning of words to suit your goals. “Nazi” is a very specific term, you label your enemies that way to justify everything and avoid objections (after all, who could possibly defend Nazis?). This is straightforward manipulation. Is Yiannopolous a Nazist? Then move your ass, find him and kill him. Or are you so coward that you know where to find a mass exterminating Nazist and you’re happy to do nothing but rejoyce when some woman throws water at him?
You know what? you are a fraud.
Imagine thinking that it’s bad to punch Nazis. It must suck to be a fascist sympathizer.
Imagine thinking that you can just call anyone you don’t like “Nazi” so you can punch him -but then not actually punch him. It must suck to be a delusional asshole.
Gavin Mcinnes and Milo Yianopalous are literally prominent figures in American Neo-Nazi groups, dipshit. Gavin literally is the leader and founder of a violent white supremacist street gang.
Dipshit Porivil,
again: if you think Yiannopoulos is a Nazist and is going to exterminate his enemies (like the other dipshit wrote) then move your ass and go and kill him. If you think that Yiannopoulos is an asshole with nasty ideals that you don’t like, that’s not a Nazist, so don’t hide behind that term to justify a fucking aggression. You are a fascist, together with all the commenters here who do not see a problem in assaulting and harassing someone who is minding his own business. Fucking fascist.
I like how you abandoned the fact that Mcinnes is in fact a violent white supremacist who leads a white supremacist gang. Also, nah, not going to go get myself convicted for murder to win internet fights with dipshits. Sorry dude, really not going to budge me on calling antisemetic white-supremacist thought leaders neo-nazis.
@74 “if you think Yiannopoulos is a Nazist and is going to exterminate his enemies (like the other dipshit wrote) then move your ass and go and kill him.”
Another commenter in another thread nailed these guys: they are spouting righteous sounding hot air, with no intent to do anything other than sound righteous, purely for woke points. These are empty grandstanders, in addition to their palpable irrationality.
@75 “I like how you abandoned the fact that Mcinnes is in fact a violent white supremacist who leads a white supremacist gang.”
Because he doesn’t dispute that ‘nazi’ (or at minimum ‘white supremacist’) is a good label for him. Did you miss his point regarding Yiannopolis? You don’t get to call people nazis just because you dislike their politics. Nazi is a specific term with a specific meaning.
Admit it. You missed that point, didn’t you?
I didn’t miss it, I think Yiannopolis fits well within the definition of a neo-nazi thought leader.
From Oxford English dictionary:
Regardless, I don’t very much care about niggling over terms like that. Call him a smeckledorf if you want. The important part is that he’s a dangerous bigot thought-leader and I’m more than happy to hear about him being assaulted, and there is not actually a thing you could say to change my mind on it.
Right yes, you’re all about the cheering on the violence thing rather than accurately assessing their positions.
Ah, aramad, you couldn’t help yourself and had to prove me right by lying about me. Again.
Kindly take your Nazi boot-licking self elsewhere.
I approve of violence against them because I’ve assessed their positions, idiot. They’re both dangerous, bigoted slime who want people like me or my partner dead.
@80
To summarize: you approve violence against persons who approve violence against other persons. But you feel different from them, how do we dare to compare them to you?
You are hopeless.
Were the Iron Front and other anti-Nazi/resistance groups fascists? Were the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and similar anti-Falangist groups fascists? Were the many anti-fascist partisan groups in Italy fascists? Some of their members and/or predecessors began acting before war or widespread extermination began, so they must all be fascists, no?
Just a reminder to all the humpty dumpties out there: words do have common meanings – not just whatever you want them to mean at that moment in time. Just because someone engages in violence, does not make them a fascist or even an authoritarian.
MattP: you are speaking of something you do not know. Italy was not a democracy when partisan movements arose. Many partisans in Italy also raped, killed, tortured oppositors, even if the overall partisan movement’s goal was to fight Mussolini and Hitler. You are just an ignorant asshole who tries to mix up words to justify his own bias. Comparing yourself to Italian partisans and your opponents to Nazists is something that requires a good psychiatrist.
@81
Nah not really. See, there is an actual, tangible, real-world difference between people who wish violence on innocent people of color and minorities, and people wish violence on people who wish violence on innocent people of color and minorities.
There have been literally zero genocides and mass murders that occurred from people hating nazis and white supremacists too much.
@84
You still spectacularly fail to see the point. No need to further waste time, let’s keep our opinions (you keep your, I keep the correct one).
@79
What was the lie? He asks, knowing fully that there will be no substantive reply.
.
@80
And now that you want them dead, I guess they’re justified in killing you first. You know, because attacking first is self-defense. Idiot.
.
@84
You both want people dead for reasons you both consider reasonable, and you both consider attacking first ‘self defense.’
~yawn~
Aramad, seriously, stop. Nobody has said they want Nazis dead. You’re such a fucking liar.
The “if you think they’re a nazi, go kill them lol” thing is entirely a creation of brain. I’m pretty fine with people settling on milkshakes.
Me too. Provided, of course, you don’t care milkshakes being thrown at you while you are out at lunch with your friends, or your family.
brain, #89
Wrong.
The huge difference is that Porivil isn’t promoting the harassment, intimidation, bullying, marginalization and/or extermination of complete strangers trying to live their already marginalized lives. That’s a difference you have failed and will continue to fail to work into your bullshit analogy.
One one side you have someone pushing hateful rhetoric against these groups of people (that regularly results in acts of violence against them) and on the other side you have someone throwing a milkshake on them.
Saad
Wrong.
Wrong, in both the fact that Porivil isn’t promoting harassment, in the fact that your characterisation of the harassment target makes any difference, and in the fact that the reason for harassing being ok can be decided by you, PZ by Porivil.
First statement you got right
If it’s so, I’m sure they are already in jail, so they cannot be out having lunch in public. This is the point you don’t get.
Do it to me and expect 1) being punched in the face, and 2) being sued for damages and unprovoked assault (I’d probably need a US lawyer to spot out the actual allegations, but you got it).
You know, it would be one thing if we hadn’t had this debate before (a little conflict called WW II, maybe you’ve heard of it?), and it hadn’t resulted in 3% of the global population dying. But it appears that some people have been slow to get the message.
I suspect that in part, that slowness was because Neo-Nazis had to wait until the generation of soldiers who defeated the Nazis the last time around was too old and feeble or dead to beat them to death with their canes.
No matter what these guys call themselves, they are Nazis. You can see that when the mask slips (viz. Milo’s post of Richard Spencer’s Charlottesville rant). And while I am not a violent person, milkshakes seem like a pretty benign form of chastisement–certainly moreso than the acid thrown on immigrants in recent months. More severe attacks just feed into the seemingly innate (and inane) feelings of paranoia and martyrdom of the far right. And doing nothing really doesn’t seem to be a good option, as Neville Chamberlain found out.
These ain’t normal times.
I wish I was naive enough to think that the US legal system is functional enough to jail neo nazis spreading hate speech. However, from my experience working in it, I can’t sustain such a fantasy.
As such, where the court fails, McDonalds will have to suffice.
@92
Ok, then go and shoot them. You have Nazis in your neighbourhood, you know where to find them, and you do nothing? Just giggle when someone throws water at them, knowing that this doesn’t make anything to stop them? You are an accomplice of their crimes: you knew and didn’t act.
Or you think some German guy could go around and say “Hey, sure, I saw it coming. But I stopped them dead: in 1935 I threw an entire glass of water to someone in a restaurant!”.
@93
Ok, at least you are honest. What you don’t get is, if you can define when you can go against the law, so can others. And one thing is protesting when someone actually promotes violence in public, another is to feel entitled to assault someone whenever you see him just because at some point he said something you don’t like while minding his own business.
Ironically named “brain”
Nazis cannot be rehabilitated. They can be marginalized. A marginalized Nazi is a relatively harmless Nazi. The goal is not to stop the Nazis with milkshakes. The goal is to demonstrate that Nazis are held in contempt by the overwhelming majority of citizens–before those citizens become co-opted by the Nazis and start informing on Jews and minorities or piloting trains to death camps and baby jails. True Nazis are few. They were even in the Third Reich. When the population starts thinking they are normal and that maybe you could cooperate with them and make a few bucks on that contract to transport Jews to the East that Nazis become dangerous.
Normalization of evil is the most dangerous evil.
brain, #91
Virtually all white supremacists, KKK members and supporters and neo-Nazis and Nazis are not in jail, you clueless fuck.
I didn’t say the Nazi scum wouldn’t (or shouldn’t) fight back. Nor did I say it should be legal to assault a Nazi piece of filth.
It is quite interesting and amusing to see that you are choosing to play the part of a Nazi in this scenario. Noted.
See, you keep doing this reductive thing where “braying for the death of people like me and my partner just for our nationality and sexuality” is just “opinions I disagree with”, and I just straight up reject that framing.
brain, #95
You just fully outed yourself. That was fun while it lasted. Thanks for playing.
Like, as a fucking reminder, Gavin McInnes is literally the leader and founder of a violent neo Nazis hate group that has assaulting people as one of its explicit core tenants, and he’s repeatedly called on them to assault and kill others.
If you think that’s just “saying things I disagree with” you’re either painfully stupid or have an agenda. Or both.
@87, 88
Multiple of you have encouraged physical assault against them, even with the knowledge that single punches can lead to death. I too have no real opposition to wetting them, water or milkshake; it’s battery that is a bridge too far.
Porivil In particular lies when he says: “I’m pretty fine with people settling on milkshakes.” Nope. You explicitly endorsed violence in posts 71, 77, and especially 80. But also Vucodlak and WMDKitty. There have probably been others, but I am not going to check previous threads to demonstrate the lie further when a quick scan of this thread suffices.
@92
“I suspect that in part, that slowness was because Neo-Nazis had to wait until the generation of soldiers who defeated the Nazis the last time around was too old and feeble or dead to beat them to death with their canes.”
Ummm WWI was only 20 years prior. Many veterans of that vconflict took up arms again, or assisted with training, strategy etc. when WWII arrived.
Just a minor historical nitpick, you go on to make a good point regarding “more severe attacks,” right wing martyrdom etc.
@101
There is no contradiction in the posts you cite. I think that punching, beating up, and killing Nazis is a good and morally commendable act. That said, if milkshakes and water are all we’re going to get, I’m good with that too.
Also, 77 wouldn’t be a contradiction anyways. Legally, dumping water or a milkshake on someone is both assault and battery. Which, being a lawyer, is how I intended that word.
Aramad, not sure why you are bringing up WW I, as I did not. I was referring to the 55 year interval between the defeat of the 3rd Reich and the birth of the Teabaggers.
These are not ordinary times. We dare not let the Rethugs normalize them. What we have is a nation within the nation–possessed of their own myths, their own historical narrative, their own professed victimhood, their own propaganda organs (not just Faux News, but also RT, Breitbart, etc.), indeed their own reality tangent to that of the rest of us. They are working to advance the agenda of enemies of the United States–and when this is pointed out to them, they don’t even bother to deny it.
At this point, I do not see how we can come to a modus vivendi with them. That leave fighting or surrendering. What would you suggest we do?
@104 103 “I think that punching, beating up, and killing Nazis is a good and morally commendable act.”
Innnnnnteresting.
So when you said “The “if you think they’re a nazi, go kill them lol” thing is entirely a creation of brain” in comment 88, you were lying. I was only wrong to point to the “settling on milkshakes” portion of that comment as a lie. Gee, my bad.
PAGING WMDKITTY, WMDKITTY TO THE COURTESY PHONE PLEASE
Are you now going to take back your statement in “Nobody has said they want Nazis dead.” comment 87?
@106
No? I’m sorry, but you have awful reading comprehension.
Brain keeps repeating “If you think they’re a nazi, you must go and kill them, or you’re lying”, as if that’s some kind of logical truth. That is entirely a creation of his misfiring neurons.
I, like every normal human being who has been alive after the 1930’s or so, am very fine with Nazis being killed. However, just because I think something is morally commendable does not mean I think that is morally necessary.
This is like the fourth consecutive time that you’ve drastically misread the plain English of what people say. By this point, I have to assume you’re either severely challenged in that regard, or are acting with an ulterior motive and doing this on purpose.
@105
I see, I misread that point of you comment 92.
“At this point, I do not see how we can come to a modus vivendi with them. That leave fighting or surrendering. What would you suggest we do?”
Since when are those the only two options? You mentioned one in your previous comment that was very useful: marginalizing them.
I have seen an interview with antifa members (Can’t find the link any more though) where they detail the things they do in addition to the brawling. Ferreting out the the identities of odious online forum posters in order to shame people and get them fired for their postings is a good example of one of their less infamous activities, along with counter protests at short notice, mixing up pepper spray antidote… they go on to say that fighting is their least used and last resort. Which makes it all the more puzzling to me that they bother with it at all – every time they attack someone, they make themselves look as bad as the people they fight against on the evening news.
Meaning, as well as being a moral mistake, it is also a messaging mistake.
@107
Oh, you sure are a stupid one. No, brain is saying that murdering nazis logically follows from what you’ve stated. The fact that you endorse it from the safety of your keyboard without doing anything about it proves you to be just a sad fantasist. Better than being a murderer by far, yet still not on the right side of the issue. A bit pathetic, really.
“I, like every normal human being who has been alive after the 1930’s or so, am very fine with Nazis being killed.”
No, just the intellectually and morally stunted ones.
“This is like the fourth consecutive time that you’ve drastically misread the plain English of what people say.”
Oh damn, what were the others? I’m sure you have examples…
@109
Right, and Brain is incorrect. The fact that I think Nazis exist, and that it is morally commendable to beat up or kill them, does not lead to the conclusion that any individual has a moral obligation to do so. There is simply no logical contradiction, I’m sorry. You really should consider researching basic logical reasoning before you make absurd statements like that.
Every normal human being is fine with Nazis being killed, sorry. That just is factual. No person who isn’t already sympathetic to the nazis looks back at WW2 and goes “Wow, it sure is awful, everyone is being so mean to these Germans, just because they have a different opinion!”
Insofar as you misreading this, you have misreading my statement about brain in 106, misreading my statement on “assault” in 101, misreading a_ray_in_dilbert_space’s “55 years” statement in 102, and you misreading my “I am fine with people settling on milkshakes” statement in 101.
Sorry, you really do just have godawful reading comprehension, in addition to a clearly incorrect understanding of logical syllogisms.
Whoa. Aramad, you just keep on lying!
I mean, it’s kind of fair, I can remember when Raiders of the Lost Ark and Inglourious Basterds were widely condemned for their use of hate speech and simulated violence against PoN (People of Nazism) just because of their belonging to a minority group. What kind of twisted world would have let those movies become near universally well-reviewed classics?
@ brain, #91
Do you have so little self-control? I don’t know how many times people have thrown things/spit at/on me (I’ve only got so many fingers and toes, after all) but it’s a lot. I don’t think I’ve hit anyone for it since I was 9, when a bully bounced a rock off the back of my skull hard enough to knock my glasses off.
Yes, I get annoyed, but to attack someone just for making a mess of my clothes and/or hair? How gauche. I don’t go around assaulting people for piddley things like that, and I’ve been saddled with the nickname/epithet “Psycho” since I was knee-high to a grasshopper. I mean really, if you can’t take a little milkshake, should you even be allowed outside without a leash? Tsk.
See, the thing is, I have experience with violence. I’ve been beaten, strangled, stabbed, and even shot at. I have been tortured, and I have been raped. I’ve done terrible things myself. I’m not a rapist, and I’ve never killed anyone, but I’ve come frighteningly close to the latter. I’ve hurt people. I’ve seen murder, I’ve seen suicide, and I’ve watched someone die for my fuckup.
I’ve more than had my fill of senseless violence and murder. Where once I enjoyed some types of violence, I’m now thoroughly sick of it. So I don’t go around punching people for little insults, or much of anything else. Hell, I didn’t hit the last person who hit me, the last person to kick me, or even the last person to try to strangle me. I shook them off and walked away.
I don’t look for opportunities to get into fights. I don’t bluster and threaten people, not with violence and certainly not with lawsuits. I will fight in defense of others or myself, but I’d rather avoid it if at all possible.
“Shoot them,” you say. How many people have you shot, asshole? I’ve only even seen three people killed by guns, and I can barely live with that. I’ve never shot anyone. The times I so much as pointed a gun at someone still give me nightmares. There may come a day when I have to pick up a gun again, but I’m hoping that it’s not too late for us to wake up and drive the Nazi scum from our midst. Maybe it’s a delusion, and maybe it’s a mistake, but I’m still hoping we won’t have to murder anyone. That we can just drive them off.
Me in comment 86:
“And now that you want them dead, I guess they’re justified in killing you first. You know, because attacking first is self-defense. Idiot. … You both want people dead for reasons you both consider reasonable, and you both consider attacking first ‘self defense.’”
Porivil replying in comment 88:
“The “if you think they’re a nazi, go kill them lol” thing is entirely a creation of brain.” [emphasis added]
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/spongebob/images/f/f4/Born_Again_Krabs_019.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20151004022137
Porivil in comment 103:
“I think that punching, beating up, and killing Nazis is a good and morally commendable act.” [emphasis original]
a direct disproof of your claim in post 88 as I aready pointed out, but it gets sillier –
Porivil in comment 107, after this was pointed out to him:
“Brain keeps repeating “If you think they’re a nazi, you must go and kill them, or you’re lying”, as if that’s some kind of logical truth.” [my emphasis]
I then point out Porivil’s obvious misinterpretation:
“No, brain is saying that murdering nazis logically follows from what you’ve stated.” [emphasis original]
I should have made it clearer, because Porivil is a poor reader, but “logically follows from what you’ve stated” is distinctly different in meaning from Porivil’s “must go and kill them” interpretation.
Porivil’s response:
“Right, and Brain is incorrect.”
Hah! It may well be that brain was incorrect to assert that, but in saying that, you conceded that you misread his point. And then you blew past it without acknowledging this fact. Because you are fundamentally unable to admit error, apparently, so you simply abandon your earlier assertion as if you never made in the first place and move on to another gripe.
“The fact that I think Nazis exist, and that it is morally commendable to beat up or kill them, does not lead to the conclusion that any individual has a moral obligation to do so.”
Yeah, I know that. Again, brain wasn’t saying that you ought to, or should, or must go kill nazis, only that that is what your previous statements imply. The fact that you don’t only goes to show that you are a sad fantasist, as I believe has been mentioned but bears emphasizing. You are a keyboard warrior who is brave only at a distance, but not even your rhetoric is any good due to your logical inconsistencies and inability to keep track of your own evasions.
“Every normal human being is fine with Nazis being killed, sorry. That just is factual. No person who isn’t already sympathetic to the nazis looks back at WW2 and goes “Wow, it sure is awful, everyone is being so mean to these Germans, just because they have a different opinion!””
Yawn. Confusedly comparing the present day to open war will not get you anywhere.
“Insofar as you misreading this…”
Aside from me mistaking a_ray’s post 92, the misreads were all yours, as I just documented.
@111
Still no examples given, and none expected. Keep shouting into the wind, child.
.
@113 “There may come a day when I have to pick up a gun again, but I’m hoping that it’s not too late for us to wake up and drive the Nazi scum from our midst. Maybe it’s a delusion, and maybe it’s a mistake, but I’m still hoping we won’t have to murder anyone. That we can just drive them off.”
Very doable, without even resorting to assault/battery.
@114
This doesn’t prove anything except your godawful reading comprehension. Brain is the only one making the statement that your statements logically result in an obligation to go and kill nazis to be non-contradictory.
And it is just as false. Nothing I’ve said has that as its logical conclusion. If you think it does, lay out the syllogism so we can all laugh at you.
Yes, and he’s incorrect about it.
Hah. Pot, kettle. Big talk from the person that couldn’t recognize a logical conclusion if it bit them in their premises.
The fact that it might not be politically expedient to go out and do any hypothetical act has no bearing on its moral character. It would be morally commendable to go and free everyone who is being held in the US concentration camps – but anyone attempting to do so would not be acting in a politically expedient manner, because it would result in them getting shot, killed, and branded a terrorist before they got within a mile. If recognizing that moral character and political expedience are not synonymous makes one a “keyboard warrior”, then it is hardly as insulting as you intend it.
It will when the people we’re talking about are literally the leaders of a violent nation-wide neo-nazi group that is already responsible for multiple deaths. That war hasn’t been formally declared doesn’t change that these are people with the same fundamental bigotries as the nazis engaging in open and deadly violence, at the behest of these two.
The fact that you assert so only continues to prove your poor reading comprehension and logical reasoning. The fact that you’re able to post this without any embarrassment in yourself also shows a distinct lack of self-awareness.
Bye, aramad and brain. We don’t need apologists for fascists around here.
I don’t understand. You ban the people who are in favour of not killing people – and of trying to find better solutions than violence – but keep the people openly advocating murder.
Porivil Sorrens wrote:
Suggesting that it isn’t acceptable to murder people is not fascist apologia, it’s just plain disgust at people who think murder is ever acceptable. As much as I despise nazis, they remain among the people I am unwilling to murder or to advocate the murder thereof. Because I am not a fucking monster. We have better options.
I didn’t think I’d see the day when encouraging murder was acceptable around these parts and discouraging it was a banning offence.
I’ll see myself out.