FarmReadyElephants
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User ID: 2869
FarmReadyElephants
7mo ago
Now that things have cracked, and it only took a failed assassination attempt to do it, what is team red supposed to do otherwise?
Has it really cracked? Will this moment of right-wing cancel power last more than a few weeks?
Physical intimidation of Supreme Court Justices is another example of substituting violence or the threat thereof for the political process. Of course I don't support it. It's a shame those who did that were not made an example of, excepting the one who brought a gun to Kavanaugh's house. It's a "loophole" in our democratic system that if left open leads to the collapse of the whole system. Just like the loophole of politicians moving about the
If you're looking for a right-wing version of violating this principle, the correct example is January 6. Though it is notable that significant deterrence was inflicted on the perpetrators in that case. The justice system, acting under the cover of the media-propaganda system, was capable of punishing those who took part in it.
The situation in America is not symmetrical between Right and Left so I reject any implicit demand to find a balanced criticism of each. I live in fear of Left cancellation. All my friends who were cancelled were cancelled by the Left. People who go to university have to swear fealty to the Left. I won't pretend that the Right shares in the Left's flaws equally, because it is not true. The couple of days that you weren't allowed to wish death on Trump in public just aren't the same kind of thing as the decade+ of threat I've experienced from the Left.
FarmReadyElephants
7mo ago
The left claims things like saying "there are only two genders" creates a culture of violence that makes society hostile towards the marginalized and that people who say it deserve to be punished to deter further harm. And I claim that celebrating a recent assassination attempt, especially in public by people of influence, is a bad thing that could make the Republic unravel.
Maybe these are rival perspectives both equally blinded by partisanship. Or maybe one is a true, time-tested fact borne out of hard-won political wisdom and the other is ephemeral revolutionary nonsense.
FarmReadyElephants
7mo ago
It's wrong to analyze this event through the lens of a cycle of escalating violence. I did it myself, before I realized that isn't what's going on.
Left-wing cancel culture is when someone loses their job for violating any norm of the Left, no matter how unpopular and niche. It can be as small as donating years prior to support a popular California ballot measure. Or it can be literally violating a norm that the Left just made up (such as the gentleman that got cancelled for making an "OK" sign out his truck window).
Right-wing cancel culture is basically nonexistent. You can't get cancelled for blaspheming Christ, for example. The man who made a work of art out of statue of Christ in a jar of his own piss received government grants. There is only a small window of power here for celebrating the recent assassination attempt on their political candidate. It will probably last only a few weeks. And it only works because mainstream leftists are willing to support the taboo. It's a good thing they are! This means we are still in a state of politics, and not in a state of war, despite all the rhetoric about Trump being an existential threat to the system.
This taboo against celebrating political assassination is not a partisan thing. It's a load-bearing taboo for our system of government. We depend on political assassinations being rare for our way of life to exist. This taboo absolutely must not erode, or we descend into a system of election by carbomb.
So it's just wrong to model this as tit-for-tat violence. It's 10,000 tits for one tat. And the one tat is a nonpartisan tat that absolutely must hold.
FarmReadyElephants
1yr ago
Having loyalties to multiple states are a special case of rival loyalties. Of course any politician is expected to be loyal to his family and his God.
FarmReadyElephants
1yr ago
Me too! (circa 300 A.D.)
FarmReadyElephants
1yr ago
The reason why Open Borders is controversial in the existing system is that migrants (or their children) are given an equal share in governance - a scarce resource currently owned by the existing population. It's not clear why the existing population should give equal shares in governance to the children of new arrivals. I expect free movement of people across borders would be more popular if this were not the case.
Was it? I seem to remember the Weathermen becoming college professors at prestigious universities.
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