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Reminds me of this excerpt from A man for all seasons[1]: Roper: So now you'd give the Devil benefit of law! More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road th

Reminds me of this excerpt from A man for all seasons[1]: Roper: So now you'd give the Devil benefit of law! More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil? Roper: I'd cut down every law in England to do that! More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you — where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country's planted thick with laws from coast to coast — man's laws, not God's — and if you cut them down — and you're just the man to do it — d'you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake. [1]: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robert_Bolt https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robert_Bolt

confounded 10y ago
Ah, good ol' unbiased, unchanging, divined law. Good job it's never been changed to favor ordinary people as the result of protest or disregard, or to centralize power as the result of corruption. I think I'll be spending this year's EFF and ACLU dues on a new armchair.
- sooheon 10y ago
  I think you somewhat missed the point of the passage. It says nothing of unchanging divine law--it explicitly claims law is man-made, and it serves to protect men from forces more evil than they. Whether it's imperfect at any given time and amenable to improvement is not a point anyone would reasonably contend.
cairo_x 10y ago
There's a conflation of liberal resistance movements and antifa going on here. I don't think Antifa expects any law to support punching Nazis in the face, or is pushing hate speech laws. As far as I can see, antifa is in defiance of the law, not directly attacking it. Also it is not a wishful template for a communist police force. I believe it's based on blackbloc, an anarchist self organized mob. These anarchist mobs existed under communism too. Stalin sent them to the Gulag and Hitler sent them to work and concentration camps. People called them cowards then, too. Anarchist mobs have been around forever. It's when they attack the side in power that people really get super outraged.
- bobwaycott 10y ago
  I'm sorry, but did you just include Hitler in the category of "communism"?
  - cairo_x 10y ago
    No. Showing they've been shitcanned by both ends of the spectrum. Sheesh. Speaking of worst possible interpretations, the author of the article makes the worst possible interpretation of hate speech law. It sounds so disingenuous I can't decide if it's infantile or some kind of NRAesque hysterical scare position.
    - bobwaycott 10y ago
      Wasn't going for a worst possible interpretation, which is why I asked for clarification. You simply worded and structured your point very poorly. Had you preceded your sentence about Stalin and Hitler with remarking that anarchist mobs existed under communism and fascism, it would have been clear you meant they were shit-canned by both ends of the spectrum.
      - cairo_x 10y ago
        I'd edit my post if I could. If you look closely I used a full stop instead of a semicolon if it makes you feel any better.
        bobwaycott 10y ago
        Ugh. It's not about making me feel any better. It's a matter of the rambling structure of your comment, which the 'full stop' doesn't alter. I do look closely, which is exactly why I bothered to ask for the clarification--your comment left me unavoidably wondering if the words you used matched the meaning you intended. Anyway, thanks for the clarification. I didn't ask my original question for it to turn into nitpicking on sentence structure. Political theory/ideology is a former field of mine, and at least in the context of American political discourse, there's a very regrettable lack of differentiation recognized by the general populace between communists and fascists--people often use them interchangeably, and will often try layering them as insults against a specific person they don't like[0]. Since you're a random stranger on the internet, I had no way of knowing aside from politely inquiring if you meant what you wrote as it was written, or if something was missing. [0]: For a ridiculously amusing example in meme form, see: http://fascist.motifake.com/image/demotivational-poster/0904/fascism-politics-congress-obama-president-fascist-marxist-ta-demotivational-poster-1239517132.jpg http://fascist.motifake.com/image/demotivational-poster/0904...

confounded 10y ago

Ah, good ol' unbiased, unchanging, divined law. Good job it's never been changed to favor ordinary people as the result of protest or disregard, or to centralize power as the result of corruption. I think I'll be spending this year's EFF and ACLU dues on a new armchair.

sooheon 10y ago
I think you somewhat missed the point of the passage. It says nothing of unchanging divine law--it explicitly claims law is man-made, and it serves to protect men from forces more evil than they. Whether it's imperfect at any given time and amenable to improvement is not a point anyone would reasonably contend.

cairo_x 10y ago

There's a conflation of liberal resistance movements and antifa going on here. I don't think Antifa expects any law to support punching Nazis in the face, or is pushing hate speech laws. As far as I can see, antifa is in defiance of the law, not directly attacking it. Also it is not a wishful template for a communist police force. I believe it's based on blackbloc, an anarchist self organized mob. These anarchist mobs existed under communism too. Stalin sent them to the Gulag and Hitler sent them to work and concentration camps. People called them cowards then, too. Anarchist mobs have been around forever. It's when they attack the side in power that people really get super outraged.

bobwaycott 10y ago
I'm sorry, but did you just include Hitler in the category of "communism"?
- cairo_x 10y ago
  No. Showing they've been shitcanned by both ends of the spectrum. Sheesh. Speaking of worst possible interpretations, the author of the article makes the worst possible interpretation of hate speech law. It sounds so disingenuous I can't decide if it's infantile or some kind of NRAesque hysterical scare position.
  - bobwaycott 10y ago
    Wasn't going for a worst possible interpretation, which is why I asked for clarification. You simply worded and structured your point very poorly. Had you preceded your sentence about Stalin and Hitler with remarking that anarchist mobs existed under communism and fascism, it would have been clear you meant they were shit-canned by both ends of the spectrum.
    - cairo_x 10y ago
      I'd edit my post if I could. If you look closely I used a full stop instead of a semicolon if it makes you feel any better.
      - bobwaycott 10y ago
        Ugh. It's not about making me feel any better. It's a matter of the rambling structure of your comment, which the 'full stop' doesn't alter. I do look closely, which is exactly why I bothered to ask for the clarification--your comment left me unavoidably wondering if the words you used matched the meaning you intended. Anyway, thanks for the clarification. I didn't ask my original question for it to turn into nitpicking on sentence structure. Political theory/ideology is a former field of mine, and at least in the context of American political discourse, there's a very regrettable lack of differentiation recognized by the general populace between communists and fascists--people often use them interchangeably, and will often try layering them as insults against a specific person they don't like[0]. Since you're a random stranger on the internet, I had no way of knowing aside from politely inquiring if you meant what you wrote as it was written, or if something was missing. [0]: For a ridiculously amusing example in meme form, see: http://fascist.motifake.com/image/demotivational-poster/0904/fascism-politics-congress-obama-president-fascist-marxist-ta-demotivational-poster-1239517132.jpg http://fascist.motifake.com/image/demotivational-poster/0904...