5 ms·

Of the four boxes of liberty [1], does anyone believe that anything but the ammo box will be effective at this point in our history? Free speech exists only in

Of the four boxes of liberty [1], does anyone believe that anything but the ammo box will be effective at this point in our history? Free speech exists only in echo chambers, every election is between a shit sandwich and a douche, and a sitting federal judge openly confirmed that our courts of law have little to do with truth or justice. I would rather face the terrifying anarchy of a revolution than continue to suffer the indignity of the current tyranny. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_boxes_of_liberty?wprov=sfti1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_boxes_of_liberty?wprov=sf...

bongodongobob 3y ago
Probably. More and more people are anti-protest as well. "Why do they have to block traffic?" If it's not disruptive, it's pointless. "Can't you just protest in a way that's easily ignored?"
- leereeves 3y ago
  Disrupting any official proceeding is now a federal felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison, so 60s style anti-government protest would be shut down quickly. The Jan 6th trials (most of which were based on that charge) set a precedent that will haunt us for a long time.
  - matheusmoreira 3y ago
    Set a precedent for the rest of the world as well. Similar protests in my country were also suppressed, in direct reference to the US ones.
    - morbicer 3y ago
      What's the alternative? Let hundred weirdos storm your Capitol and let them rule? Smash a democratic institution and then leave them to go home unpunished? You can't cosplay as a revolutionary. If you want to do insurrection you have to expect the government will surpress you and bring a force that can actually perform revolution.
      - leereeves 3y ago
        > let them rule? Smash a democratic institution? Were either of those real possibilities on Jan 6th? Did the people charged even think they were? It was quite clear, even to them I imagine, that they didn't have "a force that can actually perform revolution".
        deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
        morbicer 3y ago
        If I only "pretend" to rob a store, don't you think I should get prosecuted? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignorantia_juris_non_excusat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignorantia_juris_non_excusat
      - matheusmoreira 3y ago
        I don't know what the alternative is for the US matters. That's for US citizens to decide. Personally I don't believe there was any fraud in the US elections. I know about my own country. And what happened here is this: they saw what Trump did and were seriously alarmed. In order to stop our Trump equivalent from winning, the supreme court basically staged its own silent revolution. They gave themselves the power to do whatever they wanted. Then they implemented censorship, unheard of in Brazil since the military dictatorship of the 20th century. Blatantly unconstitutional censorship. Then they went to public events to brag about all of it. How would you feel if an unelected judge censored Trump and then publicly bragged about how he defeated Trumpism? Smash a democratic institution? This is not a democracy. Unelected judges are running this country. They tried to pass "anti-fake news" censorship laws, Google even campaigned against it and got arbitrarily fined by these judges. The law was rejected. Then about a week ago they rammed the law through anyway via "electoral court resolutions". They determine what's fake, of course. Literal ministry of truth. They regulated AI too. What do you do when your supreme court seizes power like this? What do you do when the guys who are supposed to enforce the constitution start shitting on it? The police obeys their "court orders". Do you see the point I'm making? They're arresting and persecuting everyone. People who protested this got worse sentences than murderers, rapists, drug traffickers. Seriously doubt there will be any kind of civil war. Unlike the US, nobody here is willing to die over this cursed, corrupted land. The only solution for Brazil is the airport, as they say. Who knows though, maybe our current "president" will anger the israelis so much with his palestinian support they will nuke Brasília off the map. I mean, this guy is a communist so out of touch he publicly accused the jewish nation of holocausting the palestinians.
  - seanhunter 3y ago
    _Corruptly_ disrupting an official proceeding (or doing so by threats or force) is a felony, and it became one under Sarbannes-Oxley in 2001, so not just as a result of Jan 6th.[1] [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1505 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1505
    - leereeves 3y ago
      Yes, but that was originally written to punish evidence tampering. The Jan 6th trials were the first time it was applied to protests, and that use is so novel that the Supreme Court has agreed to review it.[1] And the "corruptly" term was effectively eliminated by UNITED STATES v. ROBERTSON (2023)[2], when the appeals court ruled that it means simply “acting ‘with consciousness of wrongdoing.’” (mens rea) and with “independently unlawful means or purpose”. Almost all disruptive protests involve some minor "independently unlawful means" (such as jaywalking, trespassing, disorderly conduct, or failure to comply with a police officer), so they fit that definition. The court's example to illustrate the meaning of the term was: "a witness in a court proceeding may refuse to testify by invoking his constitutional privilege against self-incrimination, thereby obstructing or impeding the proceeding, but he does not act corruptly". The court actually said that taking the fifth is obstructing an official proceeding (but not corruptly). Imagine how little it takes to commit a felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison now. Have you seen the movie "The Trial of the Chicago 7"? If that happened today, not only could they be convicted of "corruptly" disrupting an official proceeding for the protests, they could be convicted for their behavior during the trial. (In the latter case, the independently unlawful means would be behavior that was in contempt of court) 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer_v._United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer_v._United_States 2: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-dc-circuit/115332314.html https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-dc-circuit/115332314.ht... PS: I should add that the 20 years comes from a different law with the same phrasing, 18 U.S. Code § 1512 - Tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant, section (c)(2). The existence of two laws with the same phrasing, both for specific crimes (evidence tampering and witness tampering), makes it clear that the legislature didn't intend for these laws to apply broadly. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1512#c_2 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1512#c_2
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- projektfu 3y ago
  If a protest tactic turns more people against you, it's probably counterproductive. Sure, it's hard to know if in the end it'll count as a net positive, but protest for its own sake, without strategy for winning mindshare or representation, is pointless. What was the strategy of shutting down a bridge in California "for Gaza". You're just going to get removed from the bridge and arrested. It's not like anyone is going to pressure Israel because they can't get to work on time this morning.
  - bongodongobob 3y ago
    The idea is to interrupt commerce. Governments don't like that. People don't like that. Government says this is bad, ok we're listening. very handwavy in general but that's the idea.
    - projektfu 3y ago
      The Canadian trucker action had more of a strategy, I'm not sure how much it achieved. I consider these things to be more direct action than protest per se. The 2003 Iraq war marches were protests, and while they were not successful in stopping the war they made it clear it was not a popular war. With direct action, perhaps you make it too costly to oppose your cause. Restaurants can only handle so many sit-ins where they refuse to serve and there's no room for paying customers. Sabotage might make it too costly to insure a project and its contractors could pull out. Blockading important shipping routes might mean that you get invited to the table to avoid an actual battle. But this must be balanced against the risk that you will be arrested, injured or killed with popular support. The same people who blocked the bridge for Gaza probably found the trucker action illegitimate. I've participated in all aspects of politics and one thing I know now is how important communications are and how difficult to do right. The right wing in the US has been working very hard at that for 50 years, through heavy persuasion and agenda setting. If you start to show interest in their POV, they will reach out to you constantly with direct mail, push polling, focus groups, rallies, clubs, and of course Fox News and talk radio. Other causes, like climate, peace, environment, and equality, are less coordinated, although at times they are able to set the agenda. They rarely stay in front for very long, and attempts to unite their work often break down to fighting over which one is more important. Sorry for the rant, but this has been very front-of-mind recently for me.
ThisIsMyAltAcct 3y ago
Ukraine is taking volunteers for the front. Go fight there for a month and see if you prefer that to just stopping doomscrolling.
- matheusmoreira 3y ago
  If the war is so bad, Ukraine could stop it right now. All it has to do is surrender and then do whatever Russia wants. No one wants to resign themselves to that brutally oppressive fate though. Looks like they'd rather send all their men to their deaths than do that. Sometimes there's no diplomacy and only violence gets your enemy to stop.
  - ThisIsMyAltAcct 3y ago
    Yeah, the point is the situation in the US is lightyears away from being that bad.
  - ahazred8ta 3y ago
    "You may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves." -- Churchill
goda90 3y ago
Do you enjoy a steady supply of food, fuel, electricity, clean water, and easy communication? Do you experience very little violence in your day to day life? Are you generally free to share your opinions without fear of violent retaliation? These are things that quickly disappear in civil wars.

bongodongobob 3y ago

Probably. More and more people are anti-protest as well. "Why do they have to block traffic?" If it's not disruptive, it's pointless. "Can't you just protest in a way that's easily ignored?"

leereeves 3y ago
Disrupting any official proceeding is now a federal felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison, so 60s style anti-government protest would be shut down quickly. The Jan 6th trials (most of which were based on that charge) set a precedent that will haunt us for a long time.
- matheusmoreira 3y ago
  Set a precedent for the rest of the world as well. Similar protests in my country were also suppressed, in direct reference to the US ones.
  - morbicer 3y ago
    What's the alternative? Let hundred weirdos storm your Capitol and let them rule? Smash a democratic institution and then leave them to go home unpunished? You can't cosplay as a revolutionary. If you want to do insurrection you have to expect the government will surpress you and bring a force that can actually perform revolution.
    - leereeves 3y ago
      > let them rule? Smash a democratic institution? Were either of those real possibilities on Jan 6th? Did the people charged even think they were? It was quite clear, even to them I imagine, that they didn't have "a force that can actually perform revolution".
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - morbicer 3y ago
        If I only "pretend" to rob a store, don't you think I should get prosecuted? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignorantia_juris_non_excusat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignorantia_juris_non_excusat
    - matheusmoreira 3y ago
      I don't know what the alternative is for the US matters. That's for US citizens to decide. Personally I don't believe there was any fraud in the US elections. I know about my own country. And what happened here is this: they saw what Trump did and were seriously alarmed. In order to stop our Trump equivalent from winning, the supreme court basically staged its own silent revolution. They gave themselves the power to do whatever they wanted. Then they implemented censorship, unheard of in Brazil since the military dictatorship of the 20th century. Blatantly unconstitutional censorship. Then they went to public events to brag about all of it. How would you feel if an unelected judge censored Trump and then publicly bragged about how he defeated Trumpism? Smash a democratic institution? This is not a democracy. Unelected judges are running this country. They tried to pass "anti-fake news" censorship laws, Google even campaigned against it and got arbitrarily fined by these judges. The law was rejected. Then about a week ago they rammed the law through anyway via "electoral court resolutions". They determine what's fake, of course. Literal ministry of truth. They regulated AI too. What do you do when your supreme court seizes power like this? What do you do when the guys who are supposed to enforce the constitution start shitting on it? The police obeys their "court orders". Do you see the point I'm making? They're arresting and persecuting everyone. People who protested this got worse sentences than murderers, rapists, drug traffickers. Seriously doubt there will be any kind of civil war. Unlike the US, nobody here is willing to die over this cursed, corrupted land. The only solution for Brazil is the airport, as they say. Who knows though, maybe our current "president" will anger the israelis so much with his palestinian support they will nuke Brasília off the map. I mean, this guy is a communist so out of touch he publicly accused the jewish nation of holocausting the palestinians.
- seanhunter 3y ago
  _Corruptly_ disrupting an official proceeding (or doing so by threats or force) is a felony, and it became one under Sarbannes-Oxley in 2001, so not just as a result of Jan 6th.[1] [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1505 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1505
  - leereeves 3y ago
    Yes, but that was originally written to punish evidence tampering. The Jan 6th trials were the first time it was applied to protests, and that use is so novel that the Supreme Court has agreed to review it.[1] And the "corruptly" term was effectively eliminated by UNITED STATES v. ROBERTSON (2023)[2], when the appeals court ruled that it means simply “acting ‘with consciousness of wrongdoing.’” (mens rea) and with “independently unlawful means or purpose”. Almost all disruptive protests involve some minor "independently unlawful means" (such as jaywalking, trespassing, disorderly conduct, or failure to comply with a police officer), so they fit that definition. The court's example to illustrate the meaning of the term was: "a witness in a court proceeding may refuse to testify by invoking his constitutional privilege against self-incrimination, thereby obstructing or impeding the proceeding, but he does not act corruptly". The court actually said that taking the fifth is obstructing an official proceeding (but not corruptly). Imagine how little it takes to commit a felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison now. Have you seen the movie "The Trial of the Chicago 7"? If that happened today, not only could they be convicted of "corruptly" disrupting an official proceeding for the protests, they could be convicted for their behavior during the trial. (In the latter case, the independently unlawful means would be behavior that was in contempt of court) 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer_v._United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer_v._United_States 2: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-dc-circuit/115332314.html https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-dc-circuit/115332314.ht... PS: I should add that the 20 years comes from a different law with the same phrasing, 18 U.S. Code § 1512 - Tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant, section (c)(2). The existence of two laws with the same phrasing, both for specific crimes (evidence tampering and witness tampering), makes it clear that the legislature didn't intend for these laws to apply broadly. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1512#c_2 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1512#c_2
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
projektfu 3y ago
If a protest tactic turns more people against you, it's probably counterproductive. Sure, it's hard to know if in the end it'll count as a net positive, but protest for its own sake, without strategy for winning mindshare or representation, is pointless. What was the strategy of shutting down a bridge in California "for Gaza". You're just going to get removed from the bridge and arrested. It's not like anyone is going to pressure Israel because they can't get to work on time this morning.
- bongodongobob 3y ago
  The idea is to interrupt commerce. Governments don't like that. People don't like that. Government says this is bad, ok we're listening. very handwavy in general but that's the idea.
  - projektfu 3y ago
    The Canadian trucker action had more of a strategy, I'm not sure how much it achieved. I consider these things to be more direct action than protest per se. The 2003 Iraq war marches were protests, and while they were not successful in stopping the war they made it clear it was not a popular war. With direct action, perhaps you make it too costly to oppose your cause. Restaurants can only handle so many sit-ins where they refuse to serve and there's no room for paying customers. Sabotage might make it too costly to insure a project and its contractors could pull out. Blockading important shipping routes might mean that you get invited to the table to avoid an actual battle. But this must be balanced against the risk that you will be arrested, injured or killed with popular support. The same people who blocked the bridge for Gaza probably found the trucker action illegitimate. I've participated in all aspects of politics and one thing I know now is how important communications are and how difficult to do right. The right wing in the US has been working very hard at that for 50 years, through heavy persuasion and agenda setting. If you start to show interest in their POV, they will reach out to you constantly with direct mail, push polling, focus groups, rallies, clubs, and of course Fox News and talk radio. Other causes, like climate, peace, environment, and equality, are less coordinated, although at times they are able to set the agenda. They rarely stay in front for very long, and attempts to unite their work often break down to fighting over which one is more important. Sorry for the rant, but this has been very front-of-mind recently for me.

ThisIsMyAltAcct 3y ago

Ukraine is taking volunteers for the front. Go fight there for a month and see if you prefer that to just stopping doomscrolling.

matheusmoreira 3y ago
If the war is so bad, Ukraine could stop it right now. All it has to do is surrender and then do whatever Russia wants. No one wants to resign themselves to that brutally oppressive fate though. Looks like they'd rather send all their men to their deaths than do that. Sometimes there's no diplomacy and only violence gets your enemy to stop.
- ThisIsMyAltAcct 3y ago
  Yeah, the point is the situation in the US is lightyears away from being that bad.
- ahazred8ta 3y ago
  "You may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves." -- Churchill

goda90 3y ago

Do you enjoy a steady supply of food, fuel, electricity, clean water, and easy communication? Do you experience very little violence in your day to day life? Are you generally free to share your opinions without fear of violent retaliation? These are things that quickly disappear in civil wars.