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> in the south violence against the government is treated as distinct from violence against fellow citizens From what I see and know, among conservative suppor

• rayiner 2y ago
  > From what I see and know, among conservative supporters violence against police is strongly condemned and to be harshly punished, as is any form of protest that is arguably the slightest bit disruptive. The question is who the police are being deployed to protect, private citizens or the government itself. Ordinarily police are deployed to protect citizens from criminals, so it’s bad to attack the police. But the Capitol police are protecting government officials from citizens, so attacking them is less bad. That’s the view. > 60s ... traditional It's a nice tactic to try to attribute those who disagree to a passing fancy, and your beliefs to 'tradition'. The assertion that the civil rights era signaled a major shift in views about the relationship between individuals and the government is hardly controversial. There’s a book on this idea (probably more than one): https://lawliberty.org/did-the-civil-rights-constitution-distort-american-politics https://lawliberty.org/did-the-civil-rights-constitution-dis.... Indeed, folks in the progressive left share more or less the same premise. If you talk to a progressive about foundational principles like federalism and limited government, the chief response is that those ideas were championed by our forebearers so that the government wouldn’t be powerful enough to protect minorities from the majority. The point of disagreement is about whether the new approach is better than the traditional one.
  • mmooss 2y ago
    > Today, when you talk about foundational principles like federalism, limited government, etc., the chief response is that those are incompatible with having a government powerful enough to protect minorities from the majority. We live in different bubbles, it seems. I haven't heard that argument. I have heard that 'states rights' is intended to workaround various federal rules, including civil rights. The foundation is that "all ... are creatd equal", which includes all members of minorities. The Bill of Rights is there to protect unpopular minorities from the majority. The majority can always protect itself by changing the law. Edit: > https://lawliberty.org/did-the-civil-rights-constitution-dis https://lawliberty.org/did-the-civil-rights-constitution-dis.... I skimmed through this. The source is anti-left; of course they are going to give characterizations like that. And look at this piece of doublespeak: When I talk about civil rights, the reader should not get the impression that I’m friendly to segregation, or hostile to the civil rights movement as it existed for the whole of the 20th century up until 1964. In fact, I’m very much in sympathy with the claims to an agitation for equal citizenship that went on up till then, but there were problems in the Civil Rights Act that were not evident at first. They won't say they are hostile to the Civil Rights Act and every solution to problems like segregation, oppression of minorities and women, etc. And they don't offer any other solution. They are "very much in sympathy with the claims to an agitation", however. :)
    • rayiner 2y ago
      > I haven't heard that argument. I have heard that 'states rights' is intended to workaround various federal rules, including civil rights. That’s the same argument from the other direction. The federal government, as designed, wasn’t powerful enough to protect minorities from the majority. Those rules entailed a major expansion of federal power. Indeed, you can see the seams in the civil rights laws. For example, Title VI’s ban on discrimination in public education is implemented through conditions on federal funding. Because the federal government can’t legislate such a ban directly. > The foundation is that "all ... are creatd equal", which includes all members of minorities. The Bill of Rights is there to protect unpopular minorities from the majority. That’s exactly the civil rights era retconning of the constitution I’m talking about. The statement that “all men are created equal” has nothing to do with minorities. Read the context right before and right after: https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declaration-transcript https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declaration-transcrip.... The statement is about self determination: the right of a people to determine their own form of government. The equality being referred to is the equality between Britain and its monarch and the colonists. The founders said almost nothing about protecting minorities from the majority, except perhaps in the context of religious freedom. Their concern was exactly the opposite: that a minority cabal in the government would oppress the majority.
• cmrdporcupine 2y ago
  > as is any form of protest that is arguably the slightest bit disruptive. Unless it's the Jan 6th protesters. Or the so-called "trucker convoy" across the border up here in Canada. (Convinced half the new-found hostility to us comes from this incident somehow getting on the radar of people who normally barely acknowledge Canada as existing) In the end it's very much tribal, and little to do with the substance of issues and more to do with perceived teams.