8 ms·

I think when it becomes normal for 10% or more of the citizens of a country to say they wouldn’t be upset if some member of the opposing political party were to

I think when it becomes normal for 10% or more of the citizens of a country to say they wouldn’t be upset if some member of the opposing political party were to die or when it becomes normal for that portion of the people to make fun or celebrate the death of someone from an opposing party or their murderer, everyone needs to take a step back regardless of which side you’re on and say “Why?” Because these people are not murderers or accomplices, and they are generally good people. These aren’t people that would lynch anyone or burn a cross in someone’s yard. It’s awful that anyone dies. Let’s not escalate this on either side. We don’t need another Hitler, and we don’t need a French Revolution either. We just need people that stop trying to outdo each other.

lotsofpulp 1y ago
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- frumplestlatz 1y ago
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  - bccdee 1y ago
    Who are "we," and what is it that "you're" not putting up with? The last act of violence comparable to this (against a Republican, that is—two Minnesota Democrats were shot in June¹) was the 2024 attempt on Trump's life, where the shooter was a registered Republican who espoused anti-immigrant sentiments on social media². I give it better than even odds that the Kirk shooter, if they have any coherent political views at all, is right of centre. That's where all the violent radicalization is happening right now. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_shootings_of_Minnesota_legislators https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_shootings_of_Minnesota_le... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Matthew_Crooks#Political_activities https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Matthew_Crooks#Politica...
    - frumplestlatz 1y ago
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      - bccdee 1y ago
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        frumplestlatz 1y ago
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        bccdee 1y ago
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        frumplestlatz 1y ago
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idiotsecant 1y ago
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- dolmen 1y ago
  However France has strict firearms control so the scale of violence is still in control and shooting political figures is not common nowadays.
  - ttoinou 1y ago
    This is quite backwards. Right now revolts in France are useless. When they were useful back in the days, a lot of citizens had guns. Guns laws changed to reduce their powers
    - prmoustache 1y ago
      They are not useless in the sense that they are visible and at some point the state cannot only respond with more violence from police force forever or else the dictatorship becomes assumed. But current protests aren't revolts nor violence anyway. There is side/peripheral violence but that is not the point of the protests
      - ttoinou 1y ago
        the state cannot only respond with more violence from police force forever As long as they control the media narrative it's all good it can continue for a long time
    - more_corn 1y ago
      Revolts don’t need guns. Look at Nepal. Look at Bangladesh. Look at the Arab spring. When people are so pissed off that millions of people take to the streets governments fall.
  - philipallstar 1y ago
    That's only because they cut back on the cartoons they draw.
s5300 1y ago
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bccdee 1y ago
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- orwin 1y ago
  To be clear: Hitler was not put in power by any election. Von Papen and Hindeberg, under advice from industry leaders, gave him power. In fact, the Nazi party electoral results were down from the previous election. Both the socialist and communist party were up however, and so the men in power chose Hitler to change that. All of those were killed or politically neutered within 6 months, and honestly, they made their bed.
  - bccdee 1y ago
    The Nazis and the Communists won enough seats between them in 1932 that it was impossible for Hindenburg to form a government without one or the other. Hitler didn't win a majority, but he won more seats than anyone else, which was enough to ultimately finagle his way to the Chancellorship through broadly legitimate means. I'd call that an electoral victory, albeit a weaselly one. Of course, then the Reichstag caught fire, and that was about it for Weimar democracy. But up until that point, his political success came off the back of genuine popularity at the ballot box. He only managed to became Chancellor because enough people voted for him.
    - ZeroGravitas 1y ago
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      - bccdee 1y ago
        Oh I agree, I don't think the Republican agenda reflects some sort of authentic "will of the people." It's produced as much by propaganda as anything else. Nevertheless, it's propaganda that many Americans have swallowed, and those people then go on to put Republicans in power year after year. I can't fault Democrats for their bitterness towards Republican voters.
      - d1sxeyes 1y ago
bigyabai 1y ago
> everyone needs to take a step back regardless of which side you’re on and say “Why?” It's easy to get sucked into a learned helplessness doing this, though. We know exactly why it happens - Charlie Kirk explained it himself: "You will never live in a society when you have an armed citizenry and you won’t have a single gun death. That is nonsense, [...] But I think it’s worth it. I think it’s worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the second amendment to protect our other God-given rights. That is a prudent deal. It is rational." America means guns. It's written in our constitution, reinforced through our history, reflected in our multimedia franchises and sold to American citizens as a product. The only way out of this situation is through it - we can't declare a firearms ban in-media-res without inciting even more violence and dividing people further. At the same time, America cannot continue to sustain this loss of our politicians, schoolchildren and minority populations. The threat to democracy is real, exacerbated by the potential for further "emergency powers" abuse we're familiar with from both parties. When people push for firearms control in America, this is the polemic they argue along. You can say they're justified or completely bonkers, but denying that these scenarios exist is the blueprint for erasing causality.
- goshdangit 1y ago
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- agensaequivocum 1y ago
  No it's not because of the guns. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Shinzo_Abe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Shinzo_Abe
  - bigyabai 1y ago
    Shinzo Abe's killer was captured immediately, he had to walk right in front of him to get a shot off. Charlie Kirk's assassin is still at-large and fired from a standoff distance, with a conventional long-barrel firearm. Make of that what you will.
    - 1y ago
chipsrafferty 1y ago
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- flipwassal 1y ago
  Do you know of whom they are speaking of when they say the 10%? It could be liberals, conservatives, moderates, expats from Europe, etc. I cannot believe that people think that violence is a good answer to anything. I don’t upvote these recent killing of political figures or C-levels at companies that destroy people’s lives. I sympathize with those that fight injustice and want the world changed for the better. But, there are often non-violent ways to do this.
  - lovich 1y ago
    > I cannot believe that people think that violence is a good answer to anything. There is quite a bit of philosophical arguments and discussions backing violence as _a_ solution, albeit not the only solution and usually one reserved for when other measures fail. Look to this treatise as a start[1] If you think it’s never a solution then all you have done is unilaterally disarmed, and ceded decision making power to those who still keep violence in their toolbox [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_War https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_War
ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
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- nobodywillobsrv 1y ago
  No the empathy comment is about it being confused with naive sympathy. Empathy means fully simulating the other person state of mind and world. Empathy is cognitive spend. Love thy enemy is a short cut because human brains seem to be unable to think properly in anger. You need to simulate your enemy to understand their positions and seek deals.
  - ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
    I don't follow what you're trying to say here. If you think that encouraging empathy is a bad thing and discouraging empathy is good, then there's little hope for you. The lack of empathy can easily be shown to lead to the evils of Nazism and the desire to be cruel to people who are not "in our group" (e.g. their skin colour is different or were born elsewhere)
nobodywillobsrv 1y ago
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- deleted 1y ago
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lotsofpulp 1y ago

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frumplestlatz 1y ago
[flagged]
- bccdee 1y ago
  Who are "we," and what is it that "you're" not putting up with? The last act of violence comparable to this (against a Republican, that is—two Minnesota Democrats were shot in June¹) was the 2024 attempt on Trump's life, where the shooter was a registered Republican who espoused anti-immigrant sentiments on social media². I give it better than even odds that the Kirk shooter, if they have any coherent political views at all, is right of centre. That's where all the violent radicalization is happening right now. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_shootings_of_Minnesota_legislators https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_shootings_of_Minnesota_le... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Matthew_Crooks#Political_activities https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Matthew_Crooks#Politica...
  - frumplestlatz 1y ago
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    - bccdee 1y ago
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      - frumplestlatz 1y ago
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        bccdee 1y ago
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        frumplestlatz 1y ago
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idiotsecant 1y ago

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dolmen 1y ago
However France has strict firearms control so the scale of violence is still in control and shooting political figures is not common nowadays.
- ttoinou 1y ago
  This is quite backwards. Right now revolts in France are useless. When they were useful back in the days, a lot of citizens had guns. Guns laws changed to reduce their powers
  - prmoustache 1y ago
    They are not useless in the sense that they are visible and at some point the state cannot only respond with more violence from police force forever or else the dictatorship becomes assumed. But current protests aren't revolts nor violence anyway. There is side/peripheral violence but that is not the point of the protests
    - ttoinou 1y ago
      the state cannot only respond with more violence from police force forever As long as they control the media narrative it's all good it can continue for a long time
  - more_corn 1y ago
    Revolts don’t need guns. Look at Nepal. Look at Bangladesh. Look at the Arab spring. When people are so pissed off that millions of people take to the streets governments fall.
- philipallstar 1y ago
  That's only because they cut back on the cartoons they draw.

s5300 1y ago

[dead]

bccdee 1y ago

[flagged]

orwin 1y ago
To be clear: Hitler was not put in power by any election. Von Papen and Hindeberg, under advice from industry leaders, gave him power. In fact, the Nazi party electoral results were down from the previous election. Both the socialist and communist party were up however, and so the men in power chose Hitler to change that. All of those were killed or politically neutered within 6 months, and honestly, they made their bed.
- bccdee 1y ago
  The Nazis and the Communists won enough seats between them in 1932 that it was impossible for Hindenburg to form a government without one or the other. Hitler didn't win a majority, but he won more seats than anyone else, which was enough to ultimately finagle his way to the Chancellorship through broadly legitimate means. I'd call that an electoral victory, albeit a weaselly one. Of course, then the Reichstag caught fire, and that was about it for Weimar democracy. But up until that point, his political success came off the back of genuine popularity at the ballot box. He only managed to became Chancellor because enough people voted for him.
  - ZeroGravitas 1y ago
    [flagged]
    - bccdee 1y ago
      Oh I agree, I don't think the Republican agenda reflects some sort of authentic "will of the people." It's produced as much by propaganda as anything else. Nevertheless, it's propaganda that many Americans have swallowed, and those people then go on to put Republicans in power year after year. I can't fault Democrats for their bitterness towards Republican voters.
    - d1sxeyes 1y ago

bigyabai 1y ago

> everyone needs to take a step back regardless of which side you’re on and say “Why?” It's easy to get sucked into a learned helplessness doing this, though. We know exactly why it happens - Charlie Kirk explained it himself: "You will never live in a society when you have an armed citizenry and you won’t have a single gun death. That is nonsense, [...] But I think it’s worth it. I think it’s worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the second amendment to protect our other God-given rights. That is a prudent deal. It is rational." America means guns. It's written in our constitution, reinforced through our history, reflected in our multimedia franchises and sold to American citizens as a product. The only way out of this situation is through it - we can't declare a firearms ban in-media-res without inciting even more violence and dividing people further. At the same time, America cannot continue to sustain this loss of our politicians, schoolchildren and minority populations. The threat to democracy is real, exacerbated by the potential for further "emergency powers" abuse we're familiar with from both parties. When people push for firearms control in America, this is the polemic they argue along. You can say they're justified or completely bonkers, but denying that these scenarios exist is the blueprint for erasing causality.

goshdangit 1y ago
[dead]
agensaequivocum 1y ago
No it's not because of the guns. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Shinzo_Abe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Shinzo_Abe
- bigyabai 1y ago
  Shinzo Abe's killer was captured immediately, he had to walk right in front of him to get a shot off. Charlie Kirk's assassin is still at-large and fired from a standoff distance, with a conventional long-barrel firearm. Make of that what you will.
  - 1y ago

chipsrafferty 1y ago

[flagged]

flipwassal 1y ago
Do you know of whom they are speaking of when they say the 10%? It could be liberals, conservatives, moderates, expats from Europe, etc. I cannot believe that people think that violence is a good answer to anything. I don’t upvote these recent killing of political figures or C-levels at companies that destroy people’s lives. I sympathize with those that fight injustice and want the world changed for the better. But, there are often non-violent ways to do this.
- lovich 1y ago
  > I cannot believe that people think that violence is a good answer to anything. There is quite a bit of philosophical arguments and discussions backing violence as _a_ solution, albeit not the only solution and usually one reserved for when other measures fail. Look to this treatise as a start[1] If you think it’s never a solution then all you have done is unilaterally disarmed, and ceded decision making power to those who still keep violence in their toolbox [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_War https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_War

ndsipa_pomu 1y ago

[flagged]

nobodywillobsrv 1y ago
No the empathy comment is about it being confused with naive sympathy. Empathy means fully simulating the other person state of mind and world. Empathy is cognitive spend. Love thy enemy is a short cut because human brains seem to be unable to think properly in anger. You need to simulate your enemy to understand their positions and seek deals.
- ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
  I don't follow what you're trying to say here. If you think that encouraging empathy is a bad thing and discouraging empathy is good, then there's little hope for you. The lack of empathy can easily be shown to lead to the evils of Nazism and the desire to be cruel to people who are not "in our group" (e.g. their skin colour is different or were born elsewhere)

nobodywillobsrv 1y ago

[flagged]

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]