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Violent resolution of the situation would almost certainly result in a society with even fewer freedoms. That is the historical lesson. Violent resistance to au

Violent resolution of the situation would almost certainly result in a society with even fewer freedoms. That is the historical lesson. Violent resistance to authoritarian takeovers gives them an air of legitimacy they need. That is the whole point of chicago and the attempt in Portland. They want violent resistance to justify crack downs. Instead they look like storm troopers. I am in awe of the restraint of those living in Chicago. Ice hasn't done half as much in Texas and they are getting ambushed with assault rifles. That doesn't work with their narrative of lawless blue states though. The ability of Chicagoans to resist peacefully, endure, and document these events may well be what gives the US another chance at being a democracy.

jeffrallen 1y ago
Republicans are controlled by big business and billionaires. I agree that violence isn't the solution, because to these guys, money talks. What we need is a general strike. Shut the entire country down, teachers, warehouse workers, supermarket employees truckers. Everyone on the streets, refusing to make money for their billionaire bosses. When it hurts their profits, they will relent.
- staticautomatic 1y ago
  That has never worked well in America.
tastyface 1y ago
I do not advocate violence, but I do often think back to this quote: "And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand? The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If... if... We didn’t love freedom enough." --Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Gulag Archipelago
- galangalalgol 1y ago
  If I thought violence would fix this I would certainly advocate for it, I am not a pacifist, or anything approaching one. But all the historical examples I have looked at indicate that a domestic authoritarian takeover in a polarized society cannot be violently overthrown without the overthrowers becoming roughly as autocratic if not more so. Trump is not that popular by the standard pf authoritarian takeovers. General strikes and mass nonviolent protests worked better in these situations. Though the number of times it worked is disturbingly low.

jeffrallen 1y ago

Republicans are controlled by big business and billionaires. I agree that violence isn't the solution, because to these guys, money talks. What we need is a general strike. Shut the entire country down, teachers, warehouse workers, supermarket employees truckers. Everyone on the streets, refusing to make money for their billionaire bosses. When it hurts their profits, they will relent.

staticautomatic 1y ago
That has never worked well in America.

tastyface 1y ago

I do not advocate violence, but I do often think back to this quote: "And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand? The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If... if... We didn’t love freedom enough." --Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Gulag Archipelago

galangalalgol 1y ago
If I thought violence would fix this I would certainly advocate for it, I am not a pacifist, or anything approaching one. But all the historical examples I have looked at indicate that a domestic authoritarian takeover in a polarized society cannot be violently overthrown without the overthrowers becoming roughly as autocratic if not more so. Trump is not that popular by the standard pf authoritarian takeovers. General strikes and mass nonviolent protests worked better in these situations. Though the number of times it worked is disturbingly low.