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[misko27]

I'm pretty sure Pence is just playing the "Stand by your man" game. I mean he was doing it before, there's really no benefit to stopping now and alienating his boss and his many angry supporters: anyone that would have been alienated by Pence standing by Trump has probably been alienated for a long while.

[Loud Whispers]

They're both risking their reputations by standing by each other, Trump and Pence being from very different strains of the right who don't always get along.

There is profound wisdom in this post

[smjjames]

The stakes are higher for Pence though as he's already built a political reputation. Seems like he's mainly just trying to survive and/or keep the adminstration from absolutely falling apart at this point. Also, if he leaves, Trump has no motivation to pick a VP that is friendly to Pence's base, which is something that I hadn't considered a moment ago actually.

[Max™]

Antifa need to work on their aim and piss me off for numerous reasons but I'm not talking about socking anyone I think might be a nazi in the jaw "just in case" here, I'm saying when someone marches around throwing the salutes with swastika armbands and flags, you pop them in the jaw and make them stop.
Worst case, it's a really fucking stupid cosplay choice, you can apologize and get them a drink or something.

When fighting Islamism with bullets and fists: it is like throwing water on oil, you're just spreading it around, all until someone drops a match. What differs now? Breaking their jaw is easily the worst solution, because it will just steel their conviction and make them feel like they have suffered meaningfully for their cause, it is the same principle behind hazing in groups - you can take a meaningless group or special club, beat up the newbies, the newbies will then vehemently defend the value of the special club even if it's some useless club penguin shit. Secondly you've just created an angry violent person who is already vulnerable to becoming an angry violent person. Turning a useless larper into a training soldier is not a good idea

The answer is then to not stop punching them, and seriously, if that bunch of disappointing betaboys (white polo+khakis? seriously?) had something going on besides "waaah, we used to have all the power but now we've only got most of it, waaah, I'm gonna go online and jack off to hitler memes" then they'd be the start of an actual fourth reich wouldn't they? I think everyone knows what you do when that happens.

[misko27]

Loud Whispers, I feel sometimes like talking to you is like talking to one of those "Ancient Jedi Master"-types that drip out cryptic wisdom to frustrated protagonists and Watson-like side characters. Like an ancient jedi master with an appreciation for memes.

Also, Trump has disbanded those two business advisory councils after more defections happened. It's probably not a bad move for him, given how those defections have been making headlines ever since Elon dropped out after Paris (whereas one disbanding will only hold headlines for a very short period of time). I wonder if there are implications for his relationship with the business community, but I don't know enough about whatever those councils did to judge.

[Loud Whispers]

The answer is then to not stop punching them, and seriously, if that bunch of disappointing betaboys (white polo+khakis? seriously?) had something going on besides "waaah, we used to have all the power but now we've only got most of it, waaah, I'm gonna go online and jack off to hitler memes" then they'd be the start of an actual fourth reich wouldn't they?

Spoiler: *teleports behind you* (click to show/hide)

DELET THIS

I think everyone knows what you do when that happens.

The violence turns to armed conflict and then the Chinese send weapons to antifa and fascist to ensure USA remains in perpetual state of low level conflict
Either that or it's just a massacre
pls no

Point being besides anomalies like MSH or MZ there are few people capable of sustaining an eternal face punch

Loud Whispers, I feel sometimes like talking to you is like talking to one of those "Ancient Jedi Master"-types that drip out cryptic wisdom to frustrated protagonists and Watson-like side characters. Like an ancient jedi master with an appreciation for memes.

Spoiler: I use translators (click to show/hide)

[Dunamisdeos]

Does anyone here actually envision a future where if you hurt people enough their beliefs will change? How can anyone advocate that with a straight face?
 
We saw a group of armed and volatile bigots and decided the coolest thing to do was meet them with violence, and now someone is dead and a lot of people are injured because the whole situation escalated as a result. And the reaction is "Yeah good job, let's do that some more"? When the cops saw people pulling down a confederate war monument soon afterwards, they didn't jump in and break them up because meeting them with force would obviously escalate things and people's lives are more important than pushing for or against any ideology.
 
Neither group involved out there gives half a damn who gets hurt so long as they get to be heroes in their own minds. I could care less which one of you is wearing a red armband if both of you are just as likely to get someone killed.

[Chevaleresse]

Trump's not disbanding his councils, they're disbanding themselves and he's trying to say he shut them down to save face.

[sluissa]

Trump's not disbanding his councils, they're disbanding themselves and he's trying to say he shut them down to save face.

"You can't quit, I'm firing you."

[Playergamer]

Chicago pastor calls for re-naming of Jackson, Washington parks, and removal of Washington statue.

Hmm...maybe Trump really is a time traveler.

Edit: /s that was a joke no bully

[Loud Whispers]

Does anyone here actually envision a future where if you hurt people enough their beliefs will change? How can anyone advocate that with a straight face?

Do it for the banter
 

Neither group involved out there gives half a damn who gets hurt so long as they get to be heroes in their own minds. I could care less which one of you is wearing a red armband if both of you are just as likely to get someone killed.

Reasonable, so then an important question must be asked. Little of this would occur if police were adept at keeping such groups separate, and ideally, neither groups would exist. So what went wrong that police did not, and what led to the creation of all these groups?

Chicago pastor calls for re-naming of Jackson, Washington parks, and removal of Washington statue.
Hmm...maybe Trump really is a time traveler.

Yesterday's irony really is tomorrow's sincerity

[smjjames]

Chicago pastor calls for re-naming of Jackson, Washington parks, and removal of Washington statue.

Hmm...maybe Trump really is a time traveler.

Edit: /s that was a joke no bully

Lol, look at this quote: "The pastor also said President Andrew Jackson’s name should be removed from nearby Jackson Park, because he also was a slave owner. He said he’s not necessarily asking the city rename the parks altogether. He suggested Washington Park could be named after former Mayor Harold Washington, and Jackson Park could be named after civil rights leader Rev. Jesse Jackson or singer Michael Jackson."

He literally gives himself (and the city council) a loophole to keep the names.

[Frumple]

When the cops saw people pulling down a confederate war monument soon afterwards, they didn't jump in and break them up because meeting them with force would obviously escalate things and people's lives are more important than pushing for or against any ideology.

Well, yes, because the people pulling down the confed war monument erected in the... what, 40s? to shit on civil rights, weren't genocide advocates. Even if they had broken them up, it would have likely turned to fistfights and maybe thrown shit at worst, since most ideological blocks don't look at things like vehicular homicide and call it a good day. Probably helped that the cops likely wanted the damn thing gone, too, though.

What you seem to be missing is that there isn't a situation where refusing to do everything short of outright murder (if that) to stamp nazi ideology back into the ground is anything except saying you care more about someone's ideology than people's lives. You're just saying the nazi ideology, the one that has as part of its basic makeup and inevitable results, because it's a core goddamn facet of the filth, murder and genocide, is more important than the lives they'll end up taking if left be.

Said it before. Will say it again. If you generalize this stuff out, reacting as people are suggesting trends fairly hard towards reprehensible. But this is not general. There definitely is one group involved that gives a damn whether the other gets hurt or not, and it sure as shit isn't the literal goddamned nazis who have killing people as their base goddamn goal. The problem with this specific situation is not any ideology, it's a very specific ideology that will literally start killing people if let grow to the point its adherents think they can get away with it. There is no equating capable of being done here except in staggeringly bad faith, because the people opposing Nazis at most want to stop them in today and keep them from murdering in the future, and the Nazis want to gather up enough people to start in on trying to murder millions and are, as we bloody see, happy when murder happens in the now, too. Trying to say either side of this issue is as likely as the other to get people killed is utter bullshit, because y'know, one side is literal goddamn nazis.

bloody hell even sodding white supremacy has more room to be defended than freaking nazi shit, since that shit is supremacy with an extra helping of genocide

[Lord Shonus]

Alternatively, you can say that physically attacking somebody for their beliefs, no matter what those beliefs are, is a crime against humanity. Refusing to allow somebody to use your private property to express those beliefs is perfectly good. Protests and counter-protests are an excellent way to counter speech you find repugnant on public grounds. But advocating preventing somebody you disagree with from speaking by force, and suggesting that murdering somebody for their opinions is not necessarily beyond the pale is just as vile as anything the neo-nazis have done. When their speech extends to actual violence (including destruction of property or targeted intimidation), go ahead and throw the book at them, but not one second before - and prosecute anyone who tries to shut them down violently just as much.

Doing anything else pisses on the very concept of a free society.

[Gizogin]

-snip-

Nazis are terrible. This isn't the kind of thing that needs or even permits any sort of nuance or subtlety. Anyone calling themselves a Nazi or using their imagery in the present day has looked at the atrocious crimes against humanity committed under that flag in the past - an ideology so universally recognized as evil that using it as a comparison is now seen as lazy hyperbole - and said, "Yes, please, more of that."

Defending yourself against violence that they have initiated? Great. Prosecuting them for said violence once the danger is over? Even better. But it has to be based on actions and law, not affiliation and speech. I still disagree that engaging in violence against them specifically because they are Nazis is in any way justified, let alone imperative.

First of all, what will it accomplish? Who is going to be convinced to change their mind because of a brief discourse between knuckle and jaw? To me, what that says is, "I'm not sure my words are stronger than your words, but I know my fist is stronger than your face." Hey, what was the specific event that prompted this most recent round of discussion? Did it, by any chance, involve unprovoked violence against a person participating in a (counter-)protest movement? "It's okay for me to be violent against any member of this group because they advocate (and commit) violence" seems pretty self-defeating.

Second, what kind of world would it be if it were acceptable to punch someone for expressing an opinion that you, or even a majority of people, find reprehensible? If it's to be restricted to only a certain ideology, who gets to decide which faces are punchable and which are not? Or, who would you trust to make that decision? Can you be sure that you're in all the "right" groups?

Defending people is not the same thing as defending what those people believe in, nor is it the same thing as agreeing with them.