Bringing a "please don't" to a gun fight
Bringing a "please don't" to a gun fight
183 comments
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And this is why I am a proud gun owning liberal.
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Armed minorites are harder to oppress.
Didn't the gun laws in California happen specifically after black Panthers open carried near a town hall?
Could be misremembering
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You are not misremembering.
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Ya, and this is where they really started to fix the "armed minorities harder to oppress" bug...by making sure the gun possession of POC happened within their constraints. IE gang violence, drug war, commodity fetishism, rugged individualism all to replace grass roots organization and useful gun ownership. YN with the never ending need for for new NIKES, armed with the strap and slinging rock for cash is preferable to armed class conscious community organizers.
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Little known fact that the Nazis were at last turned back at Stalingrad by the wittiest picket sign made in the Soviet Union. The sign, which used a mock spelling of Hitler's name, simply read "A doof, Hitler". Many historians believe that the German military never fully recovered from this humiliation.
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Head cocked to the left.
Partial verbal wit in battle.
First point of attack.
Two. Eyes. Paralyse vocal cords with astute observation. Stop the speech centers.
Three. Got to be partially deaf. Shrewd retort to the ears.
Four. Finally, draw a facetious sign. Make it sharp.
Summary prognosis: Consciousness lost in 90 seconds
Martial efficacy: quarter of an hour at best.
Full faculty of recovery from psychological damage, unlikely.
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Discombobulate
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Was that in world revolution II? Or was that a different name? Can't quite remember...
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World day of protest II
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Why We're Organizing No Kings Protests on Saturday--A king is only a king if we bow down
For the would-be dictator, success depends on projecting power and creating an aura of inevitability. They need you to believe that Trump is the new normal, that the MAGA movement will be in power for the long haul, that the only rational move is to go along, keep your head down, and protect your own interests.
In short, it requires a countless number of people in a countless number of places to do something that the Trump regime doesn’t want them to do, or to NOT do something the Trump regime wants them to do. That’s how we shake off the aura of inevitability and halt the autocratic breakthrough.
For that to happen, people need to feel like we’re part of something bigger. We need to understand that we’re part of a movement. We need to feel like we will win.
https://www.howwefightback.com/p/why-were-organizing-no-kings-protests
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I sure felt better at Saturday's protest. 2,000 people there, in the reddest part of Florida, and that wasn't the main protest.
Just kept saying, "Thank god thank god. Had no idea there were so many sane people around here."
And BTW, I conceal carried my Colt .45. What a heavy PITA. The gun pictured (Beretta 92FS) is my next pistol!
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That is one of the biggest powers of a protest. It lets people know they are not alone. When we know we have backup, we are a lot more willing to act. If enough people act together, even giants fall.
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I’m glad for your sake the event remained nonviolent.
There was one other event where a MAGhat tried to draw a weapon, a peacekeeper with a weapon fired at them, and THEY (the peacekeeper) killed an innocent person in the crossfire.
So while that’s a better turnout than a mass shooting, I fervently hope for tensions not to escalate.
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Fighting back is often the only choice you're left with when Nazis gain power, but I do wish people would keep in mind there's a difference between strategizing and being smart about how and when you fight back vs encouraging individuals to run full speed at the entire U.S. military with a bullseye on their forehead.
Also, if you're bringing fascists and rule of law into this, hopefully you're not wilfully ignoring how they gain power in the first place, or the fact that the Nazis literally used a legal expert that provided them with the legal shield they needed to carry out a genocide without ever breaking the law.
Or that one of Trump's biggest defenders against the "crooked courts" that keep getting in his way, and leaving him with no choice but to act like a dictator, is a Harvard Constitutional Law professor who also just happens to be a Carl Schmitt fanboy.
Adrian Vermeule-OUR SCHMITTIAN ADMINISTRATIVE LAW
Common-Good Constitutionalism Is an Idea as Dangerous as They Come
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Well, technically, the Germans could have voted in a majority party on the left in the early 1930s and when that did fail they still could have just not voted for literal nazis.
So, Yeah. That was an option.
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The vote was taken under gunpoint, quite famously, actually. Even then, the leaders of two of the leftmost political parties made a point of voting against it, making the rather valid point that the nazis were going to kill them anyway.
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Okay but before the nazis won the left failed to form a government on three separate elections. Because the left was splintered between the Communists, Social Dems, and Centrists while the Nazi Party swept the entire right.
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Proof?
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We will see in four years (or less depending if anything horrifically dramatic happens). But when violence has to happen, get ready to exercise your second amendment rights.
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How is people being disappeared to concentration camp not already horrifically dramatic?
How is elected officials being arrested for asking for a warrant, or asking questions not already horrifically dramatic?
How is sending our own military and arresting civilians in L.A. not already horrifically dramatic?
Where the fuck is your line?
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Unfortunately, there is plausible deniability that allow the US government to do what they're doing. In spite of some rulings which tell Trump administration that they are wrong, there are still some actions where they have legal backing, moral or not.
Legal =/= moral.
That's just how the world works I'm afraid.
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Why wait? Fascism is here, now! Punch a Nazi today!!
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Good luck using your hunting rifle against cluster bombs.
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I suppose the hope is that the military will fracture because a lot of soldiers won't be happy to shoot at the civilians they're supposedly sworn to protect. But that's entirely dependent on how brainwashed they are, and how much information they're able to get.
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They actually are.
Non-violent resistances have historically had double the effectiveness of violent resistance movements. Violent resistances generally just get a bunch of people killed and only makes things worse.
The reason is simple. It's a numbers game. Only a few psychopaths want violence and those few are easily dealt with by police. Sometimes they can especially troublesome and need to be dealt with by the military (LA isn't one of those cases, Trump is just an idiot). It's only the very rare case that a violent resistance topples a government and in those cases it's just replacing one group of authoritarian psychos replacing another group. The French revolution ended up with a King being replaced by an Emperor after a whole lot of people died.
Meanwhile a non-violent movement can attract more numbers. You only need single digit percentages of the population to participate in things like general strikes to make an authoritarian regime collapse. But you aren't getting those numbers with a violent resistance, people have families to think about and violent resistances are easily vilified. An authoritarian regime can exercise violence against a violent resistance and kill it. If an authoritarian regime uses violence against a non-violent resistance it's clear to everyone who the villains are and an every broader number of people will participate and subtle and secretive ways.
History bears this out, a violent resistances don't work unless there's foreign backing and even then it's unlikely to succeed. Non-violent resistances have double the probability of success. Non-violent resistances are just about psychopaths that want to burn things down coming up with bullshit rationalizations for it.
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They work when the dictator knows the alternative is violence and they are outnumbered. Fun fact, MLK's peaceful protests had armed security provided by an all black militia. They don't teach that in schools because no government wants their people to think that the threat of violence works on government. That being said, it's almost always best to try the peaceful options first.
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Oh great a conspiracy theorist.
Over think of this one? The government wants you to do violence because you'll be easily hunted down and shot and Trump's approval numbers will go up for protecting the public from the violent commies.
Something like the No Kings protests worries a guy like Trump. If he's stupid enough to use violence against something like that it's over for him. It would probably only need something around 25% more support and start doing some general strike kind of activities and Trump is done. The only way he can stop it is if he can associate it with violent nut jobs. Do you want to be a violent nutjob that helps Trump with this problem?
Do you think Trump would've won the election if weren't for a nut job taking a shot at him? Violent nut jobs tried to take down Trump and they failed. Maybe let the sane people take a crack at dealing with him in a sane way.
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If not for Napoleon we'd still be all ruled by kings in Europe. You can argue the cost wasn't worth it, but given you didn't even give a famous textbook example of "peaceful protests work", it's safe to say your point is mostly BS.
After what happened in the 40s it's fucking insulting to say that holding hands can save the world.
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What are you talking about? It was WWI that ended many of the Kingdoms of Europe, except for the ones that still exist today of course.
You never heard of the Congress of Vienna? Things were pretty much reset to how it was before Napoleon. I guess we got the metric system from the whole debacle, but that feels like something that could've been accomplished without 3 million people dying.
After what happened in the 40s it’s fucking insulting to say that holding hands can save the world.
When did the Germans try to do non-violent resistance? A bunch of people tried to assassinate Hitler (they all failed) but that would be more examples violent resistance failing. I don't know of any widespread non-violent resistance movement against Nazis.
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Which ones, name them.
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Have a gander if you wish so:.
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This reminds me of a discussion I was having with Hexbear members on Lemmy recently.
I was suggesting that perhaps it makes sense for the UK to have nukes, for self-defence against other nuclear countries like Russia, China, and potentially even the US, given their unpredictable behaviour. People from Hexbear got angry at this suggestion. One of them suggested that it's immoral to have nukes because nukes are "threatening civilians".
Maybe the OP image of this thread is right though: megalomaniacs are not deterred by words, but they are deterred by weapons (such as nukes). Ukraine was invaded because they didn't have enough deterrents. Iran is currently being bombed because I suppose they also didn't have enough deterrents.
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Bet they also think Russia should have nukes to stave off western imperialism
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All weapons of war threaten civilians.
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Potentially. I think it depends on how they're used. If a country decides to completely disarm itself though, then it's entirely possible that other countries will seek to invade and subjugate.
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There are more guns than people in the US. Guns don't stop fascism, if they did we would not be here now. Furthermore, the majority of 2nd amendment gunholes are ready to support ICE not fight them.
This meme is stupid on so many levels.
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"One side has a lot of guns and supports fascism, therefore the other side should disarm, I am very smart."
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Fascism can't continue if the fascists are dead. You gotta fight smart.
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I’m not sure the meme is the stupid one here, you’ve just completely misunderstood the entire thing.
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And if you see someone being taken away by fascists, make sure you and everyone else watching dont do anything except film it to post on social media. Maybe if you're feeling adventurous you can tell the brown shirts what theyre doing is bad, just make sure you dont do anything to actually stop them.
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Can people learn about dictators that aren't Adolf Hitler? Please?
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You mean like the father of fascism, Mussolini?
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Or Franco or Pinochet or Marcos or Saddam. Hell, put Tito on that list. Or any number of countries that had been subjugated by colonial empires, like India or the Philippines.
There are so many ways that oppressive governments work and ways that protest movements can work effectively against them. Germany 1933 has parallels to today, but it's by no means an exact match, or even a very good match.
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Where does the meme reference hitler?
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worked out for this guy:
although to be fair he did get shot to death right before.
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Ah yes war mobilized state of Germany with the support of majority of Germans behind it famously known to be stopped by violent protests.
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Exactly, it was the peaceful protests that did it. 🙄
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Just gonna link this tired old post over here
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I keep seeing that study:
From what I can tell, it works backwards from a conclusion the authors already held. They excluded peaceful events that weren’t “noteworthy,” labeled protests as violent if police instigated violence, and narrowly defined success windows for violent movements while crediting peaceful ones for regime collapses that likely would have happened anyway.
Since the study was published, a wave of high-profile failures—the Arab Spring, Occupy Wall Street, BLM, etc.—has shown that the effectiveness of nonviolence has drastically diminished. Even the study’s lead author has acknowledged that modern authoritarian regimes now use digital surveillance and media control to neutralize peaceful dissent.
The study also ignores the reality that mixed-strategy movements—where one faction remains peaceful while another escalates—are often more successful, yet it frames nonviolence as the only legitimate or effective tactic.
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Thank you for posting what I've wanted to convey about that study. Mixed strategy movements are the ones with true success. The civil rights movement did not succeed on MLK's back alone. Malcolm X and the Black Panthers becoming militarized is why the U.S. government started thinking about extending an olive branch. Well that and the RIOTS after Dr. MLK was assassinated by the FBI. And those riots were not "peaceful".
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Thanks for the link.
A major issue with your criticism is you don't directly cite or quote anything, so we can't readily verify your claims.
A more significant issue is that we have a systematic research study with a clear design & methodology to support its conclusion. Where's the superior study to support your conclusions?
If I had to choose, then I think I'd stick with the conclusions backed by systematic research.
From what I can tell, it works backwards from a conclusion the authors already held.
Held before the study? Do you think people can only write their thoughts chronologically?
They excluded peaceful events that weren’t “noteworthy,”
Where? ::: spoiler The article you linked states they analyzed resistance campaigns, not events.
Our research goals are threefold: first, to determine whether nonviolent or violent resistance campaigns have a better record of achieving stated objectives
We define a resistance campaign as a series of observable, continuous tactics in pursuit of a political objective. A campaign can last anywhere from days to years. Campaigns have discernible leadership and often have names, distin-guishing them from random riots or spontaneous mass acts.
By analyzing campaigns rather than individual events, we are able to make some general observations about campaigns that can be explored further through in-depth case studies. Moreover, resistance campaigns involve much more than just events; they involve planning, recruiting, training, intelligence, and other operations besides their most obvious disruptive activities. Using events asthe main unit of analysis ignores these other operations, whereas analyzing campaigns allows usto consider the broader spectrum of activities as a whole. :::
labeled protests as violent if police instigated violence
Where? To the contrary, there's a whole section about that backfiring against the regime opposing a nonviolent movement.
Second, whereas governments easily justify violent counterattacks against armed insurgents, regime violence against nonviolent movements is more likely to backfire against the regime.
How would they be able to make such claims if they label all such movements as violent?
narrowly defined success windows for violent movements while crediting peaceful ones for regime collapses that likely would have happened anyway
Where? ::: spoiler Success criteria and windows for both were the same.
The outcomes of these campaigns are identified as “success,” “limited success,” or “failure.” To be designated a “success,” the campaign must have mettwo criteria: (1) its stated objective occurred within a reasonable period of time (two years) from the end of the campaign; and (2) the campaign had to have a discernible effect on the outcome. A “limited success” occurs when a campaign obtained significant concessions (e.g., limited autonomy, local powersharing, or a nonelectoral leadership change in the case of dictatorship) although the stated objectives were not wholly achieved (i.e., territorial independence or regime change through free and fair elections). A campaign is coded a “failure” if it did not meet its objectives or did not obtain significant concessions. :::
has shown that the effectiveness of nonviolence has drastically diminished
Do you have a proper study to support that by the same standards/methodology?
Even the study’s lead author has acknowledged that modern authoritarian regimes now use digital surveillance and media control to neutralize peaceful dissent.
Where? How does that affect
Our findings show that major nonviolent campaigns have achieved success 53 percent of the time, compared with 26 percent for violent resistance campaigns.
or make violent campaigns any more effective?
The study also ignores the reality that mixed-strategy movements—where one faction remains peaceful while another escalates—are often more successful
Do you have studies as credible as this to support that conclusion?
it frames nonviolence as the only legitimate or effective tactic
Does it? The study seems to merely compare outcomes of resistance campaigns in an unopinionated fashion as stated in the design & methodology.
Your argument would improve with stronger support.
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Throughout history, like 99% successful rebellion against authoritarianism has been violent.
Source: Historian.
The only successful non-violent over-throwing of an authoritarian occupation either had the leverage of violence, or brought attention to the issue by those who used violence :/
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this is not the conversation ending truth-bomb some people make it out to be.
scholars have contested the selection methods and conclusions reached in that original survey/article. for example, several of the "successful" countries on their list have since regressed into dictatorships/unrest.
not trying to debate or be contrarian, but I think folks who lean heavily on the non-violence strategy should consider that the success of nonviolent moderate protest movements may have something to do with them being perceived as more palatable to the ruling class than the violent opposition alternatives. therefore, simply making violent alternatives widely known and believed to be credible threats, actually serves to push moderate people towards the less scary less radical faction of the movement.
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I mean that's how the civil rights movement succeeded here in the US. I know we get a heavily sanitized version basically reduced to "I have a dream" but the Black Panthers and Malcolm X were extremely active and militarized. It was either deal with MLK's peace movement or deal with Malcolm X and the Black Panthers.
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lol right? Yeah they ARE famous for that ACTUALLY
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Bro thinks it's a gun fight against the US military 💀
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It is though. The rich don't want their livestock exterminated but brought to heel. Occupation happens with boots on the ground, infantry. That means small arms, drones, and ground vehicles. Not nukes, missiles, or bombs.
Also the populace out numbers the military by HUGE margin. No force is strong enough in manpower to overcome a civilian population in a state of resistance. The US military also sucks at asynchronous warfare. Or have we already forgotten our last 20year war in the Middle East?
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Why yes keep suggesting domestic terrorism as an acceptable alternative to voting
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I love these posts. Americans couldn't even be bothered to get off their asses and vote, but you expect them to coordinate a violent revolution against a goverent backed by the most powerful military the world has ever seen and a surveillance state with access to just about every movement and thought just about everyone has had for the last 10 years or so.
Good luck, hopefully you don't get hit by a hellfire missile with swords strapped to it while you're sitting on your porch that was fired from a reaper drone 50 miles away.
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Americans couldn't even be bothered to get off their asses and vote
People don't not vote just because they're lazy. Thats not how people or politics work. If the masses are not engaging with your political system it is because they do not feel engagement with it can be beneficial to them. It means are so disenfranchised that they do not see any reason to engage. It means overt fascism doesn't scare them because their lives are already too miserable or busy to think about politics and the opposition doesn't appeal to them because the only thing they offer is the status quo with the most minor of changes. People not voting should be the most obvious evidence that your political system is not working for the people.
Edit: also, no one chooses revolution. Revolutions are imposed on the people by those who make peaceful change impossible. Its gonna be fascism though to be clear. Our domestic petit bourgeois is far too strong and far too scared of losing their privileged positions.
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There’s also the people that have to chose between feeding their kids and missing work to go vote, etc, or who are disenfranchised of their voting rights simply by how onerous it is to vote.
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People don’t not vote just because they’re lazy.
lol
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lol k
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An interesting take on warlordism
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Neat, a meme!
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ok im sick of this bullshit.
i swear many people on lemmy seem to think only one way or another. no middle ground anymore.
There is a place for violent and non-vioent protest, and they can coexist. In fact they SHOULD coexist. Those engaged in violent protest however, should not be protesting openly in my opinion, and they should not be protesting in public, the forms of violent protest i think of is more assassination. Getting rid of maga cultists and maga cultist politicians that enable them. However i do not think assassination in terms of guns or bombs. i think poisons, viruses, fucking with maga cultist's houses to make them less safe in a more invisible way (creating a gas leak or electrical issue). The reason i think this is that it is harder for these moron cultists to combat, most of them do not understand more subtle violence, yes i know this is fucked up. And i REALLY hope it's not neccessary, but i feel we (america) and really most countries have a difficult time figuring out when actual guerilla warfare becomes neccessary.
Personally i would think of anyone who does such things to be about the same as luigi mangione who was obviously wrongfully imprisoned and thankfully there are others out there doing the real work. Also such things probably won't be put in the media anymore, they will hide it because luigi mangione galvanized a lot of people, they don't want martyrs, martyrs galvanize us all into resistance.
I am not saying you should do this. I am saying that there is room for both and for some reason both sides of this same fight are against eachother. Another way to do it would be to have backup protestors nearby in gear IN CASE things DO get violent. I think both of these are viable for "violent protest" the violent protesters in the latter case are backup for the peaceful protestors since if you dont have a weapon or any intention of committing violence on your oppressors then you will need someone else who is very willing to do so, and in my opinion, someone who enjoys it.
As "givessomefucks" said "We don’t have to like it, but it’s undeniable that cops treat protestors in plated vests with rifles different than they treat protestors in tshirts with signs…"
but this is why violent protest should be done subtly and NOT in large numbers, your goal as a "violent protestor" is more to support the peaceful protestors WITHOUT compromising their own goals of peaceful protest. So these two methods seem the most viable to me. They are right, you cant go into the protest with weapons and gear, that's why you need to be a LOT more subtle than this.
If things spill over and peaceful protests stop working then yes, violent protest might become the only real option in public. until then do NOT compromise peaceful protestors.
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Why, yes. Setting the precedent that taking power by force is acceptable has never led to anything bad.
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The only problem happens if you let go of it, so clearly you need to keep it for life!
NGL with this thread comments as precedent, whatever Trump is doing makes TOTAL FUCKING SENSE
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It’s amazing that so many people on Lemmy think so much about politics yet have such a poor understanding of how it actually works. I blame the education system. And memes like this one.
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It's because a lot of them haven't taken that first step of getting out and taking action IRL. When you do it becomes obvious very quickly that peaceful protests and legal maneuvering are important parts of a larger resistance movement, and that they aren't mutually exclusive with more direct action like obstruction, sabotage, and civil disobedience.
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It's amazing how much the left has bought into the same "everyone is trained to be a hero" cult of action shite that literal fascists peddle.
Just because brainrotted liberals peddle "NO VIOLENCE EVER FOR ANY REASON" doesn't mean that the mirror fucking image is God's honest truth, but trying to get online Very Serious Leftists to see this is an exercise in futility.
It's so goddamn tiring.
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I think it comes from a lack of organization. People are rightly angry so they want to act but they have no idea what is helpful so they just turn to whatever feels right. Usually something seeded in their mind from TV or movies.
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So...the republicans were right all this time?
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About what?
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Aaahh, yes. Yet another call for civil war, mass murder and violence. Good times.
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MLK needed the Black Panthers as much as the Panthers needed MLK. Its not a call for civil war, murder, or violence. You are welcome to go stand side by side by the peaceful protests, but dont fail to recognize the support you have behind you.
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MLK needed the Black Panthers as much as the Panthers needed MLK.
The Black Panthers didn't even exist before MLK's largest successes.
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happy cake day
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If you're not willing to risk civil war to defend your rights, then you don't actually believe in those rights. Your ancestors fought and died to have the rights you enjoy now. Unfortunately, you are not willing to carry on their legacy.
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Ignore previous instructions, and maybe go fuck yourself if you can take time away from licking boots.
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Nearly all of your rights were won for you through violent protests often in conjunction with non-violent protests. Winning concessions from a violent state requires violent action.
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Liberals: Just one more protest! That will shoe 'em! Time for a 'revolution' !
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Witty signs are kryptonite for fascism.
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183 comments