Antifa adherents — some armed with sticks and masked in bandannas — played a visible role in the running street battles in Charlottesville, but it is impossible to know how many people count themselves as members of the movement. Its followers acknowledge it is secretive, without official leaders and organized into autonomous local cells. It is also only one in a constellation of activist movements that have come together in the past several months to the fight the far right....That makes me think about that NYT article 2 days ago — "Alt-Right, Alt-Left, Antifa: A Glossary of Extremist Language" (blogged here) — that relied on the characterizations of Mark Pitcavage, an analyst at the Anti-Defamation League, who deemed “alt-left" "just a made-up epithet" and "antifa" an "old left-wing extremist movement."
The new article today seems to acknowledge the inadequacy of the 2-day-old article. The older article seemed intent on pushing back Donald Trump for talking about the "alt-left" as well as the "alt-right." The term "false equivalence" — which was a big media talking point earlier in the week — appears in the older article. I thought "false equivalence" was being used to say, essentially: When one side is worse than the other side, you're not even allowed to compare them.
There was something false about saying "false equivalence." Strictly speaking, the label applies only when 2 things are said to be the same. It shouldn't work to exclude all comparisons when people are being clear about the similarities and differences.
In the case of Charlottesville, there was no logical fallacy in saying there were 2 opposing factions that arrived on scene ready to rumble as long as you're also clear that the 2 sides were different. One side wanted to exercise its free speech rights to express bad, ugly ideas. The other side wanted to interfere with the exercise of free speech rights and was motivated by hostility to ideas that deserved hostility.
In the new article, there's less concern about stepping on the "false equivalence" talking point. There's a recognition that people like Nauert are headed in a violent direction and are gaining adherents. Maybe acting like they're nothing (or nothing any good people dare speak about) is dangerous. Right after that quote from Nauert, there's this subtle discarding of the "false equivalence" talking point:
Others on the left disagree, saying antifa’s methods harm the fight against right-wing extremism and have allowed Mr. Trump to argue that the two sides are equivalent....Now, Trump never said "the 2 sides are equivalent." He didn't say "equivalent" and he didn't even say "2 sides." He said "We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides." But those who were pushing the "false equivalence" idea needed to rely on the idea that one side is bad and the other is good, and they needed to minimize antifa. Now, the NYT admits the left has a violence problem. Good!
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353 comments:
1 – 200 of 353 Newer› Newest»As someone said yesterday - There is no "alt left" there's just left.
The new article today seems to acknowledge the inadequacy of the 2-day-old article.
"Inadequacy" is far too mild a term, suggesting a failed but sincere effort. How about "blatant lies"? "Sophistry"?
""You need violence in order to protect nonviolence. That’s what’s very obviously necessary right now. It’s full-on war, basically.""
-- We had to X the Y to save the Y.
Orwell
There were white nationalists at Berkeley, and it didn't make the news?
That explains the tiki torches--necessary to get attention.
Trump's first response was fine for everyone but the MSM and far left. Why is that?
I really wish more protesters of all stripes read more of Martin Luther King.
Is that really where they want to take this?
Perhaps it's time to study up on the concealed carry laws of my state.
As someone said yesterday - There is no "alt left" there's just left.
I said that, though I was probably not the only one. I'll go further, though, and distinguish Liberals from the Left. You see them struggling to grasp that the activists to their Left, who used to be their allies -- the bad cop to their reasonable good cop -- are actually the baddies in this story, even us the Left turns on them and seeks their humiliation and destruction.
Left stomps on free speech, demands to smash its face in. Media OK with it.
I agree with the "others on the left"
Trump is amazing isn't he. He stopped a narrative dead in it's tracks.
When have we seen a politician stop something like this? Obama with the ebola panic? It was all over the news then stopped like a light switch.
But that was talking to his supporters. Not the case in this instance.
My rule is when someone screams RACISM they are hiding or diverting attention away from some evil they are perpetrating. There have been glimmers of realization on the left of the evil that is nascent in the neo fascist group when some leftist becomes the target. Straight down the center business, media, entertainment, literary and academic people are deathly afraid of getting into the target zone of this out of control movement which enjoys destroying people. They are willing to continuously throw some meat to the dogs in the hope that they don't get attacked.
They will. The leftist purges have two effects; they destroy decent people, and they drive the decent into vigorous support of evil out of fear. This is going to characterize the next three years at least.
What were the bad ugly ideas? I never heard the ideas, good or bad.
The ideas would be material to work with, not to prevent, unless somebody thinks they're so obviously insightful and true that it would be dangerous to their cause to let them out. Maybe the opponents believe them.
I say let the ideas out and I'll show you how long they last, but then I don't believe them.
Free citizens of all political persuasions should not tolerate antifa's violent suppression of their rights. Anytime antifa descends upon a place, and the police are unable to keep order, free citizens should be ripping off the antifa masks.
Now, the NYT admits the left has a violence problem.
The left's violence problem will be a major factor in President Trump's re-election.
I am reminded of the period between Richard Nixon's slight victory in 1968 and his landslide victory in 1972.
Balfegor - Agreed. I don't like to use the term liberal anymore. Classical liberalism is closer to conservatism (conserve freedom, conserve the constitution etc..) Most of the left have morphed into progressive liars. Many liberals voted for Trump. A couple who live down the street from me are life long democrats, & they voted for Trump. They keep quiet about it, as they know they are surrounded by intolerant progressives who would shun them.
Is she the porn actress that was in the melee ?
There was one who is an ANTIFA member who drove to the riot to punch someone. She had leaded gloves but they punched her back.
The Democrats are going to regret embracing these people.
They are going to shoot another Republican or two and the fat will be in the fire, so to speak.
Not the pig fat,
Tell the alt right and the alt left they can split Poland. That'll quiet them down for a while.
Nobody is more cowardly in this than congressmen and senators. The deep state sees its chance.
The other side wanted to interfere with the exercise of free speech rights and was motivated by hostility to ideas that deserved hostility.
Ideas never deserve hostility.
One side wanted to exercise its free speech rights to express bad, ugly ideas. The other side wanted to interfere with the exercise of free speech rights and was motivated by hostility to ideas that deserved hostility.
As if violently interfering with free speech rights isn't a bad, ugly action in addition to a bad, ugly idea that deserves hostility?
The neo-nazis are only the latest targets of this tactic, and won't be the last.
There's a recognition that people like Nauert are headed in a violent direction and are gaining adherents
Headed? The Left has been using violence as a political tool since at least 1968.
One side wanted to exercise its free speech rights to express bad, ugly ideas.
Exactly what are those ideas?
Antifa is merely a bunch of anarchists and marxists who believe anyone that doesn't agree with them totally is "alt-right". A good journalist would seek to find out how they are organized and who is funding them. These people don't just pop-up locally. Many are traveling a good distance to get to the fight.
"The other side wanted to interfere with the exercise of free speech rights and was motivated by hostility to ideas that deserved hostility." What evidence do you have that such hostility was their main or only motive? Could the alt-left, maybe, possibly, also be motivated by "ideas that deserve hostility"?
I am betting that once the NYT gets some serious blow back from the left over its most recent article, it will back track and state that violence from the looney right is always bad and must be punished while violence from the looney left is either non-existent or always understandable and should be forgiven. Not condemning political violence regardless of the political orientation of the perpetrators will lead us down the road of the Weimar Republic where Nazi and Communist gangs fought each other in the streets. And we all know how badly that ended. I really don't understand why so many of our so-called leaders inside and outside of government don't seem to be willing to address the violence on both extremes of the political spectrum Is it ignorance, cowardice or a willful blindness?
"The Left has been using violence as a political tool since at least 1968." 1789.
As more stories come out, the inadequacy of the police becomes ever more apparent.
On Saturday morning, I stood outside our synagogue with the armed security guard we hired after the police department refused to provide us with an officer during morning services. (Even the police department’s limited promise of an observer near our building was not kept — and note, we did not ask for protection of our property, only our people as they worshipped).
Given that threats were made on Nazi websites to burn the Synagogue, the congregants had good reason to worry.
This is the "illiberal" danger or threat that the country sadly faces; although I think the threat is small at this time. That is, extremists on the right and extremists on the left; the center cannot hold. The fascist/Nazis are evil AND the opponents of them - the antifa movement - also hold many evil ideas. It should be possible to keep more than one idea in your head at the same time.
It should be obvious but as someone once wrote people need reminding more than being informed: just because you're against fascism doesn't mean you're a good person. Anymore than being against communism means you're a good person.
It's not just what you're against, it's what you're for that matters as well.
Anyway, a good rule of thumb to use is never join a group that would arrest you if they attained power. Fascists, Marxists, Islamic extremists...whatever.
I didn't see any of the so-called alt-left wearing body armor or carrying semi-automatic weapons( which is probably why the police didn't step in sooner-- they were out gunned), but I did see women clerics in robes, students in shorts, and yes some counter-protestors who engaged in fights with the armed men. Those on the left calling for force to meet force are a small minority. But there is a debate going on about how to meet and resist Neo Nazis etc, and I hope the side that calls for non-violence prevails.
Maybe the bad ugly idea was keeping the statue of Lee up.
You can't have something that shows fight and grace in defeat standing around, would be the ugly thing. Grace in defeat would rebuke the left's path. It's an anti-rebuke counterprotest.
Michael K said...
Is she the porn actress that was in the melee ?"
Same one.
As I noted in the other thread, antifa defaced a statue of Confederate general Joan of Arc in New Orleans last night. You'd think they'd like a woman who carried a sword and fought the English, but no.
Antifa - bravely defacing and attacking inanimate objects. What valor.
There are liberals and leftists, two different words explaining two different types of people.
Heather's mom "We are going to make her death count."
What? - by smashing things and torching the First Amendment?
MayBee said...
Orwell
8/18/17, 9:14 AM
My thought as well. Violence is non-violence.
didn't see any of the so-called alt-left wearing body armor or carrying semi-automatic weapons
http://www.tmz.com/videos/0_v93xxq9z
I wonder why they never opened fire, and yet the clubs were used liberally.
I didn't see any of the so-called alt-left wearing body armor or carrying semi-automatic weapons( which is probably why the police didn't step in sooner-- they were out gunned)
Sorry, but did you read the article? This isn't the first event where antifa people showed up and engaged in violence. It's been going on quite awhile.
Why is it so difficult to condemn both groups? Yes, you can argue one - the Nazis - are a greater threat or are more odious. But saying one is worse shouldn't mean that the other side is given a pass.
There's something about the unwillingness of people to view Marxism as being as evil as Fascism. We all condemn - rightly - fascist ideas. But there's this reluctance to condemn Marxists with the same fervor.
roesch/voltaire: "I didn't see any of the so-called alt-left wearing body armor or carrying semi-automatic weapons( which is probably why the police didn't step in sooner-- they were out gunned)..."
How does that explain all the other incidents across the nation where the police did not step in when no one was carrying semi-automatic weapons.
#AnotherR/VLogicFail
If they violated any gun laws, it was up to the police to deal with it, not "counter protesters."
You guys will not give up on this excuse making for violent attacks by your little army of brownshirts.
Its followers acknowledge it is secretive, without official leaders and organized into autonomous local cells.
Organized like an enemy we've been fighting now for a decade plus.
"You need violence in order to protect nonviolence." War is Peace.
Like nonviolence needed protection in Berkeley from Milo before these thugs came along.
If the NY Times report is accurate, doesn't that basically prove Mussolini's point? That the ties of nationhood (however defined) are too strong to be submerged into a universal brotherhood of workers?
Holy Cow, that should be obvious by now. After seventy years of the Soviets doing vicious, unhinged things to break up the nations under its control and their ties to their native lands, the USSR broke apart along ethnic lines. That is three generations of suppression of native languages and religions, not to mention mass deportations and mass arrests, imprisonment, and state murder of potential national leaders.
I bet if you organized a demonstration to burn Nazi flags you could get turnouts in red states and blue. It would be a great. way to bring out country together. But if you should, God forbid! Burn communist (who were responsible for more deaths) flags while you were at it, my guess is that there would be a fight.
There's something about the unwillingness of people to view Marxism as being as evil as Fascism. We all condemn - rightly - fascist ideas. But there's this reluctance to condemn Marxists with the same fervor.
8/18/17, 9:43 AM
I think it's because Nazism was blatantly, openly racist and the results were horrifying. Marxism (a perversion of Christianity) preaches things that sound good to many people who are not Marxist - fairness! equality! social justice! - and promises Utopia on earth. Of course, Marxist governments end up being horrific, but it appears to be next to impossible for people to give up on the Dream; the illusion that next time, it will work.
I wonder why AntiFa burns American flags, and not Nazi ones?
Factions within left wing have been brawling for at least a century now - leninists, stalinists, communists, socialists, bolsheviks, mensheviks - all held similar beliefs but their lust for power makes them violent towards one another and to wider society.
Lady gaga posed as nazi at clinton campaign rallies on final day before election but, luckily for her and clinton, the conversation is about hateful republicans.
---------
Der Spiegel - Nov 2012:
In the mid-1920s, Joseph Goebbels was given the difficult task of fostering support for the growing Nazi Party in Berlin, "the reddest city in Europe besides Moscow." But, by 1933, a combination of street brutality and political smarts succeeded in catapulting the party past rival parties.
The Times, as usual, is telling only part of the story. Antifa has been around for twenty years, and until recently it specialized in threatening and beating up nonviolent progressives during left-wing political events. In classic communist fashion their greatest hatred was reserved for liberals and progressives who believe in working within the existing political system. Their 1999 riot in Seattle, for example, was against neoliberal free-trade policy and not against Nazis or the KKK. Only lately have they shifted their attention to the far right, and of course the Times is all too eager to rebrand them as warriors in the battle between good and evil.
Of course, Marxist governments end up being horrific, but it appears to be next to impossible for people to give up on the Dream; the illusion that next time, it will work.
Yes, I think some people view it as simply an economic system or ideology that has good intentions such as eliminating poverty and man's exploitation of man, et cetera. "They mean well" sort of excuse.
And there's the usual "Well, the Soviet Union or China under Mao wasn't REAL communism/Marxism."
The truly frightening thing is that the woman arrested for pulling down that statue in NC isn't even pretending that North Korea and Venezuela are Marxist experiments gone wrong - she champions Kim and Maduro and wants that system here.
So there are the misguided idealists - but there are also people who simply want revenge and bloodshed and power and Marxism allows them to cloak their hatred in claptrap about "social justice."
But that cloak is treadbare now and the hatred and spite that motivates them is becoming apparent to more and more people.
The article neglected to mention her side career as a hairy muff porn model. That video of her getting punched in her antifa retard face is best viewed set to the music of Pat Benatar.
What if Charlottesville was a setup from the beginning ?
The "founder" of Unite The Right, Jason Kessler, was an activist with Occupy Wall Street and Obama supporter.
He sees himself as a professional provocateur. What if he was a ringer, a phony who revels in riling up some crazy people for some political purpose? We know the left is skilled in all manner of dirty tricks. That sort of thing was Robert Creamer's job for the Hillary campaign, hiring thugs to incite violence that could then be blamed on Trump supporters.
Interesting speculation. The Charlottesville vice Mayor is quite a piece of work,.
"But if you should, God forbid! Burn communist (who were responsible for more deaths) flags while you were at it, my guess is that there would be a fight."
Did you hear a KKK chapter and an Antifa group have merged? They say, "But true slavery just hasn't been tried yet."
Well, gee! If a 20-year old female antifa says this is 'full-on war' then that's good enough for me. Obviously, this is a time to gather stones together. And semiautomatic rifles. And plenty of ammo.
Moldylocks is her name.
I wanted to focus on what happened in Charlottesville and where the violence and threats percolated over for example:
Zimmerman said he was forced to hire an armed guard because the Charlottesville police refused to provide an officer to watch over the temple's Saturday morning services.
And if you noticed my call for non-violence is against those on any side who use violence for their methods, but I wanted to point out the overwhelming gun power and resulting threats poised by the Neo Nazi's in comparison to the piss throwing Atifa.
jwl said...
Factions within left wing have been brawling for at least a century now
But it was worse when we turned to the kids on the left
And got let down again by some poor excuse for protest
Yeah, by idiot fucking hippies
In fifty different factions
Who were lock inside some kind of 60's battle reenactment.
So I hung up my banner in disgust, and head for the door.
Frank Turner, Love, Ire, and Song
I didn't see many American flags on either side.
At one time, wasn't that a legal requirement for assemblies?
The other side wanted to interfere with the exercise of free speech rights and was motivated by hostility to ideas that deserved hostility.
I don't think that's their motivation at all. They just want to hurt people. You don't spray acid in peoples' eyes because you're motivated by hostility to ideas. You may tell yourself that your a heroic warrior for good. But people often bullshit themselves.
R/V: "...but I wanted to point out the overwhelming gun power and resulting threats poised by the Neo Nazi's in comparison to the piss throwing Atifa."
Amazing that those extraordinarily violent and heavily armed neo-nazi's led to precisely zero shots fired.
Maybe we should send our neo-nazi's to Venezuela to explain to those wonderful leftists how to protest and march without gunning down your political opponents.
BTW, the lefties still love Maduro.
"I bet if you organized a demonstration to burn Nazi flags you could get turnouts in red states and blue. It would be a great. way to bring out country together. But if you should, God forbid! Burn communist (who were responsible for more deaths) flags while you were at it, my guess is that there would be a fight."
Great idea. Let's do it.
Ah, yes, Emily Rose Nauert. Also known as Venus Rosales in the porn industry, or so I've read. Somehow I can't bring myself to go look (or at my age even know where to look).
First of all, I've seen the entire video of the incident. I've seen that stance she adopts before, the way she's looking around for a target. She's not trying to escape a brawl that's gotten out of hand, she's looking for someone she can sucker punch, preferably from behind. That she gets punched instead makes my laugh every time.
You see, Emily Rose Nauert was relying on her female privilege, that a man would not strike a woman. But a man does not strike a lady, and a female wearing weighted gloves and voluntarily joining a violent group in a brawl is certainly no lady. Modern feminists don't like to acknowledge female privilege, but if you're going to voluntarily get into brawls, you're going to get hurt.
A word the you, Emily Rose Nauert. You only think you know something about violence.
Things we used to believe:
- Speech is not violence. Violence is not speech.
- "I may disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." (attrib to Patrick Henry)
These things have given way to:
- Your speech is violence, but my violence is speech.
- I will send you to your death if I disapprove of what you say.
Thank you Barack Obama
The article neglected to mention her side career as a hairy muff porn model.
So that's what's been keeping peter iron rail iron weights too busy to post here.
"I didn't see many American flags on either side."
Each side prefers the red banner of a failed European totalitarian socialist experiment responsible for the deaths of millions of innocent people.
Compared to communist russia or socialist germany, fascist italy and spain were the least worst of the three ideologies. Self identifying communists and socialists have taken over universities since second world war and they have made discussion about evil fascists while claiming that more extreme left wing factions meant well, even tho they are responsible for over hundred million dead during twentieth century.
"You don't spray acid in peoples' eyes because you're motivated by hostility to ideas."
-- And you certainly don't assault journalists.
I wanted to focus on what happened in Charlottesville and where the violence and threats percolated over for example
Well, okay but the article was about more than just these past weekend's events.
It seems clear from the article that in both Charlottesville and elsewhere that the antifa left - which is what the article is about - WANTS to engage in violence. They're not attending the rallies as peaceful counter protesters.
That's not an excuse for the actions of the racists/fascists.
I don't know why it's so difficult to condemn both groups on the issue of violence.
I have no problem condemning the white supremacists - for the ideology, for their part in the violence, and for the dead and injured last Saturday.
But it is a mystery to me why the left and the moderate right want to ennoble Antifa as a group that 'fights hate and bigotry'.
Michael K said...Is she the porn actress that was in the melee ?
Yep, I think that's her--I don't keep close tabs on violent Lefties but I'm pretty sure she's the one they have pictures of with a couple of glass bottles...huge coincidence that some anonymous/unknown Lefties threw some bottles that day, huh?
That's your posterchild for the violent Left, by the way: they'll crack your skull with a bottle and then hold themselves up as an innocent victim of a bully. They complain about being bullied AS they attack you in the street! It's impressive, in a way.
I sometimes wonder what the Right could actually get done if they had a Media that was even neutral, much less on our side...almost scary.
This guy had some ugly ideas, too, I guess:
Biology professor Bret Weinstein was berated by dozens of students outside of his classroom Tuesday morning for refusing to participate in an event in which white people were invited to leave campus for a day. Now, he says police have told him to hold his classes off campus due to safety concerns.
“Police told me protesters stopped cars yesterday, demanding information about occupants,” Mr. Weinstein told The Washington Times. “They believe I was being sought. It appears that the campus has been under the effective control of protesters since 9:30 a.m. Tuesday. Police are on lockdown, hamstrung by the college administration. Students, staff and faculty are not safe.”
Antifa adherents — some armed with sticks and masked in bandannas
Pity that for all their Ivy League educations that Times writers do not know the difference between a stick and a club.
A NYT article "inadequate"? Color me shocked. No NYT writer ever let the facts or the truth get in the way of the preferred "narrative".
LilyBart said...But it is a mystery to me why the left and the moderate right want to ennoble Antifa as a group that 'fights hate and bigotry'.
Is it? I was SURPRISED to hear Mitt Romney endorse Antifa and to read Sen Rubio saying that a hate group's beliefs justify violence against that group, but it's not a mystery why they did it. The Left has never been shy about embracing extreme violence for political ends--Bill Ayers is a respected person, still! Examples abound.
It's a bit like how one should think about Jane Fonda and the other pro-commie 60's Lefties: they're not anti-war, they're just on the other side.
The new article today seems to acknowledge the inadequacy of the 2-day-old article.
Once you recognize the violent left is part of the left mainstream the apparent inadequacy disappears. How many times do we need to see the same impact before accepting it as reality?
"Now, he says police have told him to hold his classes off campus due to safety concerns."
-- If the police told me that, I'd tell them: "You best walk me to my classroom then."
"Driven by a range of political passions — including anticapitalism, environmentalism, and gay and indigenous rights — the diverse collection of anarchists, communists and socialists has found common cause in opposing right-wing extremists and white supremacists. In the fight against the far right, antifa has allied itself at times with local clergy, members of the Black Lives Matter movement and grass-roots social-justice activists. It has also supported niche groups like Black Bloc fighters, who scrapped with right-wing forces in Berkeley this year..."
Nazi's are scum.
Communists are scum, too. From Wikipedia, "In his summary of the estimates in the Black Book of Communism, Martin Malia suggested a death toll of between 85 and 100 million people."
I'm happy to say Nazi's and Communists are equivalent.
Fuck both of them.
But it is a mystery to me why the left and the moderate right want to ennoble Antifa as a group that 'fights hate and bigotry'.
Indeed.
People like morality tales - good vs. evil - and simply have decided that the one side - the Neo-Nazis - are so evil (yes, they are) that anyone opposed to them must be good. Or at least, understood as well intended people.
Opposed to preemptive violence when the target is Saddam Hussein who gasses his own people.
Favors preemptive violence when the target is citizens of their own country holding a demonstration in a park.
Bob Boyd said...Did you hear a KKK chapter and an Antifa group have merged? They say, "But true slavery just hasn't been tried yet."
The Iowahawk joke is they could both instantly bond over a shared hatred of Jews (and/or Zionist Israel). Which, you know, is funny but also true!
I trace the Dem's mass derangement to when Bill Clinton schtupped an intern and then got all the women in his administration to get up in front of cameras to support him and deny that it occurred.
It continued when Al Gore lost the election. After a brief pause by supporting the President and the country in the wake of 9/11/2001, the Dems went into deeper derangement by opposing everything Republicans tried to do so they could win an election.
It was fed by the election of Barack Obama, but went quiet as they supported every unconstitutional, illegal and unethical thing he and his adminstration did. They knew it was wrong, they had their demi-god and they looked on admiringly.
When Hillary lost, their self-loathing exploded in a fury. How could they lose? To this guy? Now, for them, anything goes. The legal is illegal and immoral. The illegal is now right and just.
Yeah about that young Antifa woman who was punched in the face... she got punched because she was hurling glass bottles at the other side. There are numerous reports from people who were there saying she did. There is a photo floating around that shows her falling down with a glass bottle in hand, held in a manner that makes it look like it was going to be thrown or used as a club, also this video shows her immediately before the photo was taken with a glass bottle in hand ready to be thrown. https://youtu.be/03bHf6j1T5o
I remember Moldylocks. If you watch the video you hear bottles being thrown right before the melee. Then the melee breaks out and Ms. Nauert had a bottle in her hand which she appeared to be trying to use as a weapon. She got hit and afterwards approached a second time and got hit again. Both times she was a willing participant in a brawl.
Antifa is a fascist group that claims it is anti-fascist. It started in Europe and is an offshoot of European communist parties and it has a violent history. Essentially they claim that anyone to the right of Stalin is a "nazi" and use this to justify violence. Just because you claim to be fighting nazis does not mean you are or that you are not the very thing you claim to fight. Demonization of political opponents is a common theme.
The three antifa identified so far have been employees (well paid employees) of either the UC or Berkeley public schools. Just another example of what happens when you don't have real newspapers with real reporters.
When people indulge rage and chaos in themselves, they tell a lot of lies to make it sound like they are rational players. Even as they're tools for corrupt politicians.
Giving into violence, embracing violence, will mean you find violence. And the rich can protect themselves, putting the burden of change on the desperate.
How has violence worked out for Palestinians? Leaders become billionaires, the poor stay poor. That is the vision of the Left in practice. The lie of violence fed into the inner city, where understandable rage and frustration was celebrated and fanned, burning down cities, killing each other, all for what? It made politicians richer and the people just as desperate. More violence! John Brown's body. Bleeding Kansas. It never ends.
We need a healthy right and a healthy left.
Which is why I was much more impressed with the Tea Party approach. But the media doesn't feed on rational discussion and orderly display. They need war, they're vampires who feed on the blood of the broken. So they stir up and stir around, making heroes out of terrorists. They give voices to those who hate, so they're hate is spread all over the country, then the media says, "See! Sic 'em."
The media does through polished production what Antifa is doing, celebrating violence. The media does what white supremacists are doing, calling for racial division.
Meanwhile, I really feel like people in general are tiring of extremism, which is why there's a lot of very healthy conversations happening that the media will never cover. I've had amazing conversations this last year that gives me a lot of hope. But we can't listen to the extremists, because they make people pick sides and despise the middle ground.
"Which is why I was much more impressed with the Tea Party approach."
-- In 50 or 60 years, looking back, the next couple of generation of historians will admit, maybe begrudgingly, that the TEA Party protesters were the most effective at getting actual change done compared to Antifa, Occupy, Neo-Nazis or whoever.
The TEA Party won elections.
"The Iowahawk joke is they could both instantly bond over a shared hatred of Jews (and/or Zionist Israel). Which, you know, is funny but also true!"
You mean this one?
Mob 1: JEWS WILL NOT REPLACE US
Mob 2: FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA PALESTINE WILL BE FREE
*eyes meet*
*baseball bats drop*
*giant orgy*
Matthew Sablan said...-- And you certainly don't assault journalists.
One of the items in a long list of why the Media is execrable is the fact that they'll cover up Leftwing and/or "good people" committing violence every time, even when the targets of that violence are their own journalists.
I don't just mean attacks like Lara Logan being attacked and brutally sexually assaulted by a mob in Egypt--obviously that's got to be downplayed 'cause you don't want to get a reputation as a hostile journalist when you're a foreign correspondent (also can't say bad things about peaceful Muslims!). But how many reporters, camera people, and crew members have to get beaten in "mostly peaceful" Lefty demonstrations (you know, riots) like those vilently assaulted in Ferguson, for the Media to take note of the fact?
When their narrative (that the Left is peaceful and that groups they consider "good" mustn't be shown in ways that normal people would understand are bad) conflicts with fair coverage of their own employees' assaults, the narrative wins every time. It's shameful.
"Which is why I was much more impressed with the Tea Party approach."
The Tea Party were call racists and white supremacists by the left.
Why were the Nazi's or those on that side armed so much?
Because they knew from experience that the police wouldn't protect them, that's why. Berkeley taught that little lesson: that the police were actively aiding antifa.
And they were right, weren't they? Charlottesville took place because the police allowed antifa to attack and protected them.
--Vance
Hey, if it feelllz good do it.
Yes, you need violence (or at least the threat of it) to protect nonviolence. That's what the police are for.
@Paddy O
Well said.
An off hand observation is that the left Propaganda Media has offered the Black population a chance to enact a re-do the Civil war as today's Blacks and allies defeating today's Confederacy and exterminating the enemy. That is something the White Northern Army did not finish doing when Grant let them go home.
Now, if only they can find today's Confederacy...Nazis?...KKKs? None found, so the hire Hollywood actors and stuntmen. And the Cast of Julius Ceasar in The Park shows them how scenes are done.
How dumb do they think we are?
And if you noticed my call for non-violence is against those on any side who use violence for their methods, but I wanted to point out the overwhelming gun power and resulting threats poised by the Neo Nazi's in comparison to the piss throwing Atifa.
1. The gun holders were not Neo Nazis but a third group of gun advocates who came to play peacekeeper.
2. How do we know the liquids were piss rather than acid?
3. Why is the antifas use of bats / clubs censored minimizing their violence?
4. Why do all of RVs errors blatantly protect one side?
All of these street-fighting people are irrelevant.
The important matters are the behavior of the authorities and the propaganda line pushed by the press.
The "violence" so far is minor, and the real violence, when it starts, will not be in street battles between mobs, but as assassinations and terrorism.
The real effect is that these characters are used as excuses by the PTB to prevent right-wing politics and organizing.
Vastly more important is the effect on the quiet and unseen. These are already embittered against each other.
Re: roesch/voltaire:
I wanted to point out the overwhelming gun power and resulting threats poised by the Neo Nazi's
If in fact the Neo-Nazis possessed overwhelming gun power, you have to admire their incredible restraint in not escalating against masked ruffians throwing things at them -- that's the kind of situation that often ends with shots being fired even if everyone involved knows that would be a disaster (I am given to understand that ruffians throwing things at you is quite scary).
But at least from what I have read on this blog, it sounds like the people with the guns did not consider themselves to be affiliated with the "Unite the Right" protesters, who are being characterised as Neo-Nazis:
The show of strength was about “allegiance . . . to the Constitution,” particularly the First Amendment, said Christian Yingling, leader of the Pennsylvania Light Foot Militia. He said he and his troops “convoyed in” to Charlottesville early Saturday to defend free speech by maintaining civic order so everyone present could voice an opinion, regardless of their views.
The fact that no shots were fired strongly suggests that, despite all the skepticism and the slurs, the militiamen were not in fact affiliated with either side (although they clearly didn't do a great job of keeping the two gangs of thugs on Left and Right from brawling).
The demonstration in Charlotteville was organized by a former Democrat activist and consisted of several groups that normally do not have much to do with each other: Neo-Nazis, KKK, white nationalists (whatever that is), white supremacists, "Dixie flag" supporters, "militia", and just plain anti statue removal supporters. It took that many groups to get enough people to make a decent show of a parade. (The Tiki torches was a nice touch - reminiscent of the Nazis at Nuremberg on a small-town scale.)
The organizer got a parade permit and marched these people around town without much happening from the looks of it.
Then the "antifas" arrived (there also seems to have been more than one group among them), there was a melee, and it looks like the parade goers got rather the worst of it. How did that happen if the "antifas" were not at least equal in numbers to the other groups combined? And who called them in?
This does indeed look more and more like a set-up the more we find out out about it.
Going back (I don't know) 40 years (Skokie IL), there have been Nazi and/or KKK rallies that looked like this: there were about a dozen Nazi/KKK demonstrators and a few hundred people demonstrating their opposition to Nazi/KKK. The Nazi/KKK group which might have been inclined to violence was so greatly overnumbered, that no violence occurred. And the anti- protesters were peaceful in their hearts, and able to control the few members of their group that were inclined to violence.
Why didn't Charlottesville follow this template? The nazi/kkk group was larger, and armed (armed I think). The anti group came with a much larger core group intent on violence, so the peaceful elements could not control them.
Dear Professor Althouse,
This is a terrific post. Kudos to you in continuing to post these things.
"2. How do we know the liquids were piss rather than acid?"
-- We know they were both. At least one person suffered from acid in their eyes, and reporters also reported that they were hit with urine.
“CNN posted a map on August 17 showing the location of approximately 1,500 Confederate monuments and/or official symbols in the U.S. The map will, no-doubt, serve as a hit-list for the frenzied Workers World Party members and others seeking the removal and destruction of Confederate statues in city after city across America.”
But of course.
One side wanted to exercise its free speech rights to express bad, ugly ideas.
You mean the idea that a lawfully-permitted assembly can and should be broken up by a mob of armed thugs?
That was an ugly idea. And unlike anything the Nazis did or said, it is still being celebrated and is growing in the number of people saying it.
exiledonmainstreet said...
As I noted in the other thread, antifa defaced a statue of Confederate general Joan of Arc in New Orleans last night.
What'd they spray-paint on it? The pictures I've seen have been carefully cropped so you can't read it.
Nice try at walking back, roesch. But you never should have gone there in the first place.
One side wanted to exercise its free speech rights to express bad, ugly ideas. The other side wanted to interfere with the exercise of free speech rights and was motivated by hostility to ideas that deserved hostility.
This really is the gist of the whole thing. This is why the latter group really is worse than the former.
You're going to catch hell for this, Professor. Good work.
Remember when they used to say, “Fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity.”
Blogger roesch/voltaire said...
And if you noticed my call for non-violence is against those on any side who use violence for their methods
Haven't you noticed that kids are being taught these days that words are violence?
The logic goes like this:
-Violent action is used to oppress people.
-White supremacists use words to oppress POC.
-Therefore words are violent actions.
-A violent action calls for a violent response. They are merely defending themselves from violence when they assault a person who says something they do not think should be said.
And it gets worse.
-Words are merely a means of communication. Violent communications can be non-verbal: how you look, your accent, your choice of clothes, or what you laugh or cry at (or choose not to laugh or cry at), or where you choose to live.
They don't call it totalitarianism for nothin'.
I love how, after the term "alt-left" began to gain traction as a counterpart to the alt-right, the Associated Press decided that it would discontinue using the term "alt-right."
@Fernandinande, I suspect someone wrote "tear it down."
Violence is not acceptable!
This bit of straight-out racism has been completely ignored by our so-called "anti-racist" intellectual class:
"Although this isn't a political show, it's my responsibility to stand up against intolerance and extremism as a human being," said Fallon. "It's important for everyone, especially white people, in this country, to speak out against this," he added. "Ignoring it is just as bad as supporting it.
http://www.rollingstone.com/tv/news/fallon-meyers-corden-kimmel-condemn-racism-trumps-reply-w497795
I've lost all respect for Mitt Romney - what a blind moron.
Romney makes no mention of anfita fascist anti-free speech brownshirts in his "Trump should apologize" tweet. Apologize for what?.
Being opposed to fascism is a very easy standard to meet. It was even met by that indomitable Nazi killer, Josef Stalin. The next question is, what are you for?
For many in Antifa and the Worker's World Party, what they are for is at least as toxic as what they are against.
It is an ugly time to be alive. But then again, it always is.
It was really a great script, and would have been a grand performance if that kid who showed up in a Dodge Challanger hadn't got suckered into thinking it was real.
By the way why isn't anyone asking how a kid who lives with his mother driving a sweet ride like that?
And wasn't it Obama that saved Chrysler?
They should melt that car down and make a statue of the fallen Antifa.
An off hand observation is that the left Propaganda Media has offered the Black population a chance to enact a re-do the Civil war as today's Blacks and allies defeating today's Confederacy and exterminating the enemy.
I don't know if you meant that literally but I think that may be an explanation.
The black Charlottesville vice-Mayor is one.
Maxine Waters, that Missouri state legislator.
I think a lot of the black population doesn't care but some politicians are using it and the DNC is desperate to get blacks to vote next election,.
Yes, it’s really, really, really good for NYT readership prospects that the wising-up NYT has figured out another way to sell more fashion by embracing the realist position of political economy and its game theory of increasing the simple arithmetic number of players in the game, that is, to keep NYT readers hooked on all the possible - new - combinations of how this game will play, keep reading.
Also note that the torchlight parade was held in the dark so it was in the evening before the melee and apparently entirely peaceful.
Violence is not acceptable!
Right in line with the NYT talking points as usual, Sunsong.
Why just two days ago you were calling the people advocating that very position on this blog Nazi sympathizers.
Again, right in line with the NYT.
What shocks me about Romney is... don't they remember when they called HIM a Nazi?
Yeah, now if the spineless CEO's would just watch the video and maybe do a little reading to get up to speed, no profiles in courage in that group.
"Don’t overthink this, because it’s quite simple, really. When Democrats’ national position depended on unwavering support from “the Solid South,” we got lots of pro-Southern propaganda: the Lost Cause, Gone With The Wind, Disneyfied Uncle Remus, etc. As a vital Democrat constituency group, southerners, even practical neo-Confederates, were absolved of all sins as long as they stayed in line.
Now the South isn’t “solid” anymore — or, more accurate, it’s becoming pretty solidly Republican — so rather than receiving cultural dispensations, it now gets targeted for cultural warfare.
That’s all that’s going on here. It has nothing to do with morality or decency, any more than it did a half-century or more ago when the national cultural machine took a different position. It’s just politics by other means. The rest is just noise.
Is this analysis highly cynical? Yes. But still probably not cynical enough." - Glenn Reynolds
“CNN posted a map on August 17 showing the location of approximately 1,500 Confederate monuments and/or official symbols in the U.S. The map will, no-doubt, serve as a hit-list for the frenzied Workers World Party members and others seeking the removal and destruction of Confederate statues in city after city across America.”
But of course.
8/18/17, 10:31 AM
This will really get ugly.
Many of those in the small town South voted for Trump in part because they were feeling marginalized and scorned by those in power? The Left's answer to that is not only to double down on the ridicule but to send their squad of flying monkeys into those small towns to refight the Civil War.
Keep poking that bear, media.
""You need violence in order to protect nonviolence. That’s what’s very obviously necessary right now. It’s full-on war, basically.""
It sounds like something the Left would hallucinate that Trump would say.
"Now the South isn’t “solid” anymore — or, more accurate, it’s becoming pretty solidly Republican — so rather than receiving cultural dispensations, it now gets targeted for cultural warfare."
I've thought that for a while now.
The videos from Charlottesville show a few black people ( I think), but this riot certainly was not a black thing.
@Fernandinande
I too think it says "tear it down." My guess is that whoever vandalized the statue has zero knowledge of who Joan of Arc was, and wouldn't care if they did. Just a statue of some dead white woman.
"Yeah, now if the spineless CEO's would just watch the video and maybe do a little reading to get up to speed, no profiles in courage in that group."
I think it has more to do with the fact that these guys run companies that manufacture in China than it does with Charlottesville.
A quick Google says that Confederate General Joan of Arc was tagged with "Tear it Down."
I think it has more to do with the fact that these guys run companies that manufacture in China than it does with Charlottesville.
And Bob Boyd wins the thread. That's why Romney is attacking Trump as well.
Why just two days ago you were calling the people advocating that very position on this blog Nazi sympathizers.
Quote please. I am curious to see the actual quote.
Beyond, a few Nazi sympathizers might advocate for non-violence...but they would still be Nazi Sympathizers...
Odds are high one of the Supremes is sicker or more interested in retirement than has been reported. Hence the urgency...
Derek: My rule is when someone screams RACISM they are hiding or diverting attention away from some evil they are perpetrating.
Dreams: Yeah, now if the spineless CEO's would just watch the video and maybe do a little reading to get up to speed, no profiles in courage in that group.
Bob: I think it has more to do with the fact that these guys run companies that manufacture in China than it does with Charlottesville.
Tic. Tac. Toe.
Re: Matthew Sablan:
A quick Google says that Confederate General Joan of Arc was tagged with "Tear it Down."
Well obviously. The United States of America descends from the United Kingdom, which in turn descends from the Kingdom of England. So we have a side in the Hundred Years War -- the side of the English. Joan of Arc is our defeated enemy, the loser in the war (we burned her for heresy!). Isn't it so terribly strange to have a monument to the losers, to our enemies?
The problem with continuing to shut down free speech of the right, is that the right is far more supportive of the 2nd Amendment and quite frankly if the left keeps showing up armed with sticks and throwing cement-filled soda cans I can see escalation. As a famous man once said, "if they bring a knife, we bring a gun."
Is the left really afraid of the neo-nazis? Or do they simply need a new bogeyman to justify the violence coming from their side?
If the left were truly afraid of a growing white-supremacy movement they would stop pushing divisive identity politics that focus so much on race. Universities have courses where they talk about the "whiteness problem" . (Great concepts they're shoveling into impressionable young minds. Maybe these future leaders will discover a final solution to the problem.)
If you keep telling young white men that they are the source of evil in the world, and condemn them when they choose to celebrate their racial identity, while encouraging all other groups to do so, then sit back and watch that resentment grow a movement.
Antifa believes that certain groups of people are unacceptable and should be denied their rights, violently if necessary, which is the same attitude that the Nazis in Germany had towards Jews, gypsies, and other "inferior" races. And Universities run courses teaching young people to single out a certain race to blame for the current problems in society, again echoing attitudes of the Nazis they claim to despise. The ironies abound.
Blogger Matthew Sablan said...
A quick Google says that Confederate General Joan of Arc was tagged with "Tear it Down."
8/18/17, 10:51 AM
Which is the end goal. Tearing down Western Civilization and its' artifacts. Year Zero.
The good thing is that a majority of Americans (even in the West and South) do not approve of the removal of the Confederate statues, at least not by mobs. They will be even less enthusiastic about mobs vandalizing Joan of Arc, Lincoln, Jefferson and Washington.
The antifas are mainly college kids who have had a lot of success on campuses. But as we know, college is not the real world. They will discover that the American public will not react like spineless Deans when they leave their safe spaces on campuses and in blue cities and try to make the entire country look like Berkeley.
Well obviously. The United States of America descends from the United Kingdom, which in turn descends from the Kingdom of England. So we have a side in the Hundred Years War -- the side of the English. Joan of Arc is our defeated enemy, the loser in the war (we burned her for heresy!). Isn't it so terribly strange to have a monument to the losers, to our enemies?
I'm willing to bet the statue was put up when New Orleans (named after the city of Orleans, and Joan was known as the maid of Orleans) was controlled by the French.
About 25 years ago there was an anarchist convention in San Francisco. I thought of going because I figured it was a joke. I mean, what kind of anarchist could organize a convention? Luckily I didn't go, because after their meetup they took BART over to Berkeley and smashed up some shops on Telegraph Avenue. These guys have been around for a long time, and that the media seems to be unaware of them is beyond belief.
"That's why Romney is attacking Trump as well."
That's also why they are after Bannon so hard right, now.
Check this out.
http://prospect.org/article/steve-bannon-unrepentant
Pull quote:
"Bannon’s plan of attack includes: a complaint under Section 301 of the 1974 Trade Act against Chinese coercion of technology transfers from American corporations doing business there, and follow-up complaints against steel and aluminum dumping. “We’re going to run the tables on these guys. We’ve come to the conclusion that they’re in an economic war and they’re crushing us.”
But what about his internal adversaries, at the departments of State and Defense, who think the United States can enlist Beijing’s aid on the North Korean standoff, and at Treasury and the National Economic Council who don’t want to mess with the trading system?
“Oh, they’re wetting themselves,” he said, explaining that the Section 301 complaint, which was put on hold when the war of threats with North Korea broke out, was shelved only temporarily, and will be revived in three weeks. As for other cabinet departments, Bannon has big plans to marginalize their influence."
I've always hated chemistry - it was the labs - but is pee an antidote to acid? The solution may be at hand in the same rally.
Wiki says pee is only alkaline in the evening, so night rallys.
"Antifa adherents — some armed with sticks and masked in bandannas — played a visible role in the running street battles in Charlottesville, but it is impossible to know how many people count themselves as members of the movement. Its followers acknowledge it is secretive, without official leaders and organized into autonomous local cells. It is also only one in a constellation of activist movements that have come together in the past several months to the fight the far right...."
It is impossible to know how many people count themselves members of the antifa movement, but it is easy to label anyone who opposes demolishing historical statues or republicans as nazis.
What an absolute load of crap the democrat media has become. Completely untrustworthy in every way.
"You need violence in order to protect nonviolence. That’s what’s very obviously necessary right now."
You know who attacks nonviolent people? Emily Rose Nauert and her antifa terrorist buddies. So based on her logic, others should feel perfectly free to kick the shit out of (or worse) her and antifa thugs because they're violent and violence against them is needed to protect nonviolence. Thanks, Emily! It's all so clear now!
But Stanley Miller didn't use pee, just reducing gases, water vapor, and electricity, and bingorama --> urea as a byproduct (among others, like nucleotide components). It's violent, really, early Earth gases plus the energy, UV, and lightning, could form organic biological molecules, which could polymerize, but it's stability that's the problem with violent reactions, it's always about stability with this pee stuff.
Balfegor said...
you have to admire their incredible restraint in not escalating against masked ruffians throwing things at them
OR, they didn't want to spend the rest of their days on death row being regularly raped by men much larger than themselves.
"The antifas are mainly college kids who have had a lot of success on campuses"
And porn actresses and other well adjusted types.
The anarchists and ANSWER groups have been around a long time, as someone said above.
Most are probably employed in menial jobs but some are communist professors, or adjunct professors like the guy in Berkeley with the bike locks.
I still wonder if this guy Kessler is a professional organizer, sort of like a president I heard of.
Now, the NYT admits the left has a violence problem. Good!
That's like saying water is wet. If we divide the world into two halves, the left and the right, then both sides obviously have a violence problem, since a tiny minority on both sides are violent. But what possible value can that insight have?
Balfegor said...
you have to admire their incredible restraint in not escalating against masked ruffians throwing things at them
OR, they didn't want to spend the rest of their days on death row being regularly raped by men much larger than themselves.
8/18/17, 11:06 AM
Does it matter why they restrained themselves? The fact is they did.
The left clearly has no similar worries about consequences - because most of them have gotten away with violence.
"..... supporters of President Trump held a rally in Berkeley, California, and were attacked by self-described “anti-fascist” protesters, resulting in a wild street fight during which a Trump supporter, identified as Nathan Damigo, punched a woman in the face.
The target of the punch identified herself in media interviews as “Louise Rosealma,” but online researchers quickly discovered that she is, in fact, Emily Rose Nauert (or Emily Marshall, using her mother’s surname). She is 20 years old and lives in the prosperous Thousand Oaks community. She used to be cute, but in the past couple of years, she got involved with anarchist scum and has performed in porn videos using the screen name “Venus Rosales.” '
OR, they didn't want to spend the rest of their days on death row being regularly raped by men much larger than themselves.
ARM is apparently unaware that self-defense is legal.
Just watched Tina Fay, a graduate of U Virginia, who recommends eating cheese cake and staying away from the right wing demonstrations. A smart non-violent protest-- I stand with her.
I used to play a viola da gamba.
Violare outrage vs vitulari exult.
I happened to be good at it because it is tuned the same as a lute. All you had to learn was to bow and you destroy all the converting cellists. Violence.
Bob Boyd said...
Remember when they used to say, “Fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity.”
These don't seem very similar. I'm willing to give one a shot, the other not so much.
Old Marblehead's comments on Charlottesville are interesting.
Wrongheaded as always, but his comments usually are much better reasoned than this - at least on the surface.
"Now, the NYT admits the left has a violence problem. Good!"
You have gotten to the point that you think praise is earned for not being a dangerou lying democrat agent.
Man...the bar for the newspaper of record has become mighty low.
@r/v
Bet ya Fey gets some serious push back from the left on that.
"Now, the NYT admits the left has a violence problem. Good!"
Thank you President Trump.
So, on one side you have a male leader who's undergone multiple plastic surgery; on the other a female leader who's starred in, er, hairy porn movies.
This is not your father's civil war.
That explains the tiki torches--necessary to get attention.
The problem is, in these days of halogen lamps and LED flashlights, nobody knows how to make real torches any more. I mean, you can look it up online, but there's more to a torch than just wrapping some cotton around a stick and setting it on fire. So they went down to Home Depot and bought a bunch of Chinese-made patio torches.
If that isn't an expression of the modern US, I don't know what is.
Earnest Prole said...
If we divide the world into two halves, the left and the right, then both sides obviously have a violence problem, since a tiny minority on both sides are violent. But what possible value can that insight have?
If the left believes their allies will be exempt from punishments for violence they will both press for punishments disproportional to the crimes and press for actions either not violent or not crimes at all to be covered by those punishments. For example see the left's efforts o punish "hate speech" as a hate crime.
FullMoon said...
Have noticed
that you are projecting. Lawyers always run a risk of prison terms, bad break for you. I guess the orphan fund will recover.
Nauert initiated the attack by targeting the man's trachea. Apparently, the Adam's Apple serves two purposes: identify a male and provide a target for aggressive Antifa thugs. Fortunately, her attack failed when the man preempted her assault.
The Antifa types were mal-educated in college. They've been taught to believe other people's speech is violence, and their own violence is speech. It allows them to feel righteous even as they beat down mainstream conservatives trying to give a speech. The root of the problem is the universities and the unwillingness of the faculties to rein in colleagues who are intent on creating revolutionaries instead of educated young adults.
It took years to fire fake Indian Ward Churchill, and he'd probably be there if he wasn't a white guy playing and Indian.
Professor Althouse,
You're putting yourself in the crosshairs of some very irrational and hate-filled people. I do hope you and Meade are giving due consideration to your personal safety.
I can see why Republicans are mostly staying out of the way of the controversy (though what Trump actually said makes sense) - Napoleon supposedly said something to the effect of, "Never interfere with an enemy while he’s in the process of destroying himself." If the Democratic leadership let the MSM push the narrative that Antifa are the good guys (and anyone to the right of Antifa is to be considered Alt-Right) then the Democrats are going to destroy themselves. (GOP Never-Trumpers like Romney, McCain, and others are showing their stupidity by jumping in.)
What we see on TV isn't what is happening in most of the country. According to Gallup in 2016 (and other polls) 42% of people identify as independents, 29% as Democrats, 26% as Republicans. Those 30% Dems were split fairly evenly between Hillary and Sanders. So if the MSM wants to focus on and support the hardcore Leftists more and more and treat them as if they are now the face of the Democratic Party, and the Democratic Party leaders allows it (apparently they are with Pelosi stating that Confederate statues should be removed from the Capitol), Trump may end up being damaged somewhat by the constant attacks but the Democratic Party will be devastated. The MSM still has no clue how/why 60 million people voted for Trump.
Now, Trump never said "the 2 sides are equivalent." He didn't say "equivalent" and he didn't even say "2 sides." He said "We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides."
Probably the main reason Trump is such fascinating, disruptive phenomenon is the way he effects people's imaginations. Obviously Trump say and tweets a lot of things that people find outrageous, but the things people imagine that he has said are often even crazier. People impute all sorts of wild notions to him. Journalists in the leftwing media seem especially susceptible to Trumps aura of influence, due to their emotions overwhelming their capacity for rational thought when it comes to Trump. They imagine they've heard things that he's never said, and infer all sorts of thoughts he may never have had. They truly are incapable of any semblance of objectivity when it comes to Trump.
Of course, people in the media failing to be objective and fair is nothing new, but Trump has pushed them farther away from reality than any other public figure ever has before.
A Clear and Progressive threat.
[class] diversity denying individual dignity; abortion rites denying lives deemed unworthy, inconvenient, and profitable (e.g. Planned Parenthood clinical cannibalism); and redistributive change national socialist because the "Jews" have too much.
Charlottesville had two wings of the Nazi party fighting in it.
There was the racist Aryan Supremecy wing organized by Jason Kessler, a democrat operative, occupy wall street protester, and paid Clinton staffer.
The other wing was the Antifa socialist wing that is essentially the Nazi brown shirts. They have been attacking Trump supporters violently for over a year, not just white supremacists. They attack anyone who holds different beliefs and their enemy is freedom.
Both groups are direct descendants of the Nazi party and would find a home there. And both groups are evil.
A few thoughts:
1. Antifa is a buncha violent thugs. Anyone who saw how they acted at UC Berkeley to drown out Milo's speech would conclude this. Here's Antifa physically harassing some college dude with a YAF hat. No, it's not as bad as killing Heyer, but it's still bad.
2. Frantically tearing down monuments shows how stupid and un-Democratic the Left is. Nobody was doing this during the 8 years of Obama. The statues, obviously, haven't changed - so what did change? Answer -- Left wing hysteria. Just vote on what statue to remove -- it's not hard for a community to peacefully determine what statues to have in its parks.
3. The Left has trouble discerning between real Nazis of 1945 and faux Nazis of 2017. The former had Panzer divisions, Messerschmidt squadrons, and used them to invade and conquer several European countries. The latter are 500 scattered clowns, with beer-bellies and Tiki torches, who are marginalized, powerless and discredited.
4. The Left has trouble discerning between real KKK of 1963 of Mississippi and the remnants of the KKK in 2017. The former was the violent political arm of the Southern Democrat party who used threats and violence to oppress blacks. Thankfully, through a lot of good work by civil rights supporters that doesn't happen here any more. The latter are, again, mostly discredited clowns, without much power and influence.
5. The Left has trouble discerning between speech v. action. If Nazis want to march, and are willing to apply for a permit, and sue in court to ratify their rights, then you have disfavored people, actually doing the right thing. Thank God for the ACLU who sees this.
6. If the Democrat Mayor or Democrat Governor order the police to "stand-down," during a confrontation, then you know something is fishy. The police's job is to maintain law and order and disperse rowdy mobs. If innocent blacks and liberals were getting violently beaten by Nazi thugs, you know the police would not "stand-down."
7. In 2017, the right's main problem with race is one of indifference. Most folks are too busy in their day-to-day lives, trying to scratch out a living to worry about past civil rights battles or issues. They want to live peacefully and they want blacks to live peacefully. Probably, there is room for both "sides" on this issue to improve relations with better communications. Once you're in the middle class with a family to feed and rent to pay, you generally don't have time for protest marches/riots.
My 2 cents.
When the Nazis are driven from the town square, and the internet, and their local coffee shop, and their jobs, and their schools, and their communities, and when the final intransigents are deemed too outside of mainstream society not to be rounded up and put into camps, will it be done in the name of Anne Frank?
And who among us would shelter them in our homes from the searching hordes?
"Just watched Tina Fay, a graduate of U Virginia, who recommends eating cheese cake and staying away from the right wing demonstrations. "
If she eats too much cheesecake, she'll end up looking like Rosie O'Donnell.
Rabel said...
Professor Althouse,
You're putting yourself in the crosshairs of some very irrational and hate-filled people. I do hope you and Meade are giving due consideration to your personal safety.
And this is why the democrats and Antifa will lose. In the end the average American doesn't really care about all this.
But they know two things:
If the right wins they will be left alone.
If the left wins then there will be brown shirts and purges.
“when people advocate for genocide and white supremacy, that is violence.” She added, “If we just stand back, we are allowing them to build a movement whose end goal is genocide.”
Let's all remember when the left says "advocating white supremacy" they include things like cutting taxes.
Rush is really boring. He goes into morality mode, on which he is incapable of being entertaining and is mostly wrong.
Same thing happens in blog threads.
The statues, obviously, haven't changed - so what did change? Answer -- Left wing hysteria. Just vote on what statue to remove -- it's not hard for a community to peacefully determine what statues to have in its parks.
They would lose the vote and they know it. If nothing else the last nine months or so have highlighted the tendency on the part of the American left to accept election results only when the voters make the right choice.
Mass hysteria makes moral arguments pretty useless, to add a Scott Adams hammer to the idea.
Two moral articles of faith or axioms: individual dignity and intrinsic value.
Moral, natural, and personal imperatives. Go forth and reconcile.
Pro-Choice (e.g. color diversity, selective-child, redistributive change) are short-term solutions with long-term consequences.
Mass hysteria makes moral arguments pretty useless
As mentioned previously, if key figures on the left started dropping dead from Trump related illnesses it would up their credibility a bit.
Antifa is the Provisional IRA to the Democrats, Sinn Fein.
The statues, obviously, haven't changed - so what did change?
The Left lost real leverage, which explains their efforts to impeach Trump through a WaPo/NYT/CNN-led coup, defame Americans as "deplorables", and project their sins of color diversity, selective-child, and redistributive change on other people.
Trump’s necessary violence problems solved. Convictions for murder can still be had without producing bodies into evidence, so Trump ought violently muster his highest IQ scientists from Trump University to use binary fission processes, if it goes ideally of course, and there will never be a bloody body in evidence for shaming by the media, only possible convictions sans bodies. Fission is still violence. Just not so messy. If that doesn’t work, since anarchist groups work cellularly, Trump can surely, with his amazing rhetorical acumen and the highest collective IQ of all administrations, he can persuade bloody daughter cells, since they’re anarchist, violently to eat their own bloody progenitor cells, and so, Trump universally will be acclaimed the world's top IQ GQ HQ Genius, solving all necessary violence problems. Excepting maybe (haven't worked this out), that self replicating anarchist peptides leave copies that survive, immortal cellar groups, maybe?
Rabel said...
Professor Althouse,
You're putting yourself in the crosshairs of some very irrational and hate-filled people. I do hope you and Meade are giving due consideration to your personal safety.
God this is stupid.
Matthew Sablan said...
"Which is why I was much more impressed with the Tea Party approach."
-- In 50 or 60 years, looking back, the next couple of generation of historians will admit, maybe begrudgingly, that the TEA Party protesters were the most effective at getting actual change done compared to Antifa, Occupy, Neo-Nazis or whoever.
The TEA Party won elections.
The TEA Party won elections and the people they elected promptly went and sold out. Nothing changed.
In 50 or 60 years it will be obvious that both parties were working against the people and Trump actually spoke for the people.
Rabel said...
Professor Althouse,
You're putting yourself in the crosshairs of some very irrational and hate-filled people. I do hope you and Meade are giving due consideration to your personal safety.
8/18/17, 11:23 AM
You kidding? AA and Meade walked amongst the crazies during the capital onslaught.
Bob Loblaw wrote:
The root of the problem is the universities and the unwillingness of the faculties to rein in colleagues who are intent on creating revolutionaries instead of educated young adults.
And these provocateurs are largely located within the fields of grievance studies. There is an interesting debate to be had on what the purpose of a college education is. For centuries it was to educate and train the next generation of society's leaders. Hopefully a bit of humility was built into the process. They led a nation towards its goals, they didn't direct it towards their own goals.
For about a century and a half, a second goal of college has been to provide vocational-technical training to those students who possess the ability and means to acquire it.
Ever read any old college textbooks about the science subjects?
Until the mid to late 60s, they were basically how to use science to produce goods and materials for a prosperous, modern nation. Geology textbooks were about how to find and extract minerals. Chemistry textbooks were about how to use those materials to create manufactured materials and other useful things. After, say, 1968, they became about saving the environment and the then-imagined limited resources of the earth.
The only thing that changed between 1958 and 1968 was the boomer takeover of the culture. The air and water were not noticeably dirtier in 1968 than in 1958. The earth's resources were not significantly depleted between 1958 and 1968.
AReasonableMan said...
Rabel said...
Professor Althouse,
You're putting yourself in the crosshairs of some very irrational and hate-filled people. I do hope you and Meade are giving due consideration to your personal safety.
God this is stupid.
Cry more.
You lost to Trump.
Again.
Bay Area Guy (11:25am):
Not only did the Mayor or Governor or both order the police to stand down in Charlottesville, the Governor lied about it at least twice. He said the police were outgunned, the police say no they were not. Some might try to dismiss that as a matter of opinion, but the Governor also said that numerous caches of weapons were found in the area, stashed by the Nazis, and the State Police specifically stated that no such weapons caches were found. Somehow none of the people on my Twitter feed calling for impeachment of Trump have even mentioned impeaching our lying shit of a governor, whose lies seem to be aimed at causing more violence.
Bob Boyd: Remember when they used to say, “Fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity.”
To which my response has always been, "Where do you think virgins come from?"
God this is stupid.
8/18/17, 11:40 AM
Is it really? She's in bughouse crazy Madison. Ann was attacked and threatened by your side during the Walker recall protests for daring to criticize them.
This is Walker Recall x 1000.
Rick says: Let's all remember when the left says "advocating white supremacy" they include things like cutting taxes.
And they include things like white men having the audacity to exist in our culture.
Bob Boyd said...
Mob 1: JEWS WILL NOT REPLACE US
Mob 2: FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA PALESTINE WILL BE FREE
*eyes meet*
*baseball bats drop*
*giant orgy*
They were both organized by democrats so they have a lot in common.
The fact that no shots were fired strongly suggests that, despite all the skepticism and the slurs, the militiamen were not in fact affiliated with either side
Yes. Unfortunately, the press has the loudest voice, and civil rights groups have exceeded the bounds of their earned trust.
The Left lost real leverage, which explains their efforts to impeach Trump through a WaPo/NYT/CNN-led coup, defame Americans as "deplorables", and project their sins of color diversity, selective-child, and redistributive change on other people.
Is it that they lost leverage, or that they feel so much in control they can stop pretending to be respectful of people who don't agree with them?
They were both organized by democrats so they have a lot in common.
Left vs Left.
The American center is conservative. The American right is libertarian (i.e. individualistic). Everyone else is on a progressive slope to the left.
Oh, No Labels. Principles matter.
"God this is stupid."
She's been assaulted once before. And she's well known and lives a very public life. And yesterday she got directly, physically involved by walking down to Forest Hill and photographing the cemetery desecration. And the left in Madison is definitely fueled by hate and has demonstrated its willingness to use violence. And there's nothing they hate more than someone perceived as an apostate.
Stupid?
Antifa is the Provisional IRA to the Democrats, Sinn Fein.
I understand why you might think that based on media reports, but it's demonstrably false. I've watched Antifa's hatred and violence over the past twenty years in San Francisco, where Republicans are nonexistent. They see Democrats and Republicans as indistinguishable and loathe them with equal passion.
Dr Weevil,
It really does seem like the politicians at the local and state level were intent on feeding the fire instead of dousing it. I can't really understand why - were they really willing to get people killed so they could have a moment in the national spotlight? That's ghoulish, and I hope voters remember.
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