"Actual Violence"

[paft.livejournal.com]

Some of you might remember something I posted four years ago about right wing thug Mike Vanderboegh and his blog call for loyal patriots to smash the windows of Democratic Party Offices. The result -- surprise surprise! -- was the smashing of windows in several Democratic Party Offices. Mr. Vanderboegh opined that he wasn't promoting "actual violence." “How ambiguous is it if I say break windows? Am I saying kill people, absolutely not,” he said.

As I pointed out, the comments section on his blog didn't exactly jibe with his insistence that, oh mercy no, he wasn't talking about KILLING people. They included:

“Today it was bricks, tomorrow it will be ???? The fuse has been lit.”



“We need to track these highly respectable representatives (cough) down to their residences.
Where we can then present them a Hallmark card (cough) kindly requesting they consider the Contitution when they vote..
Rocks and bricks are optional but torchs, pitch forks, tar and feathers are encouraged!!”

“As we know, our society has its roots in broken windows - not to mention tar-and-feathers (always horrible, often fatal) and bullets!”

“I wonder if the brain dead socialist in Washington would get the idea if it happened a lot more often. 
Would a wrist rocket and some ball bearings help get the idea across?”

“I bought a pistol belt and load bearing harness at the Army/Navy surplus store today. Haven't worn one since 1981. Fits real nice.”

“Good thing 223 ammo is still cheep and available. just bought another 1000 rds for 'target' pratice. these clowns are the best gun and ammo salesman in the world.”

“4" PVC Pipe
End Cap
Portable Compressed Air Tank
Hose
Pipe Fittings
Valve
Expanding Foam for Sabot 
Brick

Paint, Scope, Laser Rangefinder, and compensator optional.

Use of above parts left to the imagination of the reader.”

“They're all whining about bricks......

Just wait until it turns to bullets.”


I was assured by Sandwich warrior that what ol' Mike REALLY meant was not "do what we say, or we'll kill you," but "leave us alone or we'll kill you." "Leave us alone," meaning, "don't vote for or pass any legislation we dislike."

The old dear is in the news again, and that bit about "absolutely not" advocating killing people...? Well, let's just say Mr. Mike has recently confirmed pretty much what a lot of us already know about what "Open Carry" is really all about. While making a speech at an Open Carry Rally he made the following comments:

...“We like to think that all our fellow Americans, even those who plainly state that they are committed to stealing our liberty and our property and attempting to control our very lives, are merely suffering from differences of opinion that can be overcome by the right mix of persuasion or electoral politics,” Vanderboegh said.

“Yet how many of us have tried such methods with every fiber of our being and fallen short?” he continued. “Not because we were wrong, but because those of the other side were impervious to such arguments, to such tactics, for they believe completely in their right to their appetites for our liberty, our property, and our lives with all the religious fervor of a pagan worship of naked power wrapped in a catechism of lies."

These "fellow Americans" who have been unaccountably unconvinced by his earlier "arguments" of hurling bricks through windows, are therefore, he told the crowd, “domestic enemies of the Constitution,” and as such we need to told:

"that failing all other appeals to peaceful means, that the founders’ solution to such tyranny is still available, still potent, and still waiting, for when democracy turns to tyranny, the armed citizenry still gets to vote.”

i.e. "be CONVINCED by our arguments, dammit, or we'll shoot you."

I wonder what rationalizations I'll hear from certain quarters if one day one of these maniacs opens fire with his "bullets/votes" on a Democratic Politician -- or just a Democratic voter.

Comments

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Pay attention to what I've already commented to you. using 70 year old examples, or third world countries, to try to make a modern first world point doesn't help your case.

[paft.livejournal.com]

The attacks on abortion providers didn't take place 70 years ago (neither did the attacks on Freedom Riders.) Nor did they take place in the third world.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

And those attacks are exceptionally rare, and show little, if any, relationship to rhetoric.

[paft.livejournal.com]

What have you read about that kind of propaganda? I ask because pretty much every work I've read on the subject by people who've studied it come to exactly the opposite conclusion, and draw a very strong, well defined line between the relationship between political violence and that kind of rhetoric.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

I've read plenty. There's no link, and the attacks are rare. You show it yourself by being forced to rely on third world attacks, or situations from generations ago.

[paft.livejournal.com]

What have you read? And I hate to break it to you, but the Peekskill riot, the KKK, the attacks on Freedom Riders, and the murder of Dr. Tiller did not take place in the Third World.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

No, but they are rare occurrences.

[paft.livejournal.com]

I'll ask more slowly.

What

Have

You

Read?

Titles?

Authors?

Admit it. You've read nothing on the subject of propaganda and its relation to political violence. If you had you'd have cited it by now.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Admit it. You've read nothing on the subject of propaganda and its relation to political violence. If you had you'd have cited it by now.

Or I know where this game goes, and I don't have some sort of memory out of the thousands of books I've read over the years.

If this wasn't rare, you wouldn't be going to the well with the same few situations and wouldn't be relying on third world/long-ago-historical examples to try and make a case about 2014.

[paft.livejournal.com]

LOL! I knew it!

You've read nothing on the subject. Zero. Bupkes.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Judging by the commentary, this appears to be projection more than anything else.

But please, share more instances that show this is a regular, rather than rare, modern occurrence. If you can.

[paft.livejournal.com]

I've already cited instances.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Yes, you have. But you've shown it to be a rare occurrence, yet claim it to be something more.

With the amount of "right wing hate speech," how on earth are we not seeing an all-out war complete with militias roving the streets of Cambridge, of Amherst, of Berkeley? Could it be because there's basically no relationship between the two as claimed?

[paft.livejournal.com]

bdj: With the amount of "right wing hate speech," how on earth are we not seeing an all-out war complete with militias roving the streets of Cambridge, of Amherst, of Berkeley?

We're not seeing "all out war" in liberal areas because liberals, as a rule, don't pull a gun the minute they hear an opposing view. We also don't tend to arm ourselves to the extent that the right does.

What we're seeing today is more akin to the rise in militia violence we saw back in the '90s during the Clinton administration -- which is exactly what I said I feared when I first started talking about this issue here several years ago.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

We're not seeing "all out war" in liberal areas because liberals, as a rule, don't pull a gun the minute they hear an opposing view. We also don't tend to arm ourselves to the extent that the right does.

You missed the point entirely. If this right wing violence is so stoked by this hate speech, there should be roving bands of right wingers looking to take over these liberal enclaves.

After all, you're basically telling us you're unarmed.

What we're seeing today is more akin to the rise in militia violence we saw back in the '90s during the Clinton administration -- which is exactly what I said I feared when I first started talking about this issue here several years ago.

And there's no evidence to support this ridiculous claim. As I've been saying when you first raised this ridiculous claim here several years ago.

[paft.livejournal.com]

bdj: . If this right wing violence is so stoked by this hate speech, there should be roving bands of right wingers looking to take over these liberal enclaves.

Only if you have a profoundly simplistic and unrealistic view of how human beings react. In the '90s, that's not what happened. What happened was the rise of small armed militia groups and principle Louis Beam introduced of "leaderless resistance," with an emphasis on individual acts of terrorism. We're seeing something similar now.

bdj: After all, you're basically telling us you're unarmed.

The right already knows that, and regularly boasts about it to each other when they're talking amongst themselves on their websites.

bdj: And there's no evidence to support this ridiculous claim...

As anyone with a grasp of reality and the ability to read the news knows, it's not a "ridiculous claim."

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

We're seeing something similar now.

Where? If we are, why aren't they acting? What are they waiting for?

The right already knows that, and regularly boasts about it to each other when they're talking amongst themselves on their websites.

They talk! OMG!

What are they waiting for?

As anyone with a grasp of reality and the ability to read the news knows, it's not a "ridiculous claim."

That your examples demonstrate the rarity is the evidence I have. Are you holding out on more, or is this a "words are violence" sort of thing?

[paft.livejournal.com]

bdj: Where?

Most recently in Las Vegas.

bdj: If we are, why aren't they acting?

They are.

bdj: They talk! OMG!

Yep. When you say one thing among people you know will agree with you, and the opposite among those who don't, it reveals a lot about your lack of good faith.

bdj: That your examples demonstrate the rarity is the evidence I have.

They are "rare" only in that they are outside the norm in the sense that most crime is outside the norm. I once lived on a street that had a series of break-ins over the course of three months. The fact that most of the houses were NOT broken in to did not make this crime wave any less worrisome to those of us who lived there.

You know, Jeff, I'm seriously beginning to doubt the good faith of some right wingers when they argue in the manner many do here. If people who use such "debating" tactics truly approached language and logic they way they do in these discussions, they would be unable to navigate daily life, communicate with their neighbors, their co-workers etc..

And yet, I don't get the sense that the people who argue as though life were some vast game of Sims 3 were writing from the group homes or institutions they'd require if they honestly looked at reality that way.

No, I suspect the "arguments" of at least some of these folks are not actual agruments so much as alibi-ing for beliefs and agendas they know would be too unpalatable to most people. It's akin to the rationale behind the Open-Carry movement, which, judging from Vanderboegh's comments, is about "normalizing" the carrying of guns only to the extent of lowering the guard of the people they want to shoot.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Most recently in Las Vegas.

You mean the Occupy protesters (http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2014/06/10/couple-responsible-for-vegas-shooting-spree-recently-lived-in-indiana/)?

They are.

Odd, then, that you can only show a handful of actors (some of which are apparently actually not ideologically consistent, if not outright in the left).

They are "rare" only in that they are outside the norm in the sense that most crime is outside the norm.

So now you're admitting they're rare? This is a good first step, I suppose.

The question is simple, and it's one you seem to not be handling directly: if this speech is so pervasive and so influential, why aren't we seeing action along the same lines? Why is it so rare?

It's akin to the rationale behind the Open-Carry movement, which, judging from Vanderboegh's comments, is about "normalizing" the carrying of guns only to the extent of lowering the guard of the people they want to shoot.

So in all the states with open carry, where is the significant uptick in shootings?

Or maybe it's that you aren't really paying attention to what's being said?

[telemann.livejournal.com]

You mean the Occupy protesters?

That's pretty reductive, but not surprising.

Your link mentioned Occupy once. And the logic is pretty faulty too, since Theodore Olson argued against California's Prop 8 before the Supreme Court and is against discrimination of gay marriage, that must make him a lefty too?

Meanwhile Jerad Miller was supporting Cliven Bundy's protests, making threats precisely mentioned in the OP.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

That's pretty reductive, but not surprising.

It's just the facts.

And the logic is pretty faulty too, since Theodore Olson argued against California's Prop 8 before the Supreme Court and is against discrimination of gay marriage, that must make him a lefty too?

Not at all. We can't and shouldn't assume ideology from cases lawyers take on alone.

Meanwhile Jerad Miller was supporting Cliven Bundy's protests, making threats precisely mentioned in the OP.

Pretty reductive, but not surprising.

It's not as if the Cliven Bundy situation dealt only with right wing beliefs, after all. The way the OP puts it, though, you'd expect everyone who went to Bundy's ranch to start a war. It's not happening.

[paft.livejournal.com]

bdj: You mean the Occupy protesters?

No, I mean the Clive Bundy fans who murdered two cops in cold blood and left a Gadsen Flag draped over them. I mean Jerad Miller and his wife. Jerad's "like" page on Facebook looks like this:

https://www.facebook.com/jerad.miller.1/likes

Ignoring all this and calling them "Occupy Protestors" because they attended a single event put on by the anarchist wing of Occupy is either irrational or willfully dishonest.

bdj: Odd, then, that you can only show a handful of actors (some of which are apparently actually not ideologically consistent, if not outright in the left).

Who did I cite that you consider "outright in the left?"

bdj: So now you're admitting they're rare?

Jeff, this is pathetic. Why are you pretending not to understand how the English language works?

This is part of what I'm talking about. Let's apply your line of reasoning here to everyday life:

Him: Happy birthday sweetie! I got you something extra, EXTRA special this year!

Her: Oh, goody, goody, let me see, let me see! (Sound of wrapping being torn.)

Silence.

Him: Like it?

Her: You got me the full seasons ticket plan for Yankees stadium. And a New York Yankees throw blanket.

Him: Isn't it great?

Her: But I hate The Yankees. I love the Giants. You've seen all those Orange shirts I have with the Giants logo, the pennants. I've even got a "Yankees suck" T-shirt.

Him: You're a Yankees fan! You went to a game last year to cheer them on!

Her: I went to that game because everyone in my office was going.

Him: So you admit you're a Yankee's fan!

Her: No, no, no, I'm not. I'm a Giants fan.

Him: So I just imagined you going to that Yankees game and talking about what a good time you had there...

Her: You know what. I think I'm going to go out for a bit, grab a cup of coffee, be by myself, and think. Where are the car keys?

Him: Why don't you just walk?

Her: Because there've been some muggings in the neighborhood and it's after dark.

Him: But muggings are incredibly rare! Think of all the many times you've walked down to the coffee shop by yourself after dark and not been mugged!

Her: Karen ended up with a black eye and a wrenched arm two days ago and had to replace all her credit cards! And then there was that guy down the street who was held up at gunpoint last week. And the week before that Mrs. Loman...

Him: See! Three people out of hundreds and hundreds of residents in the neighborhood. You admit muggings are rare!

Her: Oh God, look, I've had enough. You're acting like... wait a minute. Have you been taking your medication?

Him: Bleep! Null set! Change settings! Testingcheatsenabled true! Bleep!

Her: I'll go find the pills.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

The attacks on black people by savages in the South weren't exceptionally rare. They were what passed for civilization in an area nursed on the idea that cousin-humping rednecks incapable of counting to 21 without playing with themselves were superior to blacks who often worked harder than they did while bitching less and not attributing all misfortune to society being against them because they knew if they did they'd be strung up from a tree.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

I agree, but we're talking about 2014.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Who says I was talking about the 1960s? The South is still a society in need of some Iraq-style democracy, and racial violence has hardly disappeared. It might not be the kind of large-scale domestic terrorism conservatives get a woody watching, but it's still there.