Punching Nazis

[Lexicus]

Another poster has claimed they would not harm a living being under any circumstances. It is hard to imagine anything they could do about a Nazi takeover other than stand idly by.

It's obviously false, because merely by existing in late capitalism you are contributing to harming millions of living beings every moment.

 

[Gori the Grey]

And since the quarrel
Will bear no color for the thing he is,
Fashion it thus: that what he is, augmented,
Would run to these and these extremities;
And therefore think him as a serpent's egg,
Which, hatch'd, would as his kind grow mischievous,
And kill him in the shell.

Julius Caesar 2.1.28-34

 

[Manfred Belheim]

You don't have to say it, necessarily. I mean, we know that millions of people actually do stand by as authoritarians take over. So where do you draw the line about when it's OK to punch them?

Somewhere distant from small groups of powerless people, or even individuals, talking.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

One poster has clearly stated that they wouldn't punch a Nazi because the Nazis actually represent many of their own views. It seems unlikely they would do anything other than stand idly by and watch Nazis take over.

Another poster has claimed they would not harm a living being under any circumstances. It is hard to imagine anything they could do about a Nazi takeover other than stand idly by.

I could find more examples where saying "they would stand idly by and watch the Nazis take over" is just a logical conclusion from what they said, not putting words in their mouth.

Fair enough, for these people it does seem reasonable.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

I really admire your patience, consistency and well thought out points, but do you think this is a battle that can be won? They have proven to be completely resistant to all kinds of reasoning for 35 pages now, and they always use the many-against-one-approach (just like these people do it in real life too, I guess), so maybe it is just a waste of time? What do you think?

"Winning" isn't really my main motivation for arguing in these threads, I'd just like to have discussions (even heated and unfriendly ones) where each side can at least agree to take on each other's arguments as written, rather than some twisted and dishonest version of them.

 

[metalhead]

Somewhere distant from small groups of powerless people, or even individuals, talking.

Groups like his are growing in the U.S., and by a lot. They feel like they have allies at the highest level of government, and those identified allies aren't willing to disown them. So what are we to conclude? Are these people powerless? There seems to be a growing body of evidence that they are not. So when is the proper time to feel like they are a legitimate threat?

 

[Lexicus]

At least two of them are advising the President, and they've apparently infiltrated police departments around the country, but don't worry, they're powerless.

 

[Yeekim]

It's completely irrelevant because I've already specified advocating genocide as the first criterion. Yet you persist with "What if he's not really a Nazi??? What if he only believes in the 'socialist' part???" It's really dumb.

Ok, I got needlessly distracted by that second criterion. Then again, why was it even necessary to introduce the second one at all? I believe you didn't wish to convey it is all right to advocate genocide outside of Nazi ideology, right?

Pretty sure that some of the posters here think advocating genocide should not be met with violence unless it's carried out.

Well, I don't. And I doubt anyone else in this thread is going to say that.
EDIT: Well, maybe I missed the "wouldn't harm a living being, ever" guy.

You don't have to say it, necessarily. I mean, we know that millions of people actually do stand by as authoritarians take over. So where do you draw the line about when it's OK to punch them?

Well... where do you draw it? And did you just (consciously?) equate "authoritarian" with "Nazi"? So have we reached a conclusion that everyone who didn't pick up arms to stop Trump from entering the White House is as bad as a card-carrying NSDAP member?

 

[metalhead]

I draw it with, white supremacists are growing in number and have greatly increased their political power through Trump's election. So if a visible, well-known one is speaking on the street, I don't mind if someone decides to punch him in the head. Our country is not immune to this crap and we shouldn't act otherwise.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Groups like his are growing in the U.S., and by a lot. They feel like they have allies at the highest level of government, and those identified allies aren't willing to disown them. So what are we to conclude? Are these people powerless? There seems to be a growing body of evidence that they are not. So when is the proper time to feel like they are a legitimate threat?

Citations for any of this?

 

[Berzerker]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that no, fighting Nazis does not make you as bad as a Nazi, and people who think it does might as well be Nazis themselves.

you make sucker punching somebody sound almost noble

 

[Yeekim]

I draw it with, white supremacists are growing in number and have greatly increased their political power through Trump's election. So if a visible, well-known one is speaking on the street, I don't mind if someone decides to punch him in the head. Our country is not immune to this crap and we shouldn't act otherwise.

So now we've moved from "Nazis" to "white supremacists"... another pretty fluid concept.

Academic use of the term
The term white supremacy is used in academic studies of racial power to denote a system of structural or societal racism which privileges white people over others, regardless of the presence or absence of racial hatred. White racial advantages occur both at a collective and an individual level (ceteris paribus, i. e., when individuals are compared that do not relevantly differ except in ethnicity). Legal scholar Frances Lee Ansley explains this definition as follows:

By "white supremacy" I do not mean to allude only to the self-conscious racism of white supremacist hate groups. I refer instead to a political, economic and cultural system in which whites overwhelmingly control power and material resources, conscious and unconscious ideas of white superiority and entitlement are widespread, and relations of white dominance and non-white subordination are daily reenacted across a broad array of institutions and social settings.[26][27]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_supremacy

 

[metalhead]

Citations for any of this?

Several alt-right groups have expressed Trump's win as a victory for their ideology. The Southern Poverty Law Center did an excellent retrospective of the rise of hate groups in the Year of Trump. Hate groups, and white supremacists in particular, including Nazis like Richard Spencer, feel that they have entered the mainstream. I can't think of a more pressing time to send the message that they are NOT in the mainstream and are not accepted by most Americans.

 

[Gori the Grey]

Yeekim, what you've cited is the understanding of white supremacy that critics of that system of societal advantaging use in their analyses of unequal social systems.

White supremacists are people who argue for continuing and even enhancing the societal inequality that favors one racial group at the expense of others. Some of their proposals for how they would implement the continuation and enhancement of white supremacy border on Nazi-esque, but regardless, their mindset is grounded in a reprehensible view that one race is inherently superior to another.

Someone like Ansley, in your quote, would argue that a white person enjoys significant societal advantage simply by virtue of the "white supremacy" operative in, say, USAian society at large, but that doesn't make him a white supremacist, as metalhead is using the term.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Citations for any of this?

Rather than play into your "I must send you on a google quest" game, let's just use something that has been brought right to us.

It would only take 3 days of disruptions before the food rioting is inevitable in most major US cities because all of the food comes from Hundreds if not Thousands of miles away, that is a lot of territory for Guerrillas to hijack trucks. You think the military would stop them? 75% of the military would side with right-wing anti-globalist forces according to the US Army's own reports on the subject. Last time I checked it was those racists red-necks you all hate that have the stockpiles of food and ammo and join the military.

Do you think this guy came up with these ideas sitting all alone in his basement? Or does it seem likely that somewhere these (dare we call them) fascists are kicking around ideas for the "cleansing" that they figure will eventually be "necessary"? I opted not to bother pointing out that their plans here have plenty of strategic flaws, but that isn't really the point.

The point is that there actually are these people out there. They do appear to be encouraged by the political climate created by Trump, based on what they are saying among themselves as well as openly. Steve Bannon, who is clearly a key figure in the Trump administration, in his previous job, openly set his goal as to make Breitbart these people's platform.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Several alt-right groups have expressed Trump's win as a victory for their ideology. The Southern Poverty Law Center did an excellent retrospective of the rise of hate groups in the Year of Trump. Hate groups, and white supremacists in particular, including Nazis like Richard Spencer, feel that they have entered the mainstream. I can't think of a more pressing time to send the message that they are NOT in the mainstream and are not accepted by most Americans.

Okay, that's not really a citation for any of your claims though I don't think.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Do you think this guy came up with these ideas sitting all alone in his basement? Or does it seem likely that somewhere these (dare we call them) fascists are kicking around ideas for the "cleansing" that they figure will eventually be "necessary"? I opted not to bother pointing out that their plans here have plenty of strategic flaws, but that isn't really the point.

The point is that there actually are these people out there. They do appear to be encouraged by the political climate created by Trump, based on what they are saying among themselves as well as openly. Steve Bannon, who is clearly a key figure in the Trump administration, in his previous job, openly set his goal as to make Breitbart these people's platform.

Well firstly I have no idea if he sits all alone in a basement or not. I'd guess you don't either. But that fact that "these people are out there" is not evidence that they are growing in number, not that the number is significant, not that they have any power. Likewise, being a fan of Breitbart is not evidence of being a Nazi.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Well firstly I have no idea if he sits all alone in a basement or not. I'd guess you don't either. But that fact that "these people are out there" is not evidence that they are growing in number, not that the number is significant, not that they have any power. Likewise, being a fan of Breitbart is not evidence of being a Nazi.

So, you have no opinion on the likelihood that this guy just came up with this all by himself as a bit of spur of the moment trollery as opposed to he's been kicking it around in some group, probably on line, most likely at least intermittently in the pages of the "news site" that was dedicated for their use by the managing publisher who is now advising the president?

 

[Naskra]

I don't punch Nazis. I have never met a Nazi; I would think it rude to punch a stranger. I don't know many people who have been improved by punching (I never met Leon Spinks).

 

[metalhead]

Running Breitbart as an attempt to provide a mainstream platform for the alt-right is certainly evidence that Bannon wants to amplify their message, and bring it closer to the mainstream of American politics.