That’s how they get you, with a nugget of truth that in your context is reasonable and in theirs is explicitly unreasonable. The idea that one can’t choose peace if they have no choice is an old one and philosophers have been thinking about it for ages. There’s nothing wrong with the idea. What’s wrong is that in the context of the alt right they imagine themselves as John Rambo and use nonsense like this as wank material when they’re advocating for (or doing) violence. It’s a story they tell to infantilize and invalidate the left. If we’re all babies who couldn’t even choose violence if we wanted then they should make decisions for us, right? Including the decision to kill us.
Funny thing is that the left got most of the rights and protections that people of every stripe benefit from through outright violence. Strikes and protests and all that are the compromise, remember.
This makes me think of how Trump et all assumed Canada was weak and thought we could be bullied into doing whatever he wanted. Nope, if you want a trade war we’ll take our business elsewhere. Being polite and diplomatic does not equate to weakness. Assuming someone is weak because they don’t leap to grab a gun to solve everything is liable to go badly in the long term.
That’s how they get you, with a nugget of truth that in your context is reasonable and in theirs is explicitly unreasonable. The idea that one can’t choose peace if they have no choice is an old one and philosophers have been thinking about it for ages. There’s nothing wrong with the idea. What’s wrong is that in the context of the alt right they imagine themselves as John Rambo and use nonsense like this as wank material when they’re advocating for (or doing) violence. It’s a story they tell to infantilize and invalidate the left. If we’re all babies who couldn’t even choose violence if we wanted then they should make decisions for us, right? Including the decision to kill us.
Funny thing is that the left got most of the rights and protections that people of every stripe benefit from through outright violence. Strikes and protests and all that are the compromise, remember.
This makes me think of how Trump et all assumed Canada was weak and thought we could be bullied into doing whatever he wanted. Nope, if you want a trade war we’ll take our business elsewhere. Being polite and diplomatic does not equate to weakness. Assuming someone is weak because they don’t leap to grab a gun to solve everything is liable to go badly in the long term.