Political Activism

[Belsnickel]

(03-09-2017, 11:59 AM)bfine32 Wrote: My $0.02 I have no problem with anyone peacefully marching, rallying, protesting anything they want. My issue is with the counter-protests; especially when your goal is to silence your opposition. We do not need citizens policing citizens on this scale. If they are doing anything illegal or promoting violence/discrimination then the proper authorities should intervene. We have seen was the results of these confrontations can be.

Yesterday Dill and I were having a back and forth and he brought up The Greensboro Massacre. After reflecting on the incident I see that as the route we are currently traveling down and it will explode again. If you look at the Greensboro incident on its surface it is easy to say the KKK were at fault here. I mean who could defend armed KKK members shooting folks just because they are against discrimination.  However, if you look more closely you see the self-proclaimed "communists" had actually attacked at a klan meeting earlier, all but begged the klan to come to their rally for a beatdown, and attacked as soon as the klan pulled up in their cars. So who to blame becomes a little less black and white*




* Disclaimer: The in no way suggests I support the klan or their idealology, I don't think it's OK for white people to shoot black people because of skin color, I am not definitively saying the communists were to blame, I only used the term Communists because that is what they referred to themselves as, I did not kick any puppies this morning,  these statements do not constitute racism,

I don't have an issue with counter-protests unless they get confrontational. If some group like, for example, Westboro Baptist Church is holding an event and you want to counter-protest, go for it. But people need to check themselves with regards to emotional responses. I'm not advocating for a move towards Economic Man status, but we need to move away from the emotional, knee jerk responses. That is what gets so many people in trouble. I feel like the way information is being handed out to people is just furthering that.

The Trump wave is based on emotions over logic, which is what concerns me more than anything else about it. Those staunchly supporting him, and many of those opposed to him, are basing their views on emotions and that isn't how things should work in my view. Substantive discussions can't be had with some of these new political activists.