Violence Begets Violence -- Just The Way They Like It

[MrScorpio]

Watching the scenes unfold last night from Chicago and elsewhere, it became obvious that, largely as many of us have feared, Donald Trump is indeed leading the United States merrily down the path to an outbreak of not-kidding-honest-to-God-real thing fascism or proto-fascism, all without himself being a hardened fascist ideologue, but rather a right-wing populist demagogue. Then again, the two phenomena are only degrees apart, and that is what we are now seeing on the streets of the American political landscape.

Of course, while it was fairly clear that the protesters were peaceful until attacked by the Trump rally-goers, the reality also was that fighting eventually broke out on all sides and there was violence all around. Naturally, that meant that the media were already out there flogging their favorite "both sides do it" narrative.

Never mind that Trump has specifically encouraged the violence, telling reporters at a press conference that "we need a little bit more of that."


The story we'll be fed as at least "the other side" will be Trump's: that the leftist "thugs" were responsible for the violence. And we all can see where this is going: As justification for further and more intense violence.

There is a long history of this with the fascist and proto-fascist right. Indeed, martyrdom at the hands of the "violent left" was a cornerstone of early Nazi propaganda, of which the above poster is only a small sample. And a version of it helped fuel the post-Civil War Jim-Crow-and-Klan rule of the South.

http://crooksandliars.com/2016/03/violence-begets-violence-just-way-they-it

[warrprayer]

1. Is it possible

Trump is paying someone (s) to have the police react violently on the slightest pretext to draw attention to his events?

[mainstreetonce]

2. Sure it is

If he instructs his own security to react like they saw a threat ,the police will back that up.

[backscatter712]

4. Very likely.

Always remember that law enforcement circles are very heavily right-wing. There are lots of teabagger cops who would be more than happy to do a solid for Drumpf.

[gratuitous]

3. Another take from Athenae at First Draft

http://first-draft.com/2016/03/13/on-standing-up/#comments

I'll post a couple of graphs, but as the kids say nowadays, go read the whole thing:

The day after the Trump rally there was the usual bellyaching on the Internet about whether protesting was really a good thing, and lots of butchering of “free speech” and “how would you feel if this was Trump protesters taking over a Hillary rally” and blah blah blah de blah. There was lots of motive-checking of the protesters, lots of “both sides” and “shouldn’t they have worn nicer outfits and not yelled so rudely,” the usual Monday morning quarterbacking from people who won’t miss a meal if Trump is elected. And you know what? Fuck all that shit.

Ignoring ugliness is how we got here. Ignoring those who stood up to ugliness is how we got here. Disavowing those who stood up to ugliness is how we got here. Publicly worrying about how it would look to be such filthy hippies as to be on the side of human dignity is how we got here, after two decades of war and tax cuts and pretending racism was dead. Being nice and being quiet and hoping not to be hit is how we got here.

. . .

The second, though? The second reason you stand up?

Is for anybody who isn’t standing up.