Thirty-four percent of Americans think violent action against the government is sometimes justified, according to a new poll from The Washington Post and the University of Maryland released days ahead of the one-year anniversary of the insurrection at the US Capitol.
Not surprising. The problem is that too many stupid people are initiating violence when it is not necessary and has no valid justification.
The trouble is that, philosophically speaking, there are no useful guidelines for when violence is or is not justified.
When dealing with individuals, we all know when we’re justified in using violence against them (in self-defense against violence already initiated or reasonably imminent). When dealing with governments (or maybe more generalized to “any large group”), this standard just doesn’t cut it. For one, if they’ve already initiated violence against you… you’re going to lose. For another, the goal of a tyrannical government is to control you against your will, so them murdering you generally subverts their own intentions. Instead, they merely threaten violence, and often do so in a way that psychologically interrupts your ability to see that as justifying counter-violence.
People jumping the gun and trying to get riled up is a reaction to that (making sure that the psychology never interrupts the justification of counter-violence). Of course, that just means that they also attempt insurrection even when there isn’t anything resembling justification.
Until people are willing to talk about the subject, we can’t even explore just when it is and when it isn’t justified, and we’ll be left with a “you’ll know it when you see it” approach that means no one can be certain that they should fight back until they’re being shoveled into the ovens.
Probably, we’re all scared (whether or not it’s the case) that if we were to come up with a logical philosophy, we’d discover that we should have done something decades ago.
Both sides of my family fought in the American Revolution and our family name is on a famous historical landmark. I’m not going to dispute the need may exist. The U.S. was founded on fighting unjust leadership. That is why the right to gun ownership is so highly valued here.
Was violence/insurrection necessary on 1/6/2021? Absolutely not. Violence was used in an attempt to negate my legal vote in the election. It did not represent the people. It represented extremists.
I do not support those people, and they certainly committed crimes. By my count, there’s at least rioting in there, and likely others.
I wonder if it rises to the level of “insurrection” though. If you were to attempt insurrection, would you show up dressed in costumes, in most cases (the vast majority) unarmed, and without a plan for resistance? This was something more akin to a flash mob, and any actual insurrection remained solely in their absurd fantasies.
Those calling it an insurrection are doing so to try to milk it for all its political worth. More so than any child with a skinned knee wailing about how they have to go to the hospital ever did. They should be worrying about midterms, where they’re likely to lose their offices… legitimately.
It’s an insurrection initiated by Trump and his higher level supporters. The people who broke into the capital were pawns in the act. Idiots. Things said by Flynn and others made it obvious prior to Jan. 6th that this was all planned.