I think that's all fair. I think there's a few dimensions to this: One being that 'left' (or at least anti-right) violence doesn't tend to look like right wing reactionary violence. Rather than violence against civilians or government institutions, it tends to be mass protest which *might* target property. In rare cases, it's violence ag…
I think that's all fair. I think there's a few dimensions to this: One being that 'left' (or at least anti-right) violence doesn't tend to look like right wing reactionary violence. Rather than violence against civilians or government institutions, it tends to be mass protest which *might* target property. In rare cases, it's violence against police/politicians. (2016 Dallas police shooting, 2017 Congressional baseball attack.) So it does happen.
There's no guarantee it will get worse, but I think there are plenty of indicators that it will — growing urgency amongst climate activists, e.g.
But all to say, yes, the right tends to be more prone to political violence. But it goes back to one of my axioms: Polarization manifests differently on different sides.
Thank-you; I was not thinking of lone-wolf violence when writing that; my mind's eye was on militias (def: *organization* for committing violent acts) and mass-actions like protests.
Of course, I also forgot antifa, but I'm unaware of any actual hospitalizations from them, much less murders. I don't think they've ever been more-armed than sticks? Or planned actions beyond showing up at other demonstrations.
You mercifully didn't open the can of worms as to whether all Islamic terror is left-wing by a right-wing definition: it's against imperialism. The American political left-wing was basically forced to sign off on the Iraq War so that they could disassociate themselves from terrorists. They were called "soft-on-communism" for decades, and knew they had to get way out ahead of the accusations of "soft-on-terror", "terrorist sympathizers", etc. Obama didn't close Guantanamo, it might have cost him ObamaCare.
For what it's worth, I think we can say that the current state of the far-right militia movement — that is, actual paramilitary groups with proper command structures — is probably less than it was in the 90s. Now we've got a lot of militia cosplaying.
And yeah, like I wrote, we also need to realize there's more than single axis. Yes there's left/right extremism, but also religious/environmental/animal welfare/etc extremism (which may or may not be left/right)
And if one of these sides has fascistic tendencies, look out. We've been taught to fear the wrong bogeyman since shortly after the Allies won the second world war.
We didn't defeat fascism....we sent it underground for a few decades. It's a mindset.
And hard to eradicate. Wilhelm Reich wrote a book about it, and I remember his claim that all you have to do to bring out the fascist is tighten the economic screws ever so slightly. We're hard wired to be fascists he claimed.
I hate to believe that..........but recent activity around the world has me worried. Because economically, given the degree to which we're in overshoot as a planet, it can only get worse.
I think that's all fair. I think there's a few dimensions to this: One being that 'left' (or at least anti-right) violence doesn't tend to look like right wing reactionary violence. Rather than violence against civilians or government institutions, it tends to be mass protest which *might* target property. In rare cases, it's violence against police/politicians. (2016 Dallas police shooting, 2017 Congressional baseball attack.) So it does happen.
There's no guarantee it will get worse, but I think there are plenty of indicators that it will — growing urgency amongst climate activists, e.g.
But all to say, yes, the right tends to be more prone to political violence. But it goes back to one of my axioms: Polarization manifests differently on different sides.
Thank-you; I was not thinking of lone-wolf violence when writing that; my mind's eye was on militias (def: *organization* for committing violent acts) and mass-actions like protests.
Of course, I also forgot antifa, but I'm unaware of any actual hospitalizations from them, much less murders. I don't think they've ever been more-armed than sticks? Or planned actions beyond showing up at other demonstrations.
You mercifully didn't open the can of worms as to whether all Islamic terror is left-wing by a right-wing definition: it's against imperialism. The American political left-wing was basically forced to sign off on the Iraq War so that they could disassociate themselves from terrorists. They were called "soft-on-communism" for decades, and knew they had to get way out ahead of the accusations of "soft-on-terror", "terrorist sympathizers", etc. Obama didn't close Guantanamo, it might have cost him ObamaCare.
For what it's worth, I think we can say that the current state of the far-right militia movement — that is, actual paramilitary groups with proper command structures — is probably less than it was in the 90s. Now we've got a lot of militia cosplaying.
And yeah, like I wrote, we also need to realize there's more than single axis. Yes there's left/right extremism, but also religious/environmental/animal welfare/etc extremism (which may or may not be left/right)
And if one of these sides has fascistic tendencies, look out. We've been taught to fear the wrong bogeyman since shortly after the Allies won the second world war.
We didn't defeat fascism....we sent it underground for a few decades. It's a mindset.
And hard to eradicate. Wilhelm Reich wrote a book about it, and I remember his claim that all you have to do to bring out the fascist is tighten the economic screws ever so slightly. We're hard wired to be fascists he claimed.
I hate to believe that..........but recent activity around the world has me worried. Because economically, given the degree to which we're in overshoot as a planet, it can only get worse.