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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 8, 2025

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The fundamental problem is that most modern right wing violence is an accident of ideology committed by a fringe with little support. Condemnations are widespread, the people engaging it have been mostly grossly mentally ill, no leading figures are calling for it, no mainstream institutions are calling for it or supporting it (at least up until current events).

The claim here is obviously false. There is plenty of institutonal and cultural support for violence among the right. Take, for example, conservative fascination with firearms as a political tool. Or greater suport for state sanctioned killing to achieve policy goals, like the death penalty. And, while this is less true now but was certainly true in the very recent past that conservatives were very likey to prioritize violence as a solution to foreign policy as well ("turn the whole country to glass").

The acceptance of violence, or the tendency to see the use physical force as a acceptable or effective solution to problems, seems to be so pervasive among the right that it has become "baked in" to the point where it doesn't even register, like a fish in water.

I am not claiming that the left does not have problems with violence, it clearly does (especially and perhaps exclusively the woke illiberal left), but this thing I keep seeing where conservatives are casting themselves as constitutionally cherubic peaceniks against the bloodthirsty violent and demonic left is just flatly wrong.

Take, for example, conservative fascination with firearms as a political tool.

What I notice is that when conservatives talk about using firearms to defend from an oppressive government, they don't actually tend to call for people to actually go do that. In general, I would classify almost all of them as LARPers, who fancy themselves heroes in a fantasy. That doesn't make them violent revolutionaries.

The acceptance of violence, or the tendency to see the use physical force as a acceptable or effective solution to problems, seems to be so pervasive among the right that it has become "baked in" to the point where it doesn't even register, like a fish in water.

I see acceptance of violence against individuals in self defense, or as legal retribution, but again, neither of these make one a violent revolutionary.

Or greater support for state sanctioned killing to achieve policy goals, like the death penalty.

Killing political opponents as a way to get your policies enacted is very different from violence being part of the policy itself.

There is plenty of institutonal and cultural support for violence among the right. Take, for example, conservative fascination with firearms as a political tool. Or greater suport for state sanctioned killing to achieve policy goals, like the death penalty.

One could model this as the right having an interest in violence that they rarely if ever indulge, and the left blinkering their jaundiced eye to carefully ignore a higher rate of violence and destruction. The right barks, the left bites, as it were; matching relative tastes in dogs and what should be done about pitbulls.

Such a model is a little too self-serving and pat, of course. And yet, I can't shake the grain of truth in it.

I don't agree with the rest of what you are saying but you are missing the point. Any mismatch or parity on violence in the political realm is completely overshadowed by everything else.

Traditional politics is a small portion of most people's interaction with the world.

Media, education, social media, and corporate employment are all very aggressive with pushing "silence is violence" "the personal is the political" "speech is violence" "they are going to put you in camps" "they are literally Nazis" and so on.

These things have nearly zero pushback and are firmly water for the vast majority of Americans.

I have to work very hard on Reddit, on Facebook, on TV shows to find the most mild of conservative views but I am going to see left wing violent extremism on the same unless I work very hard not to.