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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   7560 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 19, 2025

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I'm pretty late to the party on discussing the Ashli Babbitt shooting, but I now get my chance, because the Trump administration is going to pay $5 million to her family. (Archived link.)

I once discussed January 6th with a conservative in real life, and his stance was that the Ashli Babbitt shooting was an example of police brutality. He said that she was issued no warnings at all before being shot, and she wasn't directly threatening anyone's life. Taking a look at the footage, I don't know how she would have been warned at a volume that she could hear, and any of the police with rifles would have been jeopardizing their own safety and the safety of the other officers to lower their rifles and physically restrain her. I think the barricaded door and the cops with guns trained on the entrance should have been enough to signal that breaking through would be a bad idea. Given all these circumstances, I think that awarding $5 million to her family is a stupid thing to do. Add it to the pile of other conflict-theory-esque actions that make this presidency a seriously mixed bag for me. regrettable. Sometimes settlements are the cheapest thing for suits.

How many barricaded doors must the police retreat behind before they are justified in opening fire? I think pretty much every armed conservative would have lit up a left-wing Ashli Babbitt if they found themselves in an analogous situation.

Ashli Babbitt did not deserve to die, in the sense that the punishment did not fit the crime. But that is true of most people killed in police / self defense shootings.

I mean what exact intent is implied by invading a Capitol and attempting to breech the doors of the legislature and ignoring multiple commands to stop? I would undertake the sympathy if she’d gone wandering around the roduntra with a sign or upside down flag, or if she’d been going into offices or something because those things do not represent the same sort of threat as attempting to invade the house floor as member of congress are fleeing. She clearly intended to do something by those actions and so did those with her.

same sort of threat as attempting to invade the house floor as member of congress are fleeing.

If I were far more right-wing than I am and feeling snarky, I'd probably say something about the right to petition one's government here, but I'd generally agree with the "play stupid games" line in this sort of scenario. Maybe that particular argument would be different if members of Congress were known for ignoring their constituents generally.

But it's also not terribly out of line with the times for police shooting "unarmed" but hostile citizens: Ferguson settled with the family of Mike Brown — of "hands up, don't shoot" fame where forensic evidence suggests his hands were not, in fact, up — for a bit under $2M 8 years ago, which is not that different adjusted for inflation.

I think you can make an argument she was playing stupid games, but the public response to it is almost totally informed by 'Blue Team Good, Red Team Bad' factionalism. People who were vehemently pushing BLM and Defund the Police slogans a month before suddenly became totally cool with the idea of a justified shoot, whilst if Babbitt had been shot as an unarmed woman in a similar circumstance whilst say trying to approach Trump during a BLM protest or entering a capitol building she would be held as a martyr to the cause.

I understand why the Red team hasn't pushed her since they tend to be more accepting of violent consequences to 'fuck around and find out' but the handling feels deeply hypocritical on part of the Blue Team.

People who were vehemently pushing BLM and Defund the Police slogans a month before suddenly became totally cool with the idea of a justified shoot

Ironically one of the loopier members of the BLM movement, Shaun King, was the only one who actually took a principled stand and said he thought the Babbit killing was a bad shoot and an act of police brutality.

Good man. Props to him even if we do disagree.

I was writing a reply to zoink above but this is ridiculous standard. Yes, many on the left are hypocrites. Somehow, it is turned to equally hypocritical defense of a riot -- see, the problem with the riot is not the riot, the problem is that out-group who are all hypocritical angry when my-own-group does a riot but they don't care when their ingroup does it.

It is extra ridiculous because this being the internet, it takes no effect effort (ETA) at all to defend consistent standards for dealing with riots, left or right. Yet somehow the most important thing when discussing news of Trump awarding 5 megadollars to Babbitt family is complain loudly about BLM.

Yes but Jan 6th aside from the location and the suggested vibe of 'If the control point of US democracy were held for 30 minutes by funny hat man, the entire USA would automatically fall under his control' was hardly even a Riot. People who were glibly encouraging far more Riotous riots and complaining about far more justified shoots suddenly dropped both principles in favor of pure team allegiance logic.

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