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Serious question: at what point is political violence justified? At what point is it defensible to take up arms in defense of one's community? I know we're all ostensibly against violent remedies, but at some point, practical and moral concerns ought to overtake an abstract commitment to the rule of law, yes?
Look at the Catholic just war doctrine, kind of a checklist of criteria violent action must satisfy to be right in the eyes of God: is there a competent authority organizing the armed action? A realistic possibility of success? A just cause for which you're fighting? And is it your last resort?
If so, then one is justified in extraordinary and violent action. The left seems to believe the situation is sufficiently dire as to justify violence. Is there sufficient cause for resisting them on their own terms?
If not, why? So as to not to break the state's monopoly on violence? To reap the civilizational benefits of settling disputes with words not weapons? After exactly how many presses of the "defect" button do you, too, press "defect"?
And after what point does insisting that people who've experienced "defect" after "defect" continue to play "cooperate" become itself a form of evil, of gaslighting, of denying people their fundamental dignity?
I'm not sure about the answers to any of these questions, but as I see parts of the Internet seething and roiling, and as I see other parts of the Internet gloating, and as I see it all spill over to real life --- the DNA lounge in San Francisco has a "neck shot" special tonight --- I have to wonder whether we're at one of those points in history at which it is less moral to follow man's law than to uphold God's law.
Going off random internet comments I see, apparently the exact moment for political violence is precisely when you personally feel that you are being attacked by "the other side" and thus your belief justifies any and all response back. There is no need to question "Ok, maybe most of The Enemy isn't actually evil monsters?" or "Maybe my perception could be flawed" because our perception is never flawed and The Enemy is 100% evil monsters, and even when they say they aren't it's all pretend.
Is that true? Basically every single left wing politician and pundit has spoken out against the attack, and we don't even know the motive! I think Hanania put it best
I suppose an argument of revenge needs to ask itself if the Charlie Kirk killing is a fair response of the Minnesota Dem killing.
The anti political violence crowd, like me, has an easy answer to both, of course not. The "yes in case of revenge" crowd is gonna be struggling to explain why that is an exception. Or how far back do we go to find the start and who is originally responsible. Five years? Ten years? What's the limit and how was it chosen?
It's crude, but this dark humor is not particularly abnormal. People were making jokes about Paul Pelosi's beating being a gay lovers quarrel, and that one trans person a few months back who killed themselves jumping off a bridge had tons of memes made from 4chan and X. Just look at those replies, prominent names like Stonetoss even joined in. 9k likes for "Not a cell of value was lost. Rest in piss"
9/11 has been made of for years bipartisanly at this point by youth, I've seen plenty of memes and jokes about dead Gazans now, likewise dead Israelis are mocked too.
We had a sitting senator just joke about shooting journalists for "fake news" a few months back.
It's sad, but it's not justified to respond to dark humor and gross jokes with violence.
And in general the same way you don't jail or kill a murderer's kids and neighbors, it's also generally not justified to use political violence "back" against people who haven't done any. Individual actions, individual responsibilities.
You mean the same Dems who tried to shout down an attempt for prayer for Kirk in Congress? Or Ilhan Omar with Medi Hassan? How bout Liz Warren?
Let's approach this in good faith, is it possible they shot it down because attempts for prayers don't happen with other victims of gun violence? There's an argument to be made about the implications there, that his life is more important than the life of a kid who doesn't get it when they die.
And hey, that's exactly the point they said
Maybe you disagree there's an implication like that made with such an exception, or heck maybe you believe that children who get shot or military who die aren't deserving of prayer in the same way, but I hope you can understand the point at least.
It's important to note on the prayer thing that it was called for literally seconds after they had just finished a moment of silence for Kirk. The whole thing was performative, they could have prayed during the moment of silence if they wanted to. I half expect if the prayer motion went through they'd then call for a brief poem in his honor and escalated until someone objected so they could get this type of headline.
That's a degree of dark brilliance I wouldn't have expected from them. Big, if true.
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