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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 8, 2025

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But despite that, we can count the number of explicitly political attacks on our fingers.

No, we can't. You have no idea how many buildings actually got burned down during the Floyd riots. You have no idea how many windows got a brick through them. You have no idea how many cars were torched or totaled. You have no idea how many people were beaten, nor how badly. Now multiply those unknowns by every other incident of organized leftist street violence, from the Battle of Berkeley on down.

We had at least two billion dollars worth of insurance claims, with no attempt I've ever seen to calculate the necessarily higher uninsurable economic damage.:

Throughout these incidents, the vast majority of that violence never involved an arrest, because over and over again the police stood down and watched people be victimized by organized gangs of thugs, often in broad daylight. On the rare occasion where arrests were made, prosecution was doubtful. When prosecution did occur, fellow thugs have been known to congregate in the courtroom, menacing the jury, and shockingly enough their comrades are found not guilty.

This person's opinion, that people like me need to be killed, is not in any meaningful sense "fringe". I would probably be fired for disagreeing with it publicly prior to the Kirk shooting. You are correct that we have not had large numbers of political murders. These people are trying to change that, and if they succeed, nothing you value will survive.

No, we can't. You have no idea how many buildings actually got burned down during the Floyd riots. You have no idea how many windows got a brick through them. You have no idea how many cars were torched or totaled. You have no idea how many people were beaten, nor how badly. Now multiply those unknowns by every other incident of organized leftist street violence, from the Battle of Berkeley on down.

That's true we don't know how much damage was caused there and by how many people. We also don't know how many, if any, are only politically motivated crimes, and not the actions of typical criminal behavior exploiting large crowds to hide in, or false flags like this or this.

Out of an estimated 16-24 million people participating, the idea that the only people in the crowds are supporters is highly unlikely. But even if they were, 16-24 million is a huge number! Even a fraction of a fraction (a very small percentage) people committing crime would be able to do a fair bit of damage.

This person's opinion, that people like me need to be killed, is not in any meaningful sense "fringe". I would probably be fired for disagreeing with it publicly prior to the Kirk shooting. You are correct that we have not had large numbers of political murders. These people are trying to change that, and if they succeed, nothing you value will survive.

Random chest thumping social media accounts from leftists trying to signal how cool they are is just as meaningless as the chest thumping from the right currently calling for "civil war" or for killing judges. It's posturing by edgelords who thinks it makes them look cool, but they don't have an actual violent bone in them.