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I'm starting a new top-level regarding trigger happy Iceman meets wine mom in Minneapolis because, rather than debating the videos, I'd like to focus more on a compare and contrast to get a true culture war angle. People have made an analogy to the woman who died on Jan 6th but I don't think it lands strongly enough. Permit me to cut closer to the bone, friends.
The only fatality on Jan 6th was an unarmed woman being shot by a federal agent[1] because she was opposing what she considered an illegitimate government action. Liberals tearlessly argued this is what happens when you Fuck Around while conservatives argued she was righteously Resisting (TM).
Today the players are the same but the jerseys are flipped. Liberals cry with so, so many tears of empathy for the dead woman in the car while conservatives argue they were obstructing a legitimate state function and put the officer in danger and this is what happens when you Fuck Around.
In broad strokes it's clear neither side cares about democracy or rule of law per se. Conservative faith in rule of law evaporates when it says no to Trump and liberal empathy for the scrappy civil disobedients dries up when it's a Chud. Both sides are happy with mob violence when it's their side doing it and cry tyranny whenever they Find Out.
I think I broadly agree.
"Ashli Babbit and Renee Good both FAFO" is a coherent and consistent view. "Ashli Babbit and Renee Good both died unnecessarily because of law enforcement/state ineptitude" is also a coherent and consistent view. (The latter does not preclude acknowledging that both women, at the very least, made poor choices and could have and should have avoided the situation, which at this point I definitely think is hard to dispute.)
If you think one was an innocent martyr and the other got what she deserved, I would really like to hear the arguments for that.
See:
That is the consistent principle.
Also this post. (I'm willing to move discussion to either thread to not fragment the conversation further.)
I don't like the Babbitt shoot, but I could understand that in the moment, the police officer didn't see Babbitt, but a limb of an angry mob. It's the only way it makes sense to me outside of some weird castle doctrine defense. Babbitt of course was a clown to do what she did.
Notably in mid 2025 the govt settled a wrongful death suit with Babbitt's family for $5 million.
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One was an assault on a police officer with a deadly weapon. The other was breaking and entering. I believe these have different thresholds for the use of deadly force.
As this thread has shown, both "assault on a police officer" and "breaking and entering" are disputed. As I keep repeating: yes, both sides will frame the respective events so Ours was martyred and Theirs FAFO'd. And no matter how much you (general you) insist the facts are indisputable and your version is true, I don't believe you (general you) unless your previous demonstration of principled and not motivated reasoning makes me believe that you wouldn't just frame them differently if the tribal participants were reversed.
Which facts are you disputing? The deadly weapon operated by Good was an automobile. Good struck the officer with her vehicle. Assault with a deadly weapon. Babbitt did not assault any police officer and was unarmed. Babbitt died while trying to breach a windowed door.
Which side is my side?
I haven't disputed anything.
I said that in this thread (and obviously elsewhere) people are disputing whether Good struck the officer, whether her actions meet the definition of assault, and whether either Reed or Babbit's actions merited a lethal response. I have opinions on some of these things, but I do not yet have a definite conclusion about everything with regards to the Reed case.
Which side is my side?
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Another consistent view is that Ashley Babbit deserved it because she was protesting for a bad cause (overturning an election) whereas Renee did not because she was protesting for a good cause (stopping the feds from kidnapping us).
The real crime of january 6th was that they used up one of our most potent civil disobedience options on something so meaningless.
It's consistent if you openly acknowledge you are embracing Conflict Theory ("we are Good, so it's Good when our side does it - you are Bad, so it's Bad when your side does it").
Most Conflict Theorists aren't so nakedly open about it. People want to pretend they have principles and their conclusions are based on reason and some form of justice.
How can you respond to this comment without modding it? The other poster is claiming without any evidence that ICE is kidnapping presumably Americans. That’s an extraordinary explosive claim wi the zero evidence.
We are often asked to mod people for "being dishonest."
We aren't mindreaders. We often suspect someone is being disingenuous, but the poster may really believe what he is saying. (You are surely aware that most progressives do consider illegal immigrants "us" so it's not implausible to me that they really believe ICE is "kidnapping people.")
Do I think @LiberalRetvrn is sincere, or a troll trying to push buttons? He's certainly on our radar, but making bad arguments is not something we ban people for. Demanding we mod people for "being dishonest" is asking us to use more personal discretion in judging posts than I think you really want. Lots of regulars are, IMO, at the very least fond of making unsubstantiated and unverified claims very confidently.
"Inflammatory claim with insufficient evidence" is the rule usually cited. Contrary to what many people think, though, this does not mean "A claim that inflamed (pissed off) me and that I don't believe."
But how is “they are kidnapping us” not an inflammatory claim without sufficient evidence?
"Inflammatory" is subjective. We don't apply it every time someone says something that pisses you off. Arguably almost every argument made here is inflammatory to someone, and unsurprisingly, people who don't agree with the argument made typically consider it to have been presented with insufficient evidence.
I already pointed out the answer to your specific case: charitably, @LiberalRetvrn does consider the people ICE is arresting to be "us" and he does consider their actions to be lawless and tantamount to "kidnapping." I am not speaking for @LiberalRetvrn here, but this is definitely a perspective common on the left, and I'm sure you know this. That this make you angry does not make it "inflammatory" such that we're going to mod people who say it. (Nor should you make any assumptions about whether or not I personally agree with the argument.)
As a meta-comment, one of the failures of the Motte is that while in theory, we are here to debate and argue and test ideas, in principal most people just want validation, venting, and affirmation. When they see an argument they don't like- especially from an ideological opponent, especially someone whose tone or style or specific POV really pisses them off - rather than saying "Ah, someone with a challenging perspective to take on!" or "Hmm, a worthy opponent?" they rush for the report button, and then yell at the mods for not shutting the mf up.
Now here's a concrete example: "ICE is killing dozens of people every day!" would be an inflammatory and falsifiable claim that you could legitimately demand some evidence for. "ICE is kidnapping people" - well, you're going to have an argument over what constitutes "kidnapping." And that's okay.
Kidnapping suggests illegal. Where is the illegality? Now you are going to say that lefties can define words to mean other than commonly defined terms.
You mod for much less absurd things.
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I do have principles, but I don't think it's possible to judge civil disobedience acts in a vacuum. Disobeying an unjust law is good, disobeying a just law makes you a nuissance to society. I have principles about freedom, individual rights, and liberalism, not about what tactics are justifiable to achieve those things.
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We've been doing that for days, and I believe you specifically mentioned in a subthread yesterday that you didn't care to follow closely because it was tiresome or some such thing, which I interpreted as "This looks bad for the side I like aesthetically and I want plausible deniability that the MAGAts were right".
I have not seen much specific discussion of how Ashli Babbit was materially different (there is now some discussion of it in this thread).
I said in general, I've avoided arguing about Renee Good online. Notably, I was not only referring to the Motte. I was referring to all my online spaces, most of which are rather different in orientation from the Motte.
Really, that is your model of where I fall ideologically?
How fascinating.
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Sometimes police need to use lethal force to enforce the laws. Like, if a criminal is trying to kill the police, or other people, then obviously the police should use lethal force.
Sometimes police need to use non-lethal force to enforce the laws. Like, a naked man running down the street, or breaking up a drunken brawl.
If the police use lethal force in a situation that does not call for lethal force, that is bad.
I do not think Ashli Babbit was a case where lethal force was warranted. Renee Good is very arguably a case where lethal force was warranted, on grounds of self defense.
Ashli Babbit was a case where non-lethal force was warranted.
A rioter who is just a rioter should be roughed up a bit, thrown in jail, and fully punished under the law.
A rioter who seriously endangers the lives of others, might warrant a bullet, and if not, absolutely warrants all of the above.
Maybe this stance does not constitute 'innocent martyr and the other got what she deserved' but my position is that the office in the Good case should not be charged with anything and the officer in the Babbit case is a murderer.
Perhaps not, but I think there is a general moral principle that when an activist inserts himself into an ugly/violent/explosive situation, the activist needs to be on his best behavior under penalty of forfeiting any claim to charity or sympathy. By this standard, neither Babbit, Good, nor Rittenhouse deserve much in the way of charity. In Rittenhouse's case though, he handled himself extremely well so that even without any charity, he should be (and was) exonerated.
From a legal perspective, these are different questions, of course. I do know that when it comes to private property, you can normally use lethal force against an intruder without waiting to see how much a threat the person poses. [Edit: Apparently this is not necessarily true] Does this principle apply to an intruder in a specific room in a public building? I don't know.
I didn't pay much attention to the Ashley Babbit situation at the time, but what concerns me now is this: If there is a general rule that law enforcement cannot open fire against an (apparently) unarmed intruder in a public building, it opens the door (so to speak) to mob tactics where the authorities won't be able to protect the building (and themselves) until it's too late.
This is not in fact true in most states. Castle Doctrine says you have no duty to retreat within your home (though some states don't even have that), but you still have to have a reasonable fear of grave bodily harm.
Thanks for pointing this out. I had recalled learning at some point that if there's an intruder in your house, you don't have to wait to see if the person has a gun, knife, etc. -- you can just open fire.
I did find this online:
I do think that as a practical matter, a homeowner has a great deal of leeway in terms of using lethal force against an (unlawful) intruder. But it doesn't seem that this is a bright line rule.
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I feel like a lot of the talk about Babbitt seems to assume that nothing short of lethal force would work. I think this is because currently our law enforcement uses basically no force when dealing with rioters so riots get out of hand. It is very easy and practical to use non-lethal force to crowd control unarmed people. If the police fully utilized the non-lethal options at their disposal to deal with rioters, rubber bullet, tear gas, water cannons, truncheons, handcuffs, etc. then I think that should be more than sufficient to control such hypothetical situations.
I think this is downstream of American Revolution/Independence hagiography and then Civil Rights.
For historical reasons, the US is very sensitive to the optics of putting down riots. It’s supposed to be done by the nasty people that America was made to get away from. So if it’s not serious enough to start shooting, nothing should be done.
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Can you convince me that you would make exactly the same argument if Ashli Babbit had been a leftist protesting Trump's inauguration, and Renee Good had been, I don't know, a Christian at an abortion protest or something?
Babbitt was standing next to several other Capital police officers with no barriers between them and her for several minutes. They were unmolested by her. It is, indeed, hard to imagine a reverse situation given the history with people like Rittenhouse having to gun down multiple convicted criminals just to stay alive in a similar situation.
So you would confidently assert that if a crowd of leftists entered the Capital building to protest/disrupt Trump's inauguration, and a woman who had previously been standing next to several officers for several minutes subsequently broke through a door in the building and was shot, that you would say "This was murder and the Capital police officer should be charged"?
Nah. People shouldn't be charged so much. The guy should have lost a large civil lawsuit meaning his future earnings to eternity go to Babbitt's children if she has them. Its better to let things lie in the middle.
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The sort of autist that posts on the the Motte tends to actually hold to principles somewhat instead of broad tribe identification.
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So, if I had argued, for example, that Rene Good was fighting against a rightful authority, and Babbitt was fighting against an illegitimate authority, I would obviously be making an argument that could be very easily swayed by motivated reasoning, even if it could also be a principled argument in theory.
If Babbitt had been a leftists I would absolutely make the same argument, but I am not really sure how I can convince you of that, and I am not really sure which part of my argument feels like partisan hackery to you.
I accept that Babbitt was doing something illegal, that it warranted a response of force from the police, just that, as she did not seem to pose a credible threat to anyone, that force should be non-lethal.
Does that position really seem so devested from baseline reality?
Honestly, I think my position on both of these cases would be the 90%+ majority opinion of Americans if the politics could somehow be removed from them.
To be fair, I was asking a genuine question: how could you convince me? Since I don't know you (and don't really have much of an impression of you, specifically), I'll just have to take your word for it that if the polarities were reversed you'd stick to the same principles.
Provisionally, I will take someone's word for that (unless they've already given me reason to believe otherwise). But generally speaking, I think we're so deep into polarization that I think most people form their opinions based entirely on who? and whom?
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Not OP, but I'm trying to think of what would actually be an analogous situation for Renee Bad[1] at an abortion clinic protest. There's not a lot of overtly disruptive things she could do in front of an abortion clinic that wouldn't be straightforward grounds for arrest, and I think the overall right generally has enough respect for the law and property rights to understand that even if they don't like that abortion is legal, that it's a matter for the legislators and the courts, not for Renee Bad to roll up and do a direct action.
[1] As in, the mirror universe right wing version of Renee Good. This is a pun and I don't intend it to imply that it's evil to be right wing. I think it's quite okay to be right wing. It's just a pun please don't hurt me.
It's harder to come up with an exact equivalent for Good, true. But I'm thinking something like, an anti-abortion protester has her SUV blocking the street in front an abortion clinic, cops arrive to clear out the protesters, she and/or other protesters are screaming at the cops, and then some cops tell her to 'Get out of the fucking car' and she accelerates- with all the subsequent minute analysis of whether she hit a cop, whether she saw the cop, whether she was provoking the cop, whether she was moving towards the cop, whether the cop was in danger, etc.
I am convinced rightists and leftists would mostly change their opinions about whether the cop was justified in shooting her in that case.
Probably not, no. Pro-life activists being arrested for protesting too hard outside abortion clinics is a thing that happens and conservatives often defend FACE violations, but, importantly, not pro-life activists who use actual violent action.
But the entire dispute is whether Good used violent action. I don't see any leftists who are saying "Yes, she tried to run down an ICE officer and she was justified." Rather, they are claiming she panicked/she didn't see him/he wasn't in danger and shooting her was unnecessary.
In the equivalent situation, no, I don't think the pro-life community would defend a pro-life activist who was actually trying to run over a cop, but they would defend someone in an ambiguous situation like this, where it is not at all clear what anyone's intentions or situational awareness was.
Fine, they also tend to not defend pro-life activists that non-violently drive a car at the police, in an attempt to escape them,
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Doesn't even have to be parking her SUV. Silently praying outside an abortion clinic is reproductive coercion and violence! That is the UK, though, so I think even the USA hasn't reached that level as yet due to robust freedom of speech rights.
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I support rioters being shot. Thought they should’ve with BLM. Same with J6.
Of course, if Congress was not illegitimately closed for a bad cold, J6 doesn’t happen.
Problem is, if you're not going to shoot BLM rioters, you don't get to shoot J6 rioters. Simple as.
Sure. I think that’s the thing that pisses off a lot of reds. There was a tepid responses to months of serious rioting and looting.
Then maximal responses to the one red coded riot.
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I certainly support the police using force against rioters and ending riots swiftly, but I don't really put rioting into the category of things that get you summarily executed, in the same way that, being an active shooter would. I view rioting as a crime more in line with vandalism or assault. If you are assaulting someone with a knife, then the police are justified in shooting you, if you are assaulting someone with your fists, although it could still be deadly, I would prefer the cops to try and physically restrain and arrest you rather than giving you new holes.
Does that include say arson?
Probably, fire is pretty deadly even if modern electronics have gotten so safe that most people have forgotten.
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The left's argument, as I understand it, can be summarised/paraphrased as follows:
"1. The belief that humans outside Our Tribe matter, just as much as those within, is Good.
"2. The belief that members of Our Tribe matter more than outsiders, thus weighing one of Us being robbed by an outsider worse than a myriad outsiders being tortured to death, is Evil.
"3. Renee Good, in opposing mass deportations, was advancing the cause of universal benevolence; therefore her actions were Good.
"4. Ashli Babbit, in attempting to forcibly overturn Mr Biden's election on behalf of Mr Trump, was advancing the cause of tribal chauvinism; therefore her actions were Evil.
"5. Actions done in the service of Good ought to receive more latitude than the same actions done in service of Evil."
I am less sure of the right-wing counterpart, but I suspect it would involve switching the alignment labels in 1-4, and possibly renaming the causes they were advancing.
Yes, exactly. People can argue that they are different because one was Good fighting Evil, and the other was Evil fighting Good. But then you're arguing the politics surrounding the events, not whether there was actually a difference in how the state responded to someone acting against it.
From what I have read and heard, "Because what the J6ers were doing is bad" is the overt, explicit justification among the left for the way they have been treated. It really is just political for them, and not based in any respect for principles.
Indeed. I think both sides are equally unprincipled.
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I don't think it's incoherent to say that protesting an evil regime is good and protesting a holy regime is evil, which seems to be the reason for the split view. It's even my view and likely the majority view: although it might be unwise to publicly fight against Hitler/Stalin, I'd definitely be rooting for someone who does. Where I'd differ is in not judging either administration as calling for unmanaged or badly managed protest.
The issue is that maintaining public order inherently involves violence, and both Babbitt and Good (and their supporters) thought that they were somehow exempt from facing violence when they were protesting (ironic, since they probably think of the respective administrations as closer to Communist/Nazi than I do).
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The primary argument I know is "Babbit (and the rest of the protestors) were actively engaged in violence (see also: the one officer who was struck in the head with a heavy object), and therefore Babbit was shot in self-defence (usually accompanied by a photo of protestors inside the Capitol with fists raised looking angry), whereas Good was at no point attempting to harm the officer, and even though he was probably out of the way of the car (especially when he fired the shots), he at the very least put himself in harm's way."
Is it accurate to the situation on the ground, in either case? I haven't looked at any videos of either, and I'm sure the exact opposite argument is made in circles I don't really frequent. I'm merely summarizing/aggregating the argument I see most often.
No. Babbit was trying to pry apart a shut door that someone else had already partially broken and having little success because she was a relatively small woman. There were numerous other armed officers around who didn't seem to consider her a particular threat. She might have been able to get through and then post a threat to someone, but it probably wasn't happening in the next 30 seconds. The officer who shot her had a history of bad decisions. It's much closer to a "cop just felt like he could get away with murdering a white bitch" situation than the comparable, valence-flipped situation where left-wing psychics intuit that the officer had murderous intent.
OTOH, she was part of a group that had stormed the building and had a lot of threatening rhetoric. If shooting her was good for that reason, then all the J6 protestors should have been killed, along with most left-wing protestors over the last 10 years.
Conversely, Good gunned the engine on her car while pointed at an ICE agent who was just a couple feet away. She did turn away from him, but if he had been a bit slower to get aside, or if she had turned the wheel just a few degrees less to the side then she could have very easily run him over and killed him.
One of those woman very much appeared to be a deadly threat to another person within the next second, and the other could plausible have posed a threat in a minute or two, presuming she managed to break down a door with her bare hands, to whatever extent you think an unarmed woman is a threat. For that last point, generally speaking, leftwingers usually argue that the threat of an unarmed woman to a male cop is "no threat at all, he should just manually restrain her, and also opening a door shouldn't be a death sentence!"
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I was going to type up a full comment, but it's midnight here and I don't have time. What I will say is that it's really nice in this discussion to see someone who mostly spends time in liberal spaces coming here with an open mind and looking to hear out perspectives from other circles.
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