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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.
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.
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?
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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