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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   29993 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 8, 2023

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This Wikipedia article has not only amused me greatly, but provided hope, something that I didn't think a Wikipedia article could ever do. I thought we had reached a point where saying "trans women are men" was socially equivalent to using a racial slur, a signal that you oppose trans rights and/or hate trans people outright. Now, there is a popular meme that plays on the fact that trans women are men, while acknowledging that it's okay for them to live in a way that's consistent with who they want to be.

I think that's what's happening.

See, I mainly know the word "bussy" in the context of discussing hypothetical sex with trans women, but that's because of the kind of people I talk to and the kinds of things I read. Is this use of the word an outlier? Is it mostly used to refer to homosexual cis men (which makes the joke much less funny)? Would a lefty who uses the term to refer to cis mens' anuses be offended if I used it to talk about trans women's anuses?

  • -15

I believe the word signifies a slightly more significant cultural shift than others might suggest. It's a joke, but it's a joke that trans people sometimes use. This indicates that some individuals are becoming more relaxed about the nuances in their sexuality. While this won't necessarily lead to trans people giving up, for instance, the fight to be included in sports, it's likely a sign that language norms are becoming less strict, more playful, and less serious.

Of course, this is downstream of cultural victories on the trans side. They become more secure as queer sexuality becomes more normalized and positively coded.

..If I didn't know better, I'd say this means that to the key to defeating wokeness and returning to the culture of 2003 is actually to let wokeness win.

I'm wouldn't go that far. I mean, it would end this culture war, but the pendulum would end up with leftist censorship for a while before people chilled out. And you'd end up with trans women in sports.

I think this is somewhat cyclical too. The culture war will wind up again eventually, on another topic.

If 2003 culture norms are what you want, then you have to fight for 2003 culture norms.

If you're ok with trans people existing, but want things to be chill again, then you have it a bit easier, because you can compromise on their behavior being ok but wanting your language to be uncensored.

Either way though. Things have gotten very spicy. It's hard to prove that you want peace while holding tools others have used as weapons. That's why it's 'bussy' and not 'manhole' or something. And it's a lot easier to maintain a compromise with a small group of friends who have already chilled out about it a bit than to end the culture war when so many people still feel so much more strongly about it on both sides.

Math got there first. “-ussy” is just crass shorthand for “homotopic to the unit circle.”

Extremely disappointed by their failure to include clussy.

I thought we had reached a point where saying "trans women are men" was socially equivalent to using a racial slur, a signal that you oppose trans rights and/or hate trans people outright.

It is.

Is this use of the word an outlier? Is it mostly used to refer to homosexual cis men (which makes the joke much less funny)?

Yes, it's most commonly used to refer to cis men, in a semi-joking fashion.

Would a lefty who uses the term to refer to cis mens' anuses be offended if I used it to talk about trans women's anuses?

Decent chance, yeah.

Sorry to burst your bubble.

That's very disappointing. What I loved about the article wasn't just that it was funny, but that it seemingly signified a cultural change, that we were once again allowed to laugh about differences and not take everything so seriously. I want to go back to the 00's so much that it's physically painful.

I’ll provide another hand for ‘gay guys referring to bottoms in both senses’, and I can provide a number of examples in the tumblr and furry spheres, albeit almost entirely NSFW (though notably e621 nixed both bussy and boy-pussy as tags).

I have seen it used in trans contexts, but it’s much more acceptable for trans men (and tbh, I find it less obnoxious there than for cis guys!) and various gender-weird contexts. It’s definitely something that would be at best controversial and more often close to fighting words for trans women, even not-hugely-lefty trans women. I think I’ve seen some conversation between two trans women use bussy without starting WWIII, but they were both already very close.

I'd rather see this a bit more fleshed out for a top level comment, personally. This feels like it belongs more in SQS.

What the heck did I just read?

Boosts my confidence in the decision to never get near anything related to TikTok though.

Would a lefty who uses the term to refer to cis mens' anuses be offended if I used it to talk about trans women's anuses?

I hate to reply with ‘I don’t care’, but even asking this question is giving it more credence than it’s worth. It’s just so ridiculous that worrying about it is almost as dumb as actually getting offended about it.

I haven't run into the word "bussy" much, but I never got the sense that it had anything to do with transwomen. If anything, it was more associated with gay men. Or rather, with boys who were to be the receivers of gay men, whether or not those boys themselves were gay.

And to think this placed used to have a big overlap with /r/drama, where “dude bussy lmao” was respected discourse. Truly, how far have we fallen?

But in seriousness yes, it’s usually a term applied, sometimes with a touch of irony, to Femboys & twinks and other entries into the genre of feminine or feminized men on the recieving end.

And to think this placed used to have a big overlap with /r/drama, where “dude bussy lmao” was respected discourse.

As a non-Dramanaut, I've always been under the impression that that was more an accident of history.

As I age, I'm really beginning to understand the experience of feeling old with regard to cultural trends. At first, it was just seeing something and it not being for me, which I didn't really think much of, because plenty of things aren't for me. But when I see the Zoomer haircut or hear "bussy", I begin to understand why the Boomers looked at some millennial things and said, "that's just fucking stupid".

But when I see the Zoomer haircut

Won't load for me, is that the cauliflower perm?

That's the one.

That's not what's happening here. "Bussy", in the literal sense, refers to a man's ass/asshole in the context of gay men. It then became a queer meme, and then ussy became a broader quirky teenger-taboo sex meme. It's not anti-trans in any way.

I see. There was at least one trans rights protest where someone has a "less hate, more bussy" sign, but I suppose it is an outlier, like my friends who use the term.

/images/16836748623814692.webp

yeah in that context it's just "MORE QUEER GAY SEX STUFF" in a funny way

It's a trans protest, specifically, though. Maybe if it was a pride parade I'd buy it as a gay thing.

They may be saying that they want it, not that they have it.

I first heard of bussy from cis gay male friends in college. The Wikipedia article references donutussy (the center whole in a donut) which seems a good indicator that appending -ussy to things is mostly a joke and not some deep aspect of gender identification. I am not in the habit of discussing trans women's anuses but my guess is that with most jokey euphemisms for genitalia the appropriateness depends overwhelmingly on context and personal dynamics and can't be deduced from the etymology of the term.

Ditto - I mostly know the word as applying to normal gay men.

Is it healthy to dwell so much over it everytime some city degenerate dies and the media decides to make it a “thing”? What would you or anyone else gain from this knowledge?

I don't know, I think it's illuminating to see how many people on TheMotte both loathe mentally ill homeless people so much and are so authoritarian that their desired solution to the mentally ill homeless problem is to kill them all.

At this point SneerClub might as well just shut down. TheMotte beclowns itself enough on a regular basis that outside mocking of this place is superfluous. There are some great contributors who rise above the mess, but a large part of this site is just /pol/ but with unnecessary verbosity.

  • -21

I think it's illuminating to see how many people on TheMotte both loathe mentally ill homeless people so much and are so authoritarian that their desired solution to the mentally ill homeless problem is to kill them all.

How many people on the TheMotte believe this? Cite me the actual comment where someone said "that their desired solution to the mentally ill homeless problem is to kill them all" and let us look at how many upvotes it got.

I assume he’s thinking of this and related discussion. Downvoted, though I find that to be a terrible proxy for actual belief.

@zeke5123

No, I do not want more censorship on TheMotte and I do not want to see such posts modded or such users permabanned. Although I find the opinions that I criticized to be distasteful and as you see I am comfortable saying so, I do not want to see opinions policed here.

I wouldn't call that a perfect representation since not every upvote means agreement

Indeed. I find the policy suggestion in the post maximally wrong but it is an earnest engagement with the topic and an effort post.

How could I credibly answer “no, this is a terrible tragedy, I never wanted to take someone’s life” when I’ve got a backlog of posts here saying explicitly that I believe that schizophrenic street criminals’ lives have no value whatsoever and that the world would be better if all of them were summarily rounded up and sent to gulags or executed?

34 upvotes

That poster also calls the event "a tragic and unforeseen accident."

No, Skibboleth correctly interpreted my comment. The bit about Neely’s death being a tragic and unforeseen accident is from the perspective of Dan Penny, who by all accounts did not intend to kill Neely and almost certainly does view the situation as tragic. I do not view it as tragic, and the measures I’m calling for would be neither unforeseen nor accidental.

Is it accurate to summarize your post and your views by saying that your "desired solution to the mentally ill homeless problem is to kill them all"? If this is not an accurate summary, how is it it inaccurate, and what is your actual "desired solution"?

Not all of them, but a substantial portion. I would like to live under a state with the capacity, the credibility, and the sovereignty to effectively carry out this policy, with the legitimate support of the public, but given the current state of our ruling elite I would settle for mass vigilantism. Note that this is specifically about the chronically homeless, the ones who have conclusively and consistently demonstrated an inability or unwillingness to respond productively to less punitive opportunities for self-betterment. The ones with long criminal records, no recent record of employment or stable contributions to society.

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Aw, man. Look, the world would be a better place without a lot of people. We would have more resources if we rounded up the disabled, the elderly, everyone below the bottom quartile of IQ, and all crime-causers, and executed them all. That obviously doesn't make it the right thing to do. I want to live in a society that takes care of me (and others) even if I develop a mental illness through no fault of my own.

I agree that we are at times a bit too sympathetic to troublemakers but you're about 100x too extreme in the opposite direction.

you're about 100x too extreme in the opposite direction.

I understand that, and I have no illusions that my very hardline position will be implemented. I’m anchoring the right end of the distribution of possible positions, and I recognize that the real future approach will ideally be somewhere in between mine and what we have now.

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Yep. That’s what people are saying. They are rooting to kill the mentally ill. Maybe the broader point is that mentally ill homeless people often cause trouble so sooner or later something like this will happen and reordering our society to cater to them is not smart.

That is, in fact, exactly what people are saying:

But our ex-Marine instead kills some useless homeless insane person who's a blight on everyone around him and this is a major problem? This is bizarro world where insane violent criminals get treated with 1000x the dignity of innocent families. If we can accept collateral damage in wasteful wars, we should accept collateral damage in maintaining basic standards of behaviour.

How could I credibly answer “no, this is a terrible tragedy, I never wanted to take someone’s life” when I’ve got a backlog of posts here saying explicitly that I believe that schizophrenic street criminals’ lives have no value whatsoever and that the world would be better if all of them were summarily rounded up and sent to gulags or executed?

There are only two tragedies here. One is that the hero’s getting his name dragged through the mud and facing social and legal harassment for taking out the trash. The second is that there are far too few subway vigilantes in the world, and far too many “Michael Jackson impersonators” terrorizing public spaces. The Subway Marine should be honored, just as Rooftop Koreans should be honored, and become a celebrity spokesman for the sandwich chain.

If they wanted to say "this is a tragic but inevitable consequence of our society's failures with respect to public safety and mental health" they could do that without also adding "Neely was human garbage, I'm glad he's dead, and we should do this more often." The fact that they did add that is evidence that yes, 'kill the undesirables' is within their range of acceptable policy.

What proportion of the Motte's posters does this sentiment encompass? Couldn't say - I expect most motte posters are smart enough to figure out that if you are directly asked "Do you support exterminating the homeless" the correct answer is "no" even if they privately feel different. But it's clearly a sentiment that they are happy to express in adjacent conversations and which garners largely positive internet points on this forum.

As a sort of aside, I saved a passage from the old place onto my notes without saving the author.

Although to me it’s highly exaggerated and extraordinarily blunt, it still really encapsulates the core of how I feel about this. It’s obviously a response so some context is missing but if anyone knows the author or can provide this missing context that would be cool.

From Dec 2020

“But utilitarian with regard to whom? The whole problem with utilitarianism is the presence of so-called "utility monsters", and homelessness presents a real world example. A small minority of the population wants to use drugs and shit in the street while slowly dying of medieval diseases. But every tiny bit of aid just pleases them so so much that utility calculus DEMANDS we all pay an 80% marginal tax rate to pay incompetent government contractors to build $500k hovels for these people.

Utilitarianism falls flat because each person's measure of utility is internal to their mind and not comparable to anyone else's. It's a moral system that privileges incompetent, clueless and greedy people at the expense of unassuming, conscientious people.

If it were up to me, I'd make it publicly known that the cops aren't going to lift a finger to aid anyone who hasn't paid at least $300 into the treasury this year. So the grocery stores and homeowners could just bayonet them (no reason to waste the ¢45 and noise of a bullet) and the disruptive homeless would retreat to rural areas and OD in the woods where we don't have to pay to bury them. The down on their luck homeless would stay in a shelter for a while and get back on their feet, and the town could maybe not be filled with human shit for ten minutes.

But notice how this policy isn't based on retribution. I don't hate the people being discussed here. I feel vaguely sorry for and disgusted by them. I am just aware that helping them ranges from expensive to impossible and I like holding on to my money without losing it all to taxes. Every dollar the county housing boondoggle gets is a dollar my children won't get, so bayonets it is. If the chronically homeless could somehow be profitably remediated, they would be my best friends.”

Quite right, if you pay for something you get more of it.

If they wanted to say "this is a tragic but inevitable consequence of our society's failures with respect to public safety and mental health" they could do that without also adding "Neely was human garbage, I'm glad he's dead, and we should do this more often." The fact that they did add that is evidence that yes, 'kill the undesirables' is within their range of acceptable policy.

Most homeless people aren't violent, and don't have law-enforcement records as long as your arm. Most homeless people - even the drug-addicted ones - don't get in your face and scream at you about how they're not afraid to die today, and not afraid to go to jail (insinuating that they're willing to commit acts which would either result in their death or long-term imprisonment - i.e. violent ones). Most homeless people are not schizophrenic street criminals with 40+ arrests, including multiple serious batteries and at least one attempted kidnapping. Most homeless people are just trying to get back on their feet and avoid the shame of being seen in a destitute condition. I have no problem with them, nor do I think that most Mottizens have any problem with them. So no, there's no connecting this to "homeless people" or "undesirables" writ large.

What proportion of the Motte's posters does this sentiment encompass? Couldn't say - I expect most motte posters are smart enough to figure out that if you are directly asked "Do you support exterminating the homeless" the correct answer is "no" even if they privately feel different. But it's clearly a sentiment that they are happy to express in adjacent conversations and which garners largely positive internet points on this forum.

It is a goddamn travesty that in American big cities, public spaces - including sensitive ones like public transit - have been abandoned to people who think it's their birthright to scream at, threaten, assault, batter, or otherwise harass ordinary people. Sometimes these people are obviously suffering from some species of mental defect; sometimes they are just cruel, entitled, and aggressive. Securing the public peace is literally the first responsibility of an organized state, and any state that can't or won't even do that is really no state at all. Moreover, if the state can- or will not do anything, people are justified in attempting to reclaim public areas, including by force if necessary. There is no affirmative obligation to suffer otherwise criminal harassment by others.

People who abuse public spaces in aggressive ways should be punished - not because they're inherently evil or "undesirable" (though they may also harbor genetic tendencies towards, e.g. psychosis that we would not affirmatively select for if we had the option) but because of their actions. Their punishment should not necessarily be death (i.e. no, don't just shoot annoying people on the subway), but I'm not going to categorically say that someone screaming threats shouldn't get cold-cocked (let alone someone who's assaulted or battered a stranger unprovoked), and when people get into physical fights, sometimes death results.

In such cases the death may be sad to the deceased's family and loved-ones, but it was not honorable. It was largely the result of their own bad actions, and (absent serious extenuating circumstances) was inflicted in defense of the public peace and welfare. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. It shouldn't be that hard to not scream in random strangers' faces and threaten them day after day after goddamn day. It's generally sad that their life was wasted on such shitty, harmful behavior, but on the whole society is improved for their absence.

This is not a good post.

I don't know, I think it's illuminating to see how many people on TheMotte both loathe mentally ill homeless people so much and are so authoritarian that their desired solution to the mentally ill homeless problem is to kill them all.

This is a bit of weakmanning.

At this point SneerClub might as well just shut down. TheMotte beclowns itself enough on a regular basis that outside mocking of this place is superfluous. There are some great contributors who rise above the mess, but a large part of this site is just /pol/ but with unnecessary verbosity.

This is antagonism and writing as if you don't want a majority of themotte to participate in the discussion.

1 day ban.

This is a general warning to everyone: I just finished going through the mod-queue for the Jordan Neely post from last week. I did not ban anyone because I was over a day late to modding it, and I didn't feel like handing out 5 or 6 bans. I will be paying attention to this thread, and the general amnesty from last week will not continue.

This is a place for civil discussions. We are not here to wage the culture war. And this is not a place for you to just vent your feelings and frustrations.

@Goodguy is either lucky or unlucky in getting the first ban. If I have to do more bans they will escalate in length.

Yeah, I think that a lot of folks here have been really struggling with the Problem of Evil, so to speak. There's so much mental illness and frankly broken people in the world that they want a quick easy solution, just sweep all the 'bad people' under the rug to fix it.

The problem as I see it is that there's clearly some major issues with the way we have organized modern societies, or maybe the influence of technology on us, that makes it so an increasing number of people just can't cope. They don't have meaning in their lives, and they can't seem to function well in society.

The progressive view is that we need to better our institutions and safety nets to allow for more flourishing, the conservative ideal looks to be that we just shame and punish people over and over until they act better. I think that we do need both sides, but too few people are willing to find a compromise between the two.

Or maybe crazy people just died off historically and it is the abundance that keeps the homeless alive today?

If that is true, why are crazy people still in the gene pool period?

Our conception of 'crazy' in the modern world may just be a symptom of our worldview. Many people who have schizo-affective disorders today would probably be legitimately accepted as prophets, or being possessed by demons, or called by the gods in previous societies. And based on historic data, those 'cures' seemed to be quite effective, at least form the anecdotes that we have passed down.

Perhaps our entire frame of the problem is an impediment to solving it.

Not so much the crazy ones as the wildly-antisocial ones - there's lots of kinds of crazy that aren't nearly as disruptive, but there are benefits to getting rid of the worst, whether crazy or not:

In each generation from 1500 to 1750, between 1 and 2% of all English men were executed either by court order or extra-judicially (at the scene of the crime or while in prison). This was the height of a moral crusade by Church and State to punish the wicked so that the good may live in peace.

Meanwhile, the homicide rate fell ten-fold. Were the two trends related? In a recent paper, Henry Harpending and I argued that a little over half of the homicide decline could be explained by the high execution rate, and its steady removal of violent males from the gene pool. The rest could be partly explained by Clark-Unz selection—violent males lost out reproductively because they were increasingly marginalized in society and on the marriage market. Finally, this decline was also due to a strengthening of controls on male violence: judicial punishment (policing, penitentiaries); quasi-judicial punishment (in schools, at church, and in workplaces); and stigmatization of personal violence in popular culture.

These controls drove the decline in the homicide rate, but they also tended over time to hardwire the new behavior pattern, by hindering the ability of violent males to survive and reproduce. The last half-century has seen a dramatic relaxation of these controls but only a modest rise in the homicide rate among young men of native English origin.

This was the height of a moral crusade by Church and State to punish the wicked so that the good may live in peace.

But yet the same church says that we are supposed to suffer in this life and that we will get eternal peace in the next so this life doesn't even matter etc etc.

Eppur si muove - whatever the rhetoric, the result speaks for itself in this case.

While it's fashionable to sneer at this today, it is not a new idea that one solution to evil is to fight it. While it's a truism in many circles that the only appropriate things to do when an unhinged mentally-ill drug-addict is acting aggressive towards you are to help them and to walk away, there are no stone tablets from God setting that out as the Truth. (or if there are, I've never heard of them).

Similarly, it is received wisdom -- but not necessarily true -- that every such problem needs a systemic solution which puts no onus on the unhinged person in question, but all of it on "society", government, or those around them to somehow fix their problems without impinging on their agency.

As for "safety nets", the name of the concept is itself deceitful. A safety net is something you fall into after screwing up, then get out of and climb up and try again. What we have today aren't so much safety nets as permanent support.

that one solution to evil is to fight it.

Great turn of phrase!

While it's fashionable to sneer at this today, it is not a new idea that one solution to evil is to fight it.

Is using a systematized solution to stop evil not fighting it?

I suppose what I'm saying is that there are many ways to fight problems. In general I favor non-violent solutions where possible, which I think is the start of where a lot of system-oriented folks get to. Our whole modern conception of agency is incredible fraught, I don't know if I can even touch that reasonably.

I agree with your point on safety nets. It's a bad term, and permanent welfare is often far worse for people. Once someone's self image becomes weak and dependent, I think it exacerbates the problem rather than solving it.

Is using a systematized solution to stop evil not fighting it?

Systemizing the solution isn't what makes it "not fighting". Demanding that the solution be restricted to "helping" is what makes it "not fighting". Systematizing it does tend to make it too big to solve and removes the responsibility of anyone to solve it. The idea seems to be "to keep the homeless person from assaulting people, you must first solve drug addiction and mental illness".

Systematizing it does tend to make it too big to solve and removes the responsibility of anyone to solve it.

This is the fundamental paradox of a massive, globally connected society. We need systems to coordinate, but humans are built to live in systems. Definitely makes for interesting discourse.

The idea seems to be "to keep the homeless person from assaulting people, you must first solve drug addiction and mental illness".

Part of this is also the nature of democracy. It's hard to win a campaign being 'tough on crime.' Generally more feel-good solutions will appeal to a broader majority, as they're far easier to justify and seem less morally fraught. Even if these types of solutions have worse outcomes overall.

Part of this is also the nature of democracy. It's hard to win a campaign being 'tough on crime.' Generally more feel-good solutions will appeal to a broader majority, as they're far easier to justify and seem less morally fraught. Even if these types of solutions have worse outcomes overall.

Is this some kind of joke? Apart from a few ultra-left-wing cities in a short period after the death of George Floyd, essentially every politician running for election with the intention of winning claims to be tough on crime (some of them are lying, of course). This is most notoriously the case in America, but it is true in every democracy where I have been paying attention. In the UK, the "soft" end of the Overton window is that we should build fewer prisons and spend the money hiring police. (The logic being that a higher chance of being caught more than makes up for a shorter sentence, so you get more deterrence with less punishment). The Chesa Boudin recall tells us that even in San Francisco, being openly soft on crime was a political non-starter by 2022.

What we have today aren't so much safety nets as permanent support.

You missed a great opportunity for a hammock analogy there.

unnecessary verbosity

Bit like saying “unnecessary ice cream”. Or “unnecessary sex”.

Yeah, don’t threaten us with a good time.

It's probably not healthy but I am going to hear about the event a lot in the next few weeks and that breeds curiosity. I don't feel that strongly about it, but thought I might be able to get the straight easily here.

The belief that he is a “degenerate” whose death doesn't matter is founded on the assumption that he was a menace to society himself, beyond simply being a homeless subway busker. Then it matters a great deal whether the violent crimes people attribute to him actually happened or not.

This is a general pattern in the culture war that really irks me. People decide they don't like someone, then either fabricate evidence or present it in the most damning way. This happens on Reddit all the time. For example, Redditors say the executives of Norfolk Southern should be in jail because they turned East Ohio into an uninhabitable wasteland. If you point out that there is no evidence that the area is or will become uninhabitable by any reasonable definition, they downvote you, because you're challenging their conclusion.

In the case of Jordan Neely, if you think he's a degenerate because he kidnaps children, it's rather important to prove whether that's true. If Jordan Neely is a degenerate even without evidence that he kidnapped a child, then people should present the evidence for that without resorting to unproven allegations.

And don't get me started on the fact that many charges can be framed in completely different ways depending on whether you like the accused or not. For example, “he kidnapped a child” can mean anything ranging from “he snatched a random toddler off the streets and stuffed her in the trunk of his car” to “he took his fifteen-year-old son on an out-of-state family visit in contravention of the custody arrangement with his ex-wife”. When you mention “child kidnapping”, people probably instinctively think of the former, while most cases are probably more like the latter.

I am not a court of law. If harassing and scaring random people around is a regular day in someone’s life then that’s a degenerate who wouldn’t survive for long in 99% of human societies that has ever existed. I don’t have to care about the specifics of their mischiefs to come to this conclusion.

On one hand, 95% of topics here have no material benefit. The Question and Wellness threads do a little better, but really, Internet commenting is a spectator sport.

On the other, examples like the OP really do emphasize that pointlessness. Mr. Penny’s use of force may have been justified, but it’s not going to hinge on a rap sheet which he couldn’t have seen. No, this is useful only for scoring points in the larger Conversation, where everyone is trying to weaponize the halo effect to make their team look saintly. Just because the media is doing it doesn’t mean it’s a good fit for this community.

On the gripping hand…I think this is truth-seeking. It’s trivia at best, and manufacturing culture war ammunition at worst, but in the end, someone will know more true things. I don’t want to discourage that.

The complete and utter vanity of the news when seen from the longterm is why I can’t help being drawn to the good news of religion. At the very least my quibbles are echos through the ages, beginning with the first quibblings of the Christians 2000 years ago. At the most, maybe I learn something that increases my happiness, who knows?

Mr. Penny’s use of force may have been justified, but it’s not going to hinge on a rap sheet which he couldn’t have seen.

Minor nitpick and only tangential to your comment. Yes, the rap sheet can’t possibly have informed the judgment of those that were on the train. For the rest of the world that wasn’t on the train, it should adjust our priors regarding the likelihood that Neely was acting erratically and threateningly enough to warrant being subdued by three grown men.

Does it matter at all? It has no effect on the situation. A raging lunatic is unpredictable. Unpredictable always implies danger. I think that is the reason this incident is not turning into second Floyd no matter how hard the anti-racist industrial complex try to make it one. Floyd was minding his own business and was not immediate danger for anyone, no one likes to be shouted on and to be on their toes by mentally ill (or drugged, or drunk) people. So it is a bit hard to find righteous indignation in the normies.

And if you are in enclosed space with someone that could potentially turn violent any second and cant disengage - engaging and restraining is the better option to protect yourself and the others.

All official NY criminal history record sites (as in ones run by the state directly) seem to charge fees for any records requests, as far as I can tell.

This is not enough for a top level thread comment. There is a possibility it was just posted in the wrong section, if I didn't have that uncertainty it would be a one day ban. Don't do this.

Edit:

The discussion on this topic last week had some bad posts and bad quality discussion. There was general amnesty for bad posts from that discussion, because I was late to moderating it. That will not be true for this thread. I've already handed out one ban there will be heightened scrutiny on these posts, especially if you are one of the people that received a warning in the thread from last week. If you are already on thin ice and don't trust yourself to avoid culture warring you are better off minimizing this thread and going to one of the other quality discussions taking place.

I don't have a primary source, but it was reported in the NY Daily News:

And he was busted in August 2015 for attempted kidnapping after he was seen dragging a 7-year-old girl down an Inwood street. He pled guilty to endangering the welfare of a child and was sentenced to four months in jail.

https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/ny-possible-charges-marine-michael-jackson-impersonator-jordan-neely-20230504-plaznkv5pjbuxaqdu2tlxpieqq-story.html

I have not seen that reported in any other article about Jordan Neely, so it is possible the NY Daily News is mistaken.

It just struck me. We haven’t had a pure meta thread. What is at the core of the breakdown in America between two sides. Is it just social media boosting of traditional sports team enthusiasm in sports? And at its core team left and team right get along in person but in online like fighting each other for entertainment? Team left likes standing up a fentanyl addicted criminal as a martyr or a male swimmer in female sports to accuse those who will take the other side as racists Hitler types? And team right likes to own them. Or is there some marxists conspiracy or Christian white behind all this?

I’ll take the view that traditional status symbols still dominate day to day life. I’ll take the view that liberal rich trust fund kid is still going to date the hot brunette from Vassar. And the liberal girl will still marry the frat boy whose parents are real estate developers.

Sure I’m setting up a lot of motte and Bailey’s. Is this just a game among elites and then followed on by keyboard warriors on social media.

It's not just the US, it's the whole anglosphere and it is because of 5 eyes attempts at manipulation of information to prevent a populism that can unite the people of any Anglo country in a way that might disrupt the current status quo.

I will never dismiss comments like these because I don't have all the answers. But how could we possibly know if this was the case?

You can't know unless you are inside, and telling anyone else has a best case outcome of ending up like Snowdon, so you can't know unless you know, in which case you already know but if you don't then you won't.

Then how do you know? There must be some information out there you are basing this on besides the existence of intelligence agencies in Anglo countries.

I don't know, I suspect based on inference. The Great War On Terror and all the fabrications by various intelligence agencies to shift public opinion (The UKs involvement with the Iraq war famously being due to a fake intelligence dossier and the astroturfed media coverage to pump public opinion away from the popular anti war sentiment of the time), Snowdon leaks, twitter leaks, plus various bits of covid narrative direction mediated by intelligence agencies, such as the FBI in the US or the role of E.g., the 77th brigade in the UK, paint a picture of a dispersed intelligence apparatus that does shift narratives and have a dominant, final, say in the anglospheres mood and man on the street opinion.

With that basis influencing me to assume it's more likely than not to be intelligence agencies manipulating opinion. When I see a sudden massive set of Anglo country wide social and cultural changes being implimented and enforced from the top down with manufactured media driven consensus, my default assumption isn't that it's a bottom up phenonomenon driven by academic marxists, economic conditions, racism, people struggling for equality out of true belief in it or whatever, but that the well funded groups of people across the world hegemonic powerstructure who have a track record of doing things like this, and have plausible reasons for doing it, very wwrll might be doing it and I will need very solid evidence to update away from that. When it comes to the culture war, my null hypothesis is the 5 eyes intelligence community probably did it or influenced the start of whatever it is.

and have plausible reasons for doing it

What reasons do intelligence agencies have to promote wokeism and social division?

Edit: Just read your comment below. So you're claiming "the powers that be" are sowing division because if people were not divided into two groups arguing with one another, they would unite and overthrow them?

Yup pretty much, although not necessarily unite in totality. Just a larger populist movement is possible drawing from.all the population than half, and that if its ire is directed at government and property ownership systems instead of the other half of the population then this is something to be avoided at all costs.

I got this in the volunteer-mod queue, and rated it "Neutral" because I think you're posting in good faith.

I do not, however, think that this is especially likely; the Five Eyes are certainly extremely powerful, but I don't think they actually want an Anglosphere that's tearing itself apart. They live here, and if the Anglosphere falls their power goes away.

I can believe in them getting mindkilled by the culture war like anyone else and sticking their hands where they don't belong. I can't believe they're responsible for the whole mess.

The power of the current system ends if populist impulse is directed at it* rather than wokes, fascist right wingers, gays, trannies, conservatives, white people, brown people, jews, immigrants, Boris Johnson, trump, the EU, racism, sexism, transphobia, bigotry, the patriarchy, etc.

*current government and property right systems.

That this strategy is awful and doesn't work very well, and seems to cause more strife than may have been anticipated, doesn't preclude it from being a driving factor.

You want the core fundamental concept? It's religious morality vs oversocialized morality.

The moral code of our society is so demanding that no one can think, feel and act in a completely moral way. For example, we are not supposed to hate anyone, yet almost everyone hates somebody at some time or other, whether he admits it to himself or not. Some people are so highly socialized that the attempt to think, feel and act morally imposes a severe burden on them. In order to avoid feelings of guilt, they continually have to deceive themselves about their own motives and find moral explanations for feelings and actions that in reality have a non-moral origin. We use the term “oversocialized” to describe such people. [2]

Oversocialization can lead to low self-esteem, a sense of powerlessness, defeatism, guilt, etc. One of the most important means by which our society socializes children is by making them feel ashamed of behavior or speech that is contrary to society’s expectations. If this is overdone, or if a particular child is especially susceptible to such feelings, he ends by feeling ashamed of HIMSELF. Moreover the thought and the behavior of the oversocialized person are more restricted by society’s expectations than are those of the lightly socialized person. The majority of people engage in a significant amount of naughty behavior. They lie, they commit petty thefts, they break traffic laws, they goof off at work, they hate someone, they say spiteful things or they use some underhanded trick to get ahead of the other guy. The oversocialized person cannot do these things, or if he does do them he generates in himself a sense of shame and self-hatred. The oversocialized person cannot even experience, without guilt, thoughts or feelings that are contrary to the accepted morality; he cannot think “unclean” thoughts. And socialization is not just a matter of morality; we are socialized to conform to many norms of behavior that do not fall under the heading of morality. Thus the oversocialized person is kept on a psychological leash and spends his life running on rails that society has laid down for him. In many oversocialized people this results in a sense of constraint and powerlessness that can be a severe hardship. We suggest that oversocialization is among the more serious cruelties that human beings inflict on one another.

I'm not sure why it's "versus" religious morality. Isn't Christian morality pretty open about nobody measuring up?

Yeah, christian morality and wokism are on the same side here. Their opposite would for example be old-school liberalism, where thoughts and speech cannot be ‘unclean’ or ‘hateful’. Christians and wokes agree on the necessity of controlling all thoughts towards their non-hateful, radically egalitarian vision and oppose free speech.

Yes, that's the difference. In Christian theology, if you screw up, it's (mostly) not a big deal because Jesus. Besides, God's justice will be realized in the end, so you can sleep easy knowing that the burden of fixing all the world's problems isn't on you.

But I don't think Christianity considers it not a big deal in itself (hence hell), it's just able to be accepted because of Christ.

hell is not justice. infinite punishment for finite wrongdoing can not be just. no one should be sleeping easy because they think people they don't like are going to hell.

Infinite punishment for offenses against an infinite God.

If anything, the punishment of hell would fall short, due to different classes of infinity? (I think, I'm not that knowledgeable about infinites.)

Not all Christian denominations believe in an eternal hell, though admittedly most of the denominations that don't are heterodox compared to mainstream Christianity i.e. the Mormons.

everyone should go to heaven. we should have been born in heaven.

in reality, i don't have a good reason to believe that i am going anywhere except the grave when i die. i think this afterlife stuff is wishful thinking at best, but cynically its deceitful manipulation.

As one of the very small number of red tribers with a strong classics background, I feel it is my job to look at how history rhymes and what the common thread tells us about the why's and wherefore's.

Fortunately the classical world has lots of recorded examples of republics collapsing due to political polarization. In every case this was rooted in the political factions becoming aligned with differing economic modes; that's why the optimates and populares had a hundred years of escalating violence and the blues and greens rioted in a way that never spiraled into the multiple civil wars of the first century BC.

So, NAFTA and open borders set the stage. The '08 recession is a major catalyst in the story, and, well, that's when the polarization stuff got kicked into overdrive. Then you've got the Obama admin, which was truly incredibly bad at lowering the temperature of the room, and a red tribe that was primed to take blue tribe obliviousness as malice due to economic polarization- that's functionally what the TEA party was. Then enter Trump, who I've always said is just an American Marius- big mouthed, prone to norm busting, hyperpopulist, attached to power, disdainful of the customs of the elite, but at the end of the day his obvious skill at things that are not statesmanship does not transfer to actual governing. The red tribe mostly doesn't understand why Trump is so offensive to the blue tribe, and the blue tribe mostly doesn't understand how the reds can not be offended by him. Then Covid became a scissor scenario.

Now obviously the US isn't ancient Rome, but ancient Rome wasn't any of the myriad Greek city states that did the exact same thing, either.

The Tea Party just always felt like traditional GOP politics to me. And on Trump I think the gop understands why the left hates him and a lot of his appeal is making them lose their mind. A lot of the time it feels to me the left promotes Trump too and gets him into the news. If we were a serious people we wouldn’t play this game. The fact we aren’t a serious people makes me think most people are comfortable and the issues aren’t real economics. If the right wanted to get shit done I think it’s beyond obvious Desantis is a better a choice. If they want to drive libs crazy Trump is the better choice.

It also seems to me a lot of left elites seem disconnect from the real world. A solution to homelessness isn’t fentanyl tent cities but police enforcement and building more housing. They wouldn’t debate what a “women” is or have trans as their main issue. They would be nicer to black people but deep down have official policies with some understanding that a lot of race differences are genetic.

The left with more people in digital industries seems more disconnected than the red tribe with more people in the real world. But compared to your historical example it just feels to me a lot of todays fight is non-serious people on both sides Larping.

I think if you were to conduct a poll of self described left-leaning voters, the trans issue would fall very very low on the priority list. Twitter, the news, and an extremely loud contingent has made the trans conversation appear much larger than it really is.

Why are left-leaning politicians making such a fuss about it then?

We just had an election last fall and I don't remember any campaign materials or speeches from any left-leaning politicians, prominent or otherwise, that made a big deal about trans issues.

That's the left's biggest advantage. Their politicians don't have to do or say anything. All of the policy changes are pushed by the media and civil service.

They don't make a big deal about them in their public campaign materials because their position on these issues is wildly unpopular -- then they get elected and apply inordinate focus to things that only impact 0.x% of the population.

I'm pretty sure this is worse?

Are they? Outside of the more online younger types, I really don't think they do make that much of a fuss about it. Speaking to Britain, where while the tribes are not directly analogous or polarised there has been some spread of the American culture war, most of the Labour party, and certainly Starmer in particular, try not to talk about it at all if they can. Activist types do overemphasise it, but among, say, the median democratic state legislator I don't think it ranks very highly.

The Bud light guy was invited to the white house. That is a full embrace by their leader.

I agree that Biden is unambiguously on the 'pro-trans' side but that doesn't mean it's a high priority.

Biden's inviting the low priorities to the White House to show they're low priority?

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The trans activists send shock troops basically anywhere there is pushback, and the Democrats will generally speak in favor of it, excuse it (see the tennessee capitol storming). The courts defend it. The schools try to secretly implement it. Large associations like the APA conspire to push it. Its hard to see, other than possibly abetting illegal immigration, a CW issue the DNC prioritizes more highly.

You really think the US secretary of health was selected on his merits? People are getting jail time for doing burnouts on rainbow crosswalks, head in the sand won't help you here.

US assistant secretary of health I think you mean. If your argument is that Democrats clearly rank trans issues as a high priority because they gave one sub-cabinet level post to a trans person... that's a rather low bar. Was there an 'affirmative action' element? Maybe, I have no idea (but note that with 24 cabinet secretaries and presumably at least that many assistants as well one assistant post going to a trans person hardly represents a great statistical anomaly), but even if there was it hardly proves much.

It's just an example -- there are plenty more. What about the nuclear energy/panty stealing guy? What about various bathroom bills? Like I say, head in the sand.

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I have a few hypotheses:

1). Politics have become a source of identification in the twenty first century much like church denominations would have in the Christian world, Or philosophy would have in the Greek or Roman world. Thus, conflict between the “tribes” to use Scott’s terminology is much like would have happened between Catholics and Protestants in the reformation. The point wasn’t just the differences, but that this “other” by not being like you, by being a heretic, they are a threat against the good. As evidence, I’d point out things that have little to do with politics being coded for one tribe or the other. For example that blues like coffee shops or indie movies, reds like beer and action movies.

2). Political issues are touching more and more of what used to be the private sphere as state power increases. Almost every decision a person makes in the modern world has some attachment to politics. It’s everywhere, every song on the radio, every movie and TV show, sports, at work, at your kid’s school, and social media. There’s no issue that isn’t ultimately political including the food you eat, the brands you buy, whether or not you recycle, how you talk to people, what kind of religion you practice, you name it, and there’s politics. And once politics becomes that important to how people actually live, it cannot help but be really contentious. I don’t want my six year old learning about pronouns, but politicized education means that unless you’re involved vocally in politics, you can’t stop it. When you’re forced to hide your beliefs from others because they’re not inclusive enough, politics becomes more important to you.

3). The increased economic division between rich and poor makes politics more pressing. The border is a threat to the poor who struggle to make it while watching millions of people pour over the border to compete for their jobs. The hollowing out of good paying jobs from rural areas has made life harder for rural areas.

Political issues are touching more and more of what used to be the private sphere as state power increases. Almost every decision a person makes in the modern world has some attachment to politics. It’s everywhere, every song on the radio, every movie and TV show, sports, at work, at your kid’s school, and social media. There’s no issue that isn’t ultimately political including the food you eat, the brands you buy, whether or not you recycle, how you talk to people, what kind of religion you practice, you name it, and there’s politics.

I think that this one is downstream of whatever the real problem is. People turning toxic and inserting politics into everything seems to me like the symptom, not the disease. It's definitely a problem though.

I’m sort of libertarian adjacent, so my thinking is that it’s because of state power being able to reach into everything in ways that tyrants of 100 years ago could only dream of. Through the civil rights act and liability issues stemming from them, the state can force your boss (for fear of lawsuits) to insert himself into what used to be private matters between employees. You’re an ass if you’re touching women on the ass, or deliberately antagonizing LGBT people, or using the N-word as a descriptive term. But such things should be able to be handled by those involved. I’m perfectly capable, as a woman, of telling you to cut it out. I think any functioning adult should be able to politely but firmly tell the person to stop being an ass.

There’s also the technology. It used to be (pre-cellphone) that unless someone in power happened to overhear the conversation or a tattletale did, it was perfectly reasonable to ignore it. Nobody could find out what you really think about and issue unless they heard it themselves or someone tattled. Internet, cameras, and social media have changed the game, and effectively collapsed the private sphere (unless you take great pains to lock down everything and only talk freely among trusted people) meaning that now any powerful person in your life can freely judge your opinions and words even if they weren’t said to that person or anyone who knew that person. I can watch you on camera and see (and sometimes hear) if you’re doing things that indicate crime-think.

All of this power, imo turns politics into a toxic stew. When the state can dictate the ethnic and gender ratios of your staff, when they can determine if you’re doing enough to not be liable for a “toxic work environment”, and can determine which groups are more worthy of protection, this makes politics much more high stakes. And I think the same is true of the regulations around safety and health and quality and so on. When a state becomes powerful enough, everything becomes political because you can use a powerful state to get your way in whatever form that takes. The government can force educators to teach a certain way and keep secrets from parents and so on, and thus angry parents yell at the school board. It’s now politically charged.

To me, the way to depolarize it is to go back to the antiquated notion that the government is not supposed to be your parents. It’s not supposed to protect your feelings or baby proof your environment. It’s not supposed to enforce quotas or workplace behaviors. And barring really catastrophic danger, I don’t think the government should be heavily involved in safety issues. And once the government stops regulating and enforcing such things, I think the temperature on political debates goes back down. If the state isn’t going to make your business liable for every word your employees say and maybe not having enough trainings, then I don’t think it’s going to be a big deal.

To me, the way to depolarize it is to go back to the antiquated notion that the government is not supposed to be your parents. It’s not supposed to protect your feelings or baby proof your environment. It’s not supposed to enforce quotas or workplace behaviors. And barring really catastrophic danger, I don’t think the government should be heavily involved in safety issues.

I don't know if this would fix it, but damn I would love to see this. I really resent that people are trying to turn the government into my mom. Yes, I don't necessarily make the best choices (though I obviously try). But they're mine, dammit. That's the whole point of being an adult. Stop trying to get the government involved. It almost certainly doesn't know better than me, and even if it did, it's infantilizing and insulting.

I'm not convinced that Team Left and Team Right do, in fact, get along in person and simply fight online. I suspect that a significant amount of online toxicity bleeds into meat-space interactions, particularly as the unwritten rule of "Leave politics and religion out of your professional interactions" gets more and more abandoned. I think there's some polling data that shows that political differences are increasingly a dealbreaker when it comes to dating; I can't find it at the moment, though.

With regards to the core question, I think there's a few things going on. My personal theory is that with the end of the Cold War, America was no longer faced with an external threat to fight, and so ended up expending its energy on fighting each other. Mix that in with the decline of Protestant Christianity as a unifying factor and the rise of the Internet amplifying differences and killing common culture, and we end up with the situation we're in now.

Shakespeare, Honor, Unitary Leadership, and How To End the Culture War

As part of my continuing effort to give myself the Classical Education I believe in, I’ve been working my way through Shakespeare. I have been listening to the lectures in this class on latter Shakespearean works in a sort of random order, after listening to the play in question here and occasionally reading passages as I go. The beauty of the work is really making me happy. But in this case I want to talk about some events in the play Cymbeline.

Cymbeline is considered a “problem play” by many scholars. It is marked in different contemporary printings as both The Tragedie of Cymbeline and as Cymbeline, King of Britain; the former suggests the work is a tragedy while the latter suggests it is a history. Parts of the play definitely suggest a tragedy is oncoming, from the jealousy, trickery and banishment to the soliloquized contemplation of suicide by main characters. And Cymbeline is a pseudo-historical king of Britain

, probably familiar to the audience of the time from works in the Matter of Britain, who did have significant interactions with the Romans; though it is always unclear what contemporary educated Brits considered “Historical truth." Much of the play’s content suggests a comedy, with comic relief characters playing a major role, and the play concludes with all the “good" characters and warring sides reconciled, all the evil characters dead, peace and love reign and the true heirs are returned to the throne. It does not neatly characterize itself the way that headliners like Hamlet, Richard II, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream fit gracefully within their genres.

The play really does have it all, from a Blue Pill v Red Pill debate over whether AWALT, to hidden heirs returning to heroically defend British independence in battle, gender bending and cross-dressing heroines, wicked stepmothers, the courtship of the Rich English Doofus, questions of family and duty. But what really caught my eye about the play, and lead to my deeper examination and meditation on its meaning, was the political conflict between Rome and Britain, and the way it plays out through names. This play isn’t a comedy or a tragedy, it is primarily a parable, it is no more about Leonatus and Imogen than Animal Farm is about the windmill.

THESIS: Cymbeline is primarily a play about Roman Catholicism in England, a plea by a Catholic Shakespeare for England to return to communion with the church of Rome, which dramatizes to the positive impacts that the Roman Catholic Church had on English society and pointing towards a synthesis of Roman and British virtues and an accommodation that benefits both parties. Shakespeare writes this allegory in terms of ethnicity and honor, and considering Shakespeare’s vision of honorable victory and the resulting honorable submission reflects on how to navigate the dangers of our own times.

As background to the historical moment, most of you I’m sure are aware of the English Reformation and the basic circumstances surrounding it. Around 1530 the process of breaking the Church of England from papal authority towards Monarchical supremacy began, and ratcheted up its Protestantism over time. Many historians speak of a “Long Reformation” that stretched well into the 17th century, with the distance from Catholicism growing and waining over time. Shakespeare’s own lifetime would have begun just 30 years removed from the break with Rome, during the reign of Mary Tudor who reintroduced Catholicism, while his career largely fell within the reign of Elizabeth I who returned to Protestantism. William would have been 24 years old at the time of Spanish Armada, the great roll of the dice at which the Elizabethan reformation, and even English independence, could have failed and been consigned to the ash heap of history next to the Cathars and the Burgundians. Next to the Blitz, the Armada is arguably the greatest and most heroic moment of British History. For the audience at the likely premier of Cymbeline in 1611, the Armada was about as far back as 9/11 is for us; a very relevant and present part of history.

The Political plot of Cymbeline follows a fictionalized version of Britain’s gradual accession to Rome. Within the play, set during the reign of Caesar Augustus, King Cymbeline had fought an inconclusive war against the Romans (during which Leonatus’ father and Belarius served valiantly) signed a treaty with Julius Caesar wherein Britain would remain independent but pay tribute. Under the influence of the unnamed wicked Queen and her son Cloten (his stepson), Cymbeline has declared that the treaty was only in force during Julius Caesar’s life and ceased paying tribute to Rome, treating a Roman ambassador roughly despite the threat of war. Various romantic and comedic shenanigans ensue, and when the Roman’s invade only the timely and heroic arrival of Leonatus, Belisarius, and Cymbeline’s lost sons leads to a British victory over the Roman invasion force. After Cymbeline’s victory is assured and his happiness restored by the successful marriage of his daughter and the restoration of his heirs, he magnanimously declares that Britain will resume paying tribute and end the war with Rome, reconciling with the Roman leadership.

Linguistically, an analysis of the names tells us what the characters are meant to symbolize. Some names are clearly British in origin: Cymbeline, Imogen, Cloten. Then on the other hand we have Roman/Latinate names for characters in England: Leonatus Posthumus, Belarius who guards the two heirs Guiderius and Arvirargus. Then we have Giacomo, who is quite obviously Italian but not Roman, a Florentine or Venetian rather than a Classical Roman.*

Cymbeline, King of Britain, has rejected the heroic line of Roman-Britains (Belarius, Leonatus) under the influence of a native British-Welsh queen. Belarius takes the Roman-British heirs to the throne and hides them, instructs them in Roman-British virtue, rather than the brainlessness of the Celtic Cloten. Leonatus, the Roman-Britain, wishes to marry Imogen who represents the British people in her mix of virginal virtue and plucky courage, they are prevented by the king who wishes to marry her to Cloten. In the battle against the Roman invasion, the Roman-Britains pitch in and win the battle, but afterward the King chooses peace. British honor has been satisfied by the victory, there is no need to continue the war over mere money tribute. The British, especially the Roman British, have proven themselves worthy of equality with Rome, and an accommodation can be found.

The historical parallels with the Reformation are obvious. The message of the play is a Catholic Shakespeare, nudging the audience, hey we beat the Armada, we proved our point, time to come home to Rome. There is a belief within the play that war is brutal, war is death, but war is also purifying, war is healing, war reveals truths. War reveals the true natures of the hidden heirs, the threat of death reveals truths about the hidden Imogen and the lying Giacomo. In the clear light of war, after the lucky victory in the battle, Cymbeline sees that he cannot win the war, that Rome is bigger and more powerful and will not quit, and makes peace. The Armada revealed how powerful Britain was, but it was at the end of the day lucky, the stratagems and weather than combined to deliver Britain would not be repeated. The continental powers would return, it was better to rejoin the Catholic Church.

This ideal of personal leadership, and concomitant personal (for the ruler) and national (for the ruler and the ruled) honor is missing from today’s wars, both the physical and the cultural. We live in an era of total war, of mob war. Zhou Enlai said that the French Revolution has not yet ended**, we still live in the era we have inherited from it, SA says we all live in America, in many ways we all still live in Paris in the 1790s. It strikes as instantly morally repugnant for the warring sides to make peace after battle, if you were going to resume tribute why start the war? But in a global period, rather than a momentary utilitarian analysis, a system in which a people can exercise and demonstrate their power, and then be satisfied with their demonstration and resume peace, is preferable to one where the end of any conflict must be the extermination of one power or the other. At the end of Cymbeline (most of) the Romans and (most of) the Britons are still there, still alive, still in power.

Most CW conflicts are, at core, about power. “Mis"gendering is, at core, meaningless. Who says Nigger and who doesn’t is at core meaningless. Drawing a cartoon of Mohammed is at core meaningless. Whether one kneels after a High School football game, or kneels before a professional one, is at core meaningless. These acts, and their negations, are imbued with meaning because they are exercises of power, and to enforce them or to recognize them is to demonstrate and acknowledge power. All these efforts at exercising power, by groups that want to demonstrate their power, form the core of the CW. Why did White ethnics experience Trump’s victory as their own victory, despite his objectively doing almost nothing for them? Because it was a demonstration of white power, in the literal sense. Why do Black or trans advocates insist on enforcing absurd speech codes? Because they are a demonstration of their power.

1/2

Doesn't make sense. First off, Cymbeline is a fictional character. The actual kings of the era were declaring wars and causing schisms for the pettiest of reasons.

Secondly, assuming this play really is about the english reformation like you say: It’s obviously stupid to declare war and then agree to the same terms as before. We know it’s stupid, the people then knew it.

The play is just Shakespeare trying to retcon history, 4D chess style, against opponents who would rightly point out that that ship – recatholization- had sailed, and was sunk by storms and the royal navy.

In Shake’s telling, the english were only pretending to be retarded. The pope and the rest of christendom would only respect them more for stacking injury upon insult. As we know, once the bloody point was made, the english were welcomed back into the fold, more admired than before.

History has determin’d that the guy was bullshiting.

And because our conflicts are structured as Who, Whom class conflicts in which one must overtake the other, these conflicts can only end in the social death of one group. What we need is an American Cymbeline. We need a leader that says “Hey, we demonstrated our power, we proved our point, time to head home.” Rather than continual acceleration towards armageddon, we need the ability to see a point proven, and to respect a point that has been proven, without continuing to push it. But I am as trapped in the matrix as any, I don’t even know what that would look like.

*Giacomo’s character is a fascinating anachronism, he is clearly coded as an Italian in the Renaissance stereotype. Crooked, Machivellian, horny, prone to gambling and to cheating. His subplot revolves around Giacomo’s claims that he is essentially the ultimate PUA, and that AWALT. His debate with Leonatus could probably form a whole CW post in the “la plus ca change” genre, but I’ve written too much as it is.

**This is itself kind of fascinating to me, most accounts at the time seem to say that he was speaking not about the French Revolution, but about the 1968 riots in France which also inspired the Rolling Stones Street Fighting Man. But I like the other way of looking at it better, something can have meaning even if that meaning is a misinterpretation. A sort of very short death of the author.

We live in an era of total war, of mob war

Only by negation, in that people act like it despite being so far from it. Our total war is less this and more maga racists and woke libs arguing on twitter (or more likely, scrolling other people arguing on twitter) for thirty minutes before driving to work. Where they'll, directly or indirectly, serve desires of consumers of all political stripes, contributing to the general peace and prosperity we all experience. The troubles are still recent, weren't even close to total war, and are a thousand times worse than American internal conflict. A thousand people get fired for saying the wrong thing - it sucks, but it's not a thousand car bombs, it's not half a city being firebombed. Is such a dramatic solution really necessary?

What is an honorable, monarchial victory for one side in modern politics? "The left" wins both on democratic numbers, 'elite' numbers, or raw skill of believers, so ... imposed racial quotas on all jobs? You giving up your political beliefs and accepting Gay Space Communism as your new ruler? The 'purifying nature' of historical war wasn't a new empire conquering your nation and then everyone hugging and making up. Maybe local life would be mostly undisturbed - new elites, occasional conscription of your men to fight more of the empire's wars (not very peaceful). Or maybe you convert to an entirely new religion, with new rituals and social arrangements. The magnanimity of the king is to not continue to kill the conquered, because conquered men are more useful to him than dead men. The king shows his power when claiming new territory so he can use that territory later, not just to 'be powerful' in some abstract sense that's never used. What does the libs 'using you' look like?

preferable to one where the end of any conflict must be the extermination of one power or the other

Nobody's being exterminated! Neither the trans nor the conservatives. Both are almost entirely "free" to live their lifestyle as they wish. Again, notably contrasting to the strict cultural codes of historical societies ruled by monarchs.

Who says Nigger and who doesn’t is at core meaningless. Drawing a cartoon of Mohammed is at core meaningless

So was the Filioque, so was the long-past successor of Muhammad, and yet millions were killed under "personal leadership" for "national honor" from that. One could make the opposite argument - the diffuse social-media war over a thousand different topics eats up man's instinct for conflict, greasing the wheels of the cooperative global economy, or something. If democracy and mass media gives people a mode of conflict-resolution that isn't war - and the conflicts are, as FHM suggests, meaningless - why isn't democracy better? (this paragraph was exploring an idea, not something I believe is good)

I'm not sure your analogies work.

tangent on literal war, to not seem like a l*ftoid: Actual war finely separates the most capable, complex individuals and structures from the slightly-less-so, and as such is a grand, civilizational elaboration of the evolution that produced every trait we hold dear. But it's not peaceful, and it's not clear modern war, even from a consequentialist HBD darwinist nietzche [...] perspective, is particularly useful for anything.

Actual war finely separates the most capable, complex individuals and structures from the slightly-less-so, and as such is a grand, civilizational elaboration of the evolution that produced every trait we hold dear. But it's not peaceful, and it's not clear modern war, even from a consequentialist HBD darwinist nietzche [...] perspective, is particularly useful for anything.

Interesting points overall. I think there are things we could learn from modern war, though.

In actual war, the combined might of NATO failed to defeat the Taliban, a fairly small group of religious fundamentalists supported by next to nobody! We had all the wealth, firepower, training and logistics. We totally failed to achieve our objectives, whatever they were. We are missing something vital here! There is something the Taliban has and we don't, something that let them win where we lost, despite having every materiel advantage. There's something the British had and lost, when they ruled 1/4 of the world. Could modern Britain even rule 1/2 of Iraq, today? I doubt it - they can barely field 80,000 men in the army!

Maybe it's some combination of heartfelt desire for victory, self-confidence, good leadership and coherent politics.

Even the Soviet puppet government of Afghanistan had more integrity than the clowns we put in charge - it lasted until September 1992, longer than the Soviet Union itself.

I don't think that war merely reveals small details, like whether Lockheed Martin has better engineers than Chengdu Aircraft Industry Group or Sukhoi, whether AirSea battle is better than whatever Beijing is cooking up. It can show if there's a beating heart inside a civilization, or whether there's been a lobotomy.

Two things.

First I think your analysis conflates disputes that will be resolved by exercises of power (persuasive or coercive) with disputes about who is more powerful. When people argue about misgendering or the use of slurs in certain contexts it's not because of some perceived power differential, it's a genuine dispute over how it's appropriate to use words. When people object to using "Nigger" in even the "mention" sense it is generally because they think it is inappropriate when used that way. Similarly when people defend its use they think it is because using it in the context is appropriate or valuable. This is a dispute that might be settled by exercises of power but the dispute is not centrally about who is more powerful.

Second I think the emergence of a Cymbeline is impossible due to the distributed nature of the groups involved in Culture War disputes. The reason Cymbeline can credibly capitulate Britain to Rome is that the Britons, as his subjects, are obliged to follow his wishes on the matter. There is no similar entity or institution (or set of entities or institutions) in our modern distributed politics.

Imagine I'm a trans person and I want to negotiate a Truce With The Transphobes. Two questions arise. First, who am I? What entity or institution can credibly claim to speak on behalf of trans people everywhere? Second, who am I negotiating with? What entity or institution can speak for all the anti-trans groups and organizations out there? International relations are a bad model for intra-national group relations because in international relations there are generally well defined entities that can credibly make commitments on behalf of their nation. Not so with Culture War groups! We often talk about groups as if they were agents, with wants and desires and engaging in actions, but it is important to remember this is an abstraction, a convenience, not reality.

As an aside I think this second thing is a powerful contributor to the degradation of political discussion. It leads us to unclear thinking or, at least, substantial inferential distance with the people we are conceiving of this way.

I want to make clear that I'm not sure I have a solution, I'm as trapped in the matrix as everyone else. I'm not sure I can imagine anything that looks like a realistic solution, at best we're all in the gutter but some of us are looking up at the stars.

I broadly agree with your second point. The lack of organized groups, with leaders to whom loyalty is owed and goals that are to be met and not exceeded, has been a significant contribution to the CW spiral. BLM isn't a group with demands, it is a gag reflex that engages whenever a Black person is harmed under sufficiently dire (apparent, reported) circumstances. One can't negotiate with it.

And the way that you, as an individual Trans person, would work toward negotiating a truce in whatever small way, isn't by actually negotiating. It is by engaging in loyalty and working on building groups within your own community that are well run and loyal, encouraging your compatriots to show loyalty and deference. It is only once groups exist that command loyalty that negotiation is possible.

I can't find the quote, but I remember a bon mot about, I want to say Syria on gaining independence?, that went something like "Today, 50% of the population thinks they are merely major religious or political leaders, 40% think they are great writers, 5% think they are Prophets, and the last 5% think they are God." I'm probably butchering it from a history book I read a long time ago. But one of the things I do think Moldbug gets right is that what is missing isn't leadership, it is obedience. We can't all be leaders, we can't all think of ourselves as leaders, or nothing will ever get done. I guess we can take it back another three hundred years and say that we're still living through the consequences of the Protestant Reformation?

As to the first point: I disagree. The increasingly confusing restrictions on the use of the word Nigger, or the application of pronouns, or which sports teams people practice with, are all exercises of raw social power. Performed by their advocates for the purpose of demonstrating power, resented by their targets because they are exercises of power. I'd compare the use of speech codes by analogy to this kind of exchange:

Imagine you've just gone through a bad breakup. You're a little sick of everyone talking about it, asking you how you're doing, asking you what happened, you just want to move on and talk about something else for a bit. You go over to your brother's house to watch the game, you say "Hey, listen, I don't want to talk about the breakup, I'm tired of talking about it, let's just watch the game." He proceeds to ask you about it, over and over, even though you remind him that you don't want to talk about it.

Most people in that scenario, even if they weren't that upset about talking about the breakup to begin with, will become furiously angry at being forced to talk about it. Talking about the breakup was merely embarrassing or unpleasant, but being told that you aren't allowed to say you don't want to talk about something is saying that you have no power to determine that. The other party, your brother, will in turn become angry that he "isn't allowed to ask questions." Because that is limiting his power.

The goal of symbolic actions, like banning words, is to exercise power. Power that cannot be exercised arbitrarily does not exist. Make it clear to your enemies that you can do symbolic, or absurd, things, and it will be clear that you could do dangerous things too.

Thanks for writing this up. I wish I could comment on the play itself but unfortunately I haven't read it.

What we need is an American Cymbeline. We need a leader that says “Hey, we demonstrated our power, we proved our point, time to head home.”

Ok, but... which side is he saying this to? Would you accept a rightist Cymbeline who told you "ok, you proved your point, but now it's time to let MTFs in women's sports and institute permanent DEI quotas and all the rest of it", just imagine him asking for total capitulation on whatever CW issue is nearest and dearest to your heart. Would you be ok with that?

If not, then why would you expect leftists to accept a leftist Cymbeline?

Conflicts always happen for a reason. It's not like people are stupid and they're just failing to realize that they could, like, not fight each other or something. Most CW issues aren't very amenable to compromise either - there's no physical piece of territory that you can split up 50/50. You either accept MTFs as women or you don't, you either pay reparations or you don't, etc. That's part of what makes the conflicts so interminable.

Would you accept a rightist Cymbeline who told you "ok, you proved your point, but now it's time to let MTFs in women's sports and institute permanent DEI quotas and all the rest of it", just imagine him asking for total capitulation on whatever CW issue is nearest and dearest to your heart. Would you be ok with that? [emphasis added]

I am neither an orthodox leftist nor an orthodox rightist, so I don't want to pretend I can speak for anyone. But I think the obvious flaw in your theory is that avoiding total capitulation through partial accommodation is sort of the whole point. In an existential struggle, we can be certain that one side will cease to exist. I would have liked to see Leftists respond to the 2016 Trump victory in a way that didn't lead me to link that one Brecht poem constantly. And I would like to see Republicans respond to the 2020 Trump loss by coming to terms with the facts, rather than denying them.

And to be frank, I disagree with the idea that...

Most CW issues aren't very amenable to compromise either - there's no physical piece of territory that you can split up 50/50. You either accept MTFs as women or you don't, you either pay reparations or you don't, etc.

For the most part, we had compromises on most of these positions that were broadly perceived as "good enough" in the Washington Consensus period of 1992-2008. People who want to transition are allowed to, with their own funds, and will be accepted or rejected on an ad hoc social basis. Most high concept and many lowbrow sit coms had a [now considered insensitive] very special episode on the topic. Affirmative Action is accepted in a limited way, but not at a scale that would present significant problems to advancement for talented white people.

One could say those weren't stable equilibria, that it was a slippery slope to a decision one way or the other. I'm not sure I agree, but I'm not sure by what mechanism to disagree.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/12/us/jordan-neely-daniel-penny-new-york-subway-death-charge/index.html

Daniel Penny, a 24-year old Marine, turned himself to police after being charged with 2nd degree manslaughter for the killing of Jordan Neely. It looks like I was initially wrong. I said that drugs may have played a role given that the original NYTs story, which I replied to, from a week ago said that Neely had been choked for only 2-3 minutes and released and was unresponsive. The updated story is that he was choked out for much longer, as long as 15 minutes, which would have def. been lethal, and the video is pretty bad.

So retract my original argument in which I posit drugs played a role. This is why you should always wait until you have all the information before forming an opinion. I didn't think the story would blow up like it did. I just assumed it was some random altercation. The video is why it went so viral. I think Penny is not without some guilt here. Keeping someone in a choke for so long is going to end in death. It's likely Neely was not rendered unconscious near-instantly from blood loss to the brain, such as from a sleeper hold as I assumed from the original story (I assumed Penny put Neely in a hold, and then Neely went limp in 20-30 seconds and did not come back), but far worse, had been suffocated to death, like being held underwater because his windpipe was restricted. That's why he was flailing around. It would have been more humane had Penny just shot him although that would have carried a worse charge.

A second degree manslaughter conviction is not that bad. only max 15 years for killing someone, and with parole Penny may only spend 5 years, which is a pretty lenient sentence for killing a guy, and not even in self defense or accident. By comparison, Ross Ulbricht faces multiple life sentences despite not killing anyone. I cannot say Penny is not without some blame in this matter. But In Penny's defense, the police took too long to come, and despite Marine training he and his accomplices didn't know what else to do.

Yeah, the updated story isn't looking good for this dude. Sure the person he killed was not that many steps above scum, but he was still human. Good on him for turning himself in at least.

Something I am still struggling with - shouldn't a Marine know how to hold/disable somebody without killing him? I know next to nothing on Marine training, but I imagine there are situations where you want to capture the enemy soldier (e.g. to interrogate him later) and there must be ways to hold somebody relatively safely to oneself without choking them to death. Am I wrong? Also, being a Marine, he should have known what a long chokehold would do to a person. Did he mean to kill the guy? If yes, did he not foresee killing a guy in public in this fashion - after he is clearly subdued already and not presenting clear and present danger - would end up in serious charges, especially in New York? How did he expect this would end up?

that's what I was thinking too. I assume 'restraining someone safely' would be covered in basic training , especially when the assailant is not armed and does not seem particularly strong

Functionally it ends up through pain compliance and this seems to be a case where that wouldn't work.

Something I am still struggling with - shouldn't a Marine know how to hold/disable somebody without killing him?

I have basically no 1st hand knowledge on the subject, but any time I hear from people who have actual knowledge of combat (e.g. mixed martial artists or law enforcement), it seems to me that humans are very fragile creatures where the line between merely stopping an oppositional person with force and killing them is extremely fine. I'm sure there are techniques that maximize the chances of someone surviving when holding/disabling them, but the chaotic nature of a physical altercation makes it so that there's a lot of variance and unpredictability in the outcome. So my thinking is that it's very possible that he tried his best to disable him without killing him but failed at that endeavor, for whatever reason. Whether that was due to reckless negligence is up to the courts to decide, I suppose.

it seems to me that humans are very fragile creatures where the line between merely stopping an oppositional person with force and killing them is extremely fine.

Put more precisely, the line between incapacitation and killing is very fine. People can stop an action of their own volition whenever they want. It's making them stop against their will that's fraught.

Speaking as someone with an extensive combat sports background, this idea that training should have helped him is highly dubious. I'm sure he was given some training, but probably never used it in real life, and hasn't kept up with it. Indeed, it probably makes things worse. He kept trying to do the thing he was trained to do, but kept getting it wrong, which is made very difficult by being in real life (not on a mat) and battling a live opponent (who also probably was giving off odors that made him less able to focus).

Jesus, he used a chokehold, not a glock. How much softer can you get?

We back to "de-escalation training"?

Any chokehold is the barehanded equivalent of a glock.

Theirs a reason I constantly bitch about guys who refuse to tap because they have testosterone poisoning and that refs full body throw themselves onto the ground and get within 8 inches of your face when you are getting choked, and it's because it goes from a fun sporting competition to a negligent murder in about 30 seconds.

I don't expect this dude to do a kimura or some shit, but a 15 minute choke is a bit much.

a 15 minute choke is a bit much.

And why do you think that is even possible, or happened?

You're in a match. You sink a RNC. How long can you hold it before your arms burn out? Fifteen minutes?

Yeah? Unless your rotator cuff is fucked or you are weak as shit, you can hold an rnc forever. It's the easiest hold to hold, its why getting one locked in right should be an instant tap.

You can's struggle against an rnc once it is locked in because your point of leverage is your squishy trachea area, the best you can do is try to pull their hands off their own arms get a finger loose, but if it is locked in you have shitty leverage for that also.

A lot. There are different ways to hold people. Source: 15 years of martial arts training. I don't claim I would have done better in this situation (one reason I moved from California is to reduce the chance to ever find myself in such a situation) but I know there are other ways than chocking the daylights out of a person. That's why I am wondering why he decided to do what he did.

I mean, he probably convened a meeting of ethics professors, focus grouped the results a bit, got a supreme court ruling and a blessing from the pope before confronting the maniac.

You've got fifteen years of martial arts training? What's the better control position to back control? What's the least damaging incapacitation you can do to a person?

Should he have gone for the Kimura and torn Neely's shoulder off? Snapped his elbows off backward? Or just punched him in the head repeatedly?

What's the least damaging incapacitation you can do to a person?

It's hard to answer such generics, there could be a number of ways depending on the situation. But yes, I think it'd be better even if he broke his shoulder or punched him out (though this is a risky one too - people may react wildly different to being punched, including possible fatal injuries) than killing him. If it were somewhere in deep self-defense friendly red state, then the calculation would be different, but in New York, with races being as they are, you're pretty much guaranteed very vigorous and politicized prosecution. This is also a component of safety - what happens after. Again, I am not saying I know the solution for this, it would be stupid for me not being there, not seeing it, to make any suggestions. It's just the choice that actually happened looks strange to me, and I wonder why was it made. No amount of low-effort mockery "yes, he should have filed a petition to Supreme Court!" is going to answer this. I don't expect anybody to know the answers, but maybe at least some higher effort thoughts than that.

It's hard to answer such generics

It's not, you just refuse to because the answer is obvious and inconvenient. The RNC is the lowest risk to both parties. It does not sacrifice control like an armbar, it does not require coming to striking distance like mount. Back control is bar none the best control position and the RNC is the absolute least damaging and risky option to incapacitate someone.

This is the absolute minimum force possible that produces incapacity without injury in the wild majority of cases. 99%, with decimals to ten or so places.

If the RNC is not justified, then no violence is justified. The critique of "well why didn't he try some other nonspecific technique which from the keyboard I think might have had a better result after the fact?" is ridiculous.

I mean, he probably convened a meeting of ethics professors, focus grouped the results a bit, got a supreme court ruling and a blessing from the pope before confronting the maniac.

Pretty unnecessary response imo.

I don’t especially care about this incident anymore than I care about any of the other daily killings in NYC, but even maintaining the same hold without putting the one hand behind the head (which is what causes the downward pressure on the bloodflow) would have been both easier and less lethal. Not even saying he should have done that in the situation if the guy was violent, but if all he wanted to do was restrain him (as opposed to knock him out and dip) then almost any way of holding someone other than the really specific RNC position is less lethal.

almost any way of holding someone other than the really specific RNC position is less lethal.

This is either wildly wrong or extremely pedantic. And less lethal for who exactly?

This is either wildly wrong or extremely pedantic.

…it isn’t though? Fitting your hand behind the back of somebody’s head and pushing down isn’t a natural, easy-to-fall-into movement - you might have to literally force your hand up in between their body and yours while they’re struggling - and that move is specifically what causes the blood flow to cut off. Almost every other form of back control doesn’t have that immediate risk because the RNC isn’t back control, it’s a submission. Even just take the same hand and use it to pin his arm to his body and you have a movement both less dangerous and more natural for beginners, whereas as the RNC isn’t something people know intuitively without being taught.

As for your comment about lethality, in every conversation I’d had about this event, including my comment above, I’ve very explicitly said I’m not condemning the use of lethal force, which may have literally been necessary if the guy was attacking him or somebody else on the train. I’m disagreeing with the people who are for some reason arguing that choking someone out for a long ass time doesn’t have obviously lethal potential. And if it turns out the guy wasn’t attacking anyone, for better or for worse you don’t get to knock people out just for being awful.

This is bogus.

"No, you can't carry a gun for self defense, just use martial arts"

:guy gets punched, hits head, dies:

"He should have known the risk hitting someone, he should totally have used something less damaging"

:guy gets choked, dies:

"Obviously lethal, should have used some other secret squirrel thing that only exists in the keyboard warrior's head"

:guy gets tased, dies:

" Yeah, 'less than lethal' means lethal, should have known that this could happen, deploying a taser is lethal force!"

:Guy gets pepper sprayed, dies:

"Why are people allowed to carry obviously lethal pepper spray"?

Strange how there are exactly zero responsible and reasonable uses of force, at least after the fact if something goes badly and someone dies. All the good uses of force exist.......mostly in the minds of critics.

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Maybe he wanted to just knock him out as opposed to restrain him for an indeterminate amount of time?. Being so close to a Vagrant like Neely mustn't be very fun.

Yeah I was gonna say actually knocking him out and withdrawing quickly could have made sense, if the guy was attacking him at least. If you can’t land it perfectly just applying sustained pressure to the throat for a long time is dicier though. And if the guy doesn’t turn out to have attacked anyone, you can’t just knock someone out for being really awful to be around.

How do you knock someone out?

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Marines are trained to kill though. That's the whole point. They're shock troops, not a police force.

You will be taught how to disable someone without killing them, but in a way that maximizes your safety and doesn't really take into account that you'll be fighting some drug ridden mentally ill lowlife but an actual enemy combattant.

Marines are trained to kill though

Yes, that's one of the things they are trained to do. But I really hope that's not the only thing they are trained to do. Knowing when it is appropriate and not appropriate to kill should have been part of it too.

but in a way that maximizes your safety and doesn't really take into account that you'll be fighting some drug ridden mentally ill lowlife but an actual enemy combattant.

How does it make any difference? I'm sure if you choke an enemy combatant for 15 minutes he'd die just as well as a mentally ill lowlife. Anybody would. That's what I don't understand - he knew what would happen and he must have had other options. Why did he choose this one?

But I really hope that's not the only thing they are trained to do

Why are you exactly hoping for this?

Because an army of mindless psychopathic murderers is a bad way to conduct wars. And releasing them into society when they're done service would be even worse.

releasing them in society when they've done service would be even worse

This is a legitimate unsolved problem.

It was already pretty hard to train people to be ready to kill and not just ready to boast at the enemy with automatic weapons. Training them back into being normal citizens is something I'm not sure to even be possible.

Not about to say the average jarhead can't be integrated back into society, but fucking with him is a deadly business and likely always will be. Doesn't matter what the law says.

Training them back into being normal citizens is something I'm not sure to even be possible.

Why not? They are not killing any person they encounter at random. They are killing who they are ordered, when they are ordered, and in a manner they are ordered. Otherwise they're not an army, they are a horde of psychos. Why would it be impossible to order them not to kill civilians?

but fucking with him is a deadly business and likely always will be

As I understand, the wacko in question did not even pose an imminent danger - certainly not to the Marine, but also not to anybody else. He disturbed the peace, was stirring shit up and was running his mouth, but he was not actively trying to murder anyone, and especially not Penny. So it's hardly "fucking with him".

Why not? They are not killing any person they encounter at random. They are killing who they are ordered, when they are ordered

Because that's not how it works in reality.

In 1947, Brigadier General S. L. A. Marshall published Men Against FIre: The Problem of Battle Command, arguably one of the most influential publications in military psychology. In it, he makes the now infamous "ratio of fire" claim that fewer than 25% of men in combat actually fired their weapons at the enemy. His figures are contested, but the finding itself has been independently reproduced by multiple studies performed by other armies over multiple centuries. And remember we are talking about men that were drilled into operating their weapons and are in mortal danger.

The reason for this remains the object of intense debate, but Marshall most definitely succeeded in convincing people to look into methods of increasing this ratio.

By 1950 and Korea the US Army had started efforts to use B. F. Skinner's newly discovered conditioning techniques to do so.

One of the most famous changes wrought by these programs was the use of human silhouette instead of bullseye targets during basic training as one such conditioning tweak. But it is also one of the least successful.

The increase in the availability of crew served weapons, which provide a sociological pressure to the individual soldier, and the widespread use of artillery which allows for the reduction of the enemy to an item on a map did a lot more to increase the ratio. All these factors and more made Korea an important learning experience for this venture and all the lessons learned would be applied to the extreme in the next war.

VIetnam would see these techniques perfected, and used with great effect.

Desensitization is of course the name of the game here, the level of bloodthirsty rhetoric and celebration of killing in a recruits training was significantly increased compared to Korea and even more significantly so compared to the world wars. Training videos and lectures full of gory details and celebration of the mutilation of the enemy were commonplace.

Conditioning was also greatly employed, to produce reaction without thought. While previously a marksmanship course would have you take a prescribed position while calmly shooting at stationary targets, a similar course for Vietnam would have you standing in a foxhole, wearing full gear, waiting anxiously for a moving target to pop up at random and only allow you a few moments to shoot. That same target producing a satisfying sound when dispatched correctly.

A great emphasis was placed on realism, they went as far as making mock Vietnamese villages complete with livestock and villagers to have the recruits patrol and do mock missions within. All to turn the destruction of the enemy into a reflex.

Of course all this conditioning comes at a cost. The mental restraints we have against killing are there for a reason, and many argue that the atrocities committed against Vietnamese civilians as well as the widespread psychatric issues associated with Vietnam vets are consequences of such conditioning.

This is all to say that the idea that destroying your fellow man as something that can be simply be turned on and off and controlled with individual reason is far from an accurate picture.

The distance between an effective soldier and what you term psychopathy is much smaller than I think you realize.

the wacko in question did not even pose an imminent danger

This is most probably what the law cares about. But you're not hearing me if you think that is what matters. Whether it is true or not.

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They are of course trained for other combat activities, and to operate equipment, and survive in the field, and all sorts of other things. They are not much trained in nonlethal combat, occupation enforcement, or policing. They are not meant to be used for that purpose.

I think he might be guilty of going too far. I expect a hung jury because these cases haven’t been working in NYC.

I think the bigger question is what should we be doing with people like Neely? He’s obviously a net negative utilitarian value on society harassing people all day with a potential to have a bad moment and throw someone in front of a train.

Just locking him in a cell seems a little mean and drastically increases his suffering. My solution sounds a little like slavery where we put people on a farm with supervision. He gets to do a little work like taking off vegetables etc. But is removed from society.

with a potential to have a bad moment and throw someone in front of a train.

If memory serves, he already tried exactly that. But I can't seem to find the source and there have been a lot of rumours flying about, so take it with a grain of salt.

I've seen this claimed on twitter, but no proof. There is however a short video of a black man who pushes a woman into (not in front of) a train at a station, but I don't think it's Neely. I have a feeling that people saw this and just ran with it.

the push for de-institutionalization is partly to blame. In the past maybe he would have been committed. It's easy to find solutions to deal with overtly violent or mentally ill people, but those who are a nuisance and only occasionally act or threaten violence, but without breaking laws or physically harassing people, are harder to deal with.

Would he have been institutionalized in a non-prison? Based on his choices of victims: children and old ladies, he seems fairly sane. Just bog standard sociopathy and desire to harm humans explains this behavior pretty well.

Couldn’t it be that there are just far less mentally ill people in Japan, per capita? At least when it comes to the mental illnesses, like schizophrenia, which are likely to produce homelessness and street harassment? I’ve seen persuasive evidence that rates of schizophrenia differ by race/ethnicity, and it seems plausible that Japan would have significantly less homelessness than the U.S. no matter what economic/political arrangement were in place in either country.

I’ve seen persuasive evidence that rates of schizophrenia differ by race/ethnicity, and it seems plausible that Japan would have significantly less homelessness than the U.S. no matter what economic/political arrangement were in place in either country.

Do you have a link? I agree it seems plausible Japan would have less homelessness regardless.

Here’s an analysis of race differences in psychotic personality. Huadpe also linked to a similar one up above. I’ll see if I can find one about schizophrenia.

That's a study of race and psychopathic personalities. That's a pretty big mistake. But otherwise a very interesting study, cheers.

You’re right, and I should have been far more careful in my phrasing and distinguished those two things. Good call-out.

Right, I’m specifically talking about the mental illnesses that cause the types of symptoms we associate with homeless street harassers; I don’t doubt that Japan has high rates of depression, anxiety, etc., but those don’t make you homeless and don’t make you harass strangers.

Japan as a culture has a long, long history of valorizing and romanticizing suicide as a totally acceptable and even deeply admirable response to a variety of negative situations. If culture has any effect at all on behavior, I'd expect a lot more suicide in a country that pumps out a deluge of memes about how suicide is heckin' rad.

I'm under the impression that mental health is very poorly-understood in Japanese society compared to the US, so it may just be that they seem mentally-healthier simply because they're broadly more ignorant of the potential reality of things. You arguably see this reflected in the culture; besides the culture around suicide mentioned below, I have seen a fair number of "these people need therapy" takes in discussions about mecha anime (especially as many characters in these works tend to be teenagers who go through traumatic things), and ever since the explosion of VTubing, the term "menhera" (from the English term "mental health") has become a fixture of the lexicon of certain communities around it (and often used in context of talents making particularly odd or poor decisions stemming from, well, mental health issues that haven't been diagnosed or treated). Japanese culture seems to favor the grin-and-bear-it approach to emotional suffering, whereas modern Western/first-world culture favors directly interrogating emotional suffering.

"Mental illness" is, I think in most cases, something of a euphemism. At best most of these people are dual diagnosis (mental illness and drug addiction).

There are tons of people who, with a cheap studio apartment could likely get by working part time hours at a McDonald's and being at least at the margin a productive-to-neutral member of society.

I think tons overstates it. A substantial portion of the unhoused cohort have already been evicted from free housing. They were unable to follow the rules for housing and many are non-compliant with their medication. They'll need more supervision than a flop house provides.

Neely ran away from a residential care facility he was placed in as part of a plea deal and there was a warrant for his arrest at the time of his killing. He's a shining example of someone who should be institutionalized, but lowering barriers to instituionalization involves complex trade offs and reasoning about them from viral news clips seems like a bad idea.

It comes up a lot in discussions of homelessness that there are lots of low visibility functional temporarily homeless people, and then a smaller number of high visibility dysfunctional long term homeless people. I briefly worked with an otherwise functional middle aged adult who had been homeless for a couple months. Cheap flophouses would be a huge benefit to people who are temporarily in between relatives with couches to crash on, but it wouldn't do much for the guys screaming on the subway.

Forensic mental health facilities are effectively prison tier secure. They are designed with multiple layered barriers between the inmate and the outside.

I have experience with the design of these facilities. In one fun example some open air courtyards are designed without 90 degree angles (think octogon rather than square) and with rotating anti-climb barriers . The reason for this is that some mental health patients are capable of ridiculous feats of strength and will attempt things that no sane person would attempt. Things like wedging themselves into a 90 degree corner of an outdoor courtyard and shimmying up 6 metres to get onto the roof.

Yes, that I can see. The people together enough to couch surf could use a flop / boarding house. Housing the Jordan Neely's with this cohort would drive them out, or pull down the marginal ones.

The cohort in tents are often in tents because of addiction or other mental health issues. They may not be as aggressive as Neely, but they're unlikely to be suitable for flop houses either.

Might even be acquittal rather than a hung jury. Bernhard Goetz -- who was pretty messed up himself and did his own case a lot of harm, including fleeing the scene, destroying evidence, bragging about how he wanted to make the people he shot suffer and claiming he said "You seem to be alright, here's another" before firing his last shot -- was acquitted of all but weapons violations. And Penny didn't use a weapon and seems to at least be sensible enough to do his talking through his lawyers.

He might, but most of the damage to Penny's reputation has already been done, and a felony conviction isn't going to mean much given that. If I'm his attorney I'm taking any deal that allows him to avoid prison time. This incident is going to follow him around regardless of what happens, so an acquittal doesn't really give him that much of an advantage over a plea to a lesser charge. The DA has already charged so low that they're not particularly worried about public reaction and it's well within the ballpark of being able to avoid jail time. No need to tempt fate for the sake of principle.

He might, but most of the damage to Penny's reputation has already been done

What damage? Outside of New York most people will forget about him pretty quickly. Within New York, his reputation will likely remain decidedly mixed. A felony conviction is more than damage to reputation; it legally disqualifies you from many jobs and positions. And even those it doesn't, it's a bad thing to have and many people will not hire felons.

The DA has already charged so low

Second degree manslaughter is a class C felony carrying a up to 15 year prison term; the classes range from A down to E.

Yeah, I know a felony conviction is bad. And sure, most people will forget about this, but from here on out absent unusual circumstances this incident will come up as soon as you type his name into Google. It's enough of an issue that even people like Monica Lewinsky who technically did nothing wrong still have problems finding employment because no one wants the attention that comes with hiring them. By charging low, I meant that in most cases like these the activists are braying for blood and couldn't care less that Man 2 is technically a serious crime; they want a murder charge but would accept a plea of Man 1. Man 2 has a 15 year max but a guy like Penny is probably getting more like 1 to 3 years given his lack of a record and the sympathetic circumstances. It would be an outrage. If what they'e charging could result in his being out of jail in a year after a jury conviction, then they have no pressure not to just use the specter of jail time as a cudgel to get him to quietly take a plea of criminally negligent homicide and a few years probation. By that point no one will care.

So while he certainly may be able to get off, it's a pretty hefty gamble to take a year in The Tombs over some easy peasy probation or suspended sentence or conditional release or whatever other deal the DA throws at him. If you're not a hardened criminal, the decision is pretty easy to make unless you have an ironclad case, which he doesn't. Goetz got off, but he was in a situation where he was actually approached by a group of people carrying potentially dangerous objects. With Penny, it's not clear if he was even in the same car while Neely went on his tirade, and he held the guy in a dangerous position much longer than can reasonably be described as necessary, especially given the publicity surrounding George Floyd. So I wouldn't say it's exactly a slam-dunk acquittal, and juries are unpredictable. You're basically trying to get the jury to sympathize with the general public's sense of order and decency, which seems fine enough until you realize that there's going to be a grieving family on the stand and in the gallery, and a prosecutor who's going to ask why he went for the guy's neck when several people were holding him down and restraining his arms and legs could have been equally effective. It's a pure crapshoot, and you don't risk prison on a crapshoot.

What damage? Outside of New York most people will forget about him pretty quickly. Within New York, his reputation will likely remain decidedly mixed.

Apparently he's working his way through college as a bartender -- the incident could be a benefit for a bartender job, but probably not for whatever he's up to at college.

He could maybe reenlist, depending what he pleads to?

This is kind of what asylums used to be, or were supposed to be - fairly nice open-air warehouses where people were encouraged to do a little bit of gardening or knitting to keep them minimally occupied, and otherwise drugged or sedated into docility.

I think the bigger question is what should we be doing with people like Neely?

I have settled on what I think would be referred to as "nicer prison" if using honest verbiage. The important part for me is that people like him are separated from decent society. Once that decision is made, it seems obvious to me that this should be made no more unpleasant for him than absolutely necessary. If it's feasible for him to do a little work as you suggest, sure, that seems like a more meaningful life than some other options. If he wants to basically just play video games all day, that's pretty much fine by me. If he'd like to walk around the grounds, that's fine as long as he's not getting into fights with others too frequently. Ultimately, I would leave the administration of this to people with much more expertise and interest than I with the basic mission of, "don't let this guy out, but don't make his life any worse than it has to be". I'm fine with funding this at fairly high levels because I think the current policy imposes massive externalities. How much would I pay for a subway that didn't have angry vagrants, begging pests, and meth-addled lunatics? A lot.

The issue with your proposal is that you have to provide the guy with some form of due process, and you'd need to establish what is practically an entirely separate division of the court system to do this. One of the reasons institutionalization started to wane in the 1960s was that the existence of psychiatric drugs meant that a lot of the people who were previously hopeless were now capable of leading normal lives. These people obviously didn't want to continue to be committed to a nuthouse, and the state has no interest in supporting people who are capable of supporting themselves, but there was an impasse because many of these people had lifetime insanity commitments. So the laws changed to require periodic reviews to determine if there was still reason for commitment. These reviews, of course are expensive, as you need to have a judge available, a representative of the state available, get an advocate for the inmate appointed, get testimony from doctors, etc. For every inmate, like once a year. So the goal became getting people with mental health problems either on their own or into group-home type settings where they could potentially have jobs outside and lead somewhat normal lives. This is obviously only one factor in the demise of institutionalization, but it's the relevant one for my case.

By and large, the system has worked. Historically, the main institutions for the Pittsburgh area were Mayview State Hospital and Woodville State Hospital. Mayview had over 3700 patients at its peak in and Woodville had 3200. By the time Mayview closed in 2008 it had a mere 225. By contrast, the winter 2022 homeless population of Allegheny County (the most recent year for which data is available) was 880, and only about 250 of them had severe mental illness. You could house all of the county's homeless population at just one of the old hospitals, though I'd personally want to limit it to people with mental illness, drug addiction, chronic health problems, and physical disabilities. In one fell swoop you eliminate all the people who are wither causing problems or are charity cases in need of treatment (I'd try to keep domestic violence victims separate because they are neither causing problems nor in need of treatment).

I'd propose a system where if someone gets arrested for something minor and meets certain criteria, like having a history of being homeless and committing the kinds of crimes the homeless commit, the prosecutor gives them the option of living in a voluntary residential community similar to a state hospital. The person could also be referred by a social worker if they aren't causing problems but are chronically homeless and have health problems or disabilities. If they opt in they are evaluated and either put into a treatment program or labeled long-term if it's unlikely treatment is going to help. Once in, they'll be given treatment they need and plenty of recreational activities, etc., including the opportunity to work if they so desire. They're free to leave at any time. That's the carrot. The stick is that there is a crackdown on public disorder caused by homelessness. If you don't opt in you will be prosecuted, and your social worker ain't gonna save you, because she wants you in the program. If you opt-in the program but leave before your treatment program is over or before 2 years in the case of chronics, you'll forfeit your right to go back into the program and will be dealt with by the legal system. The place would be nice but just crappy enough that no one who can live independently would live there voluntarily. I'm thinking mid-level assisted living facility.

That probably takes care of about half the homeless population. With them out of the way, we can focus on housing and employment and all the other things without them getting fucked up by the problematic people. Housing a bunch of strangers in a large dormitory is a lot easier when you know that none of them have any particular inclination to use drugs or steal from other residents or harass the women. The goal here should be to make sure that they have a place to sleep and keep their stuff and take a shower and do laundry so they can stay presentable for the the job market and either keep their jobs if they have them or go back to work if they don't. These places wouldn't have all the amenities as the institutions but there would be no restrictions on coming or going and would be more like a college dorm. The only real difference is that you're still in "the system" and any arrests or violations of drug policy (I'm thinking obvious signs of use, not mandatory searches) would have you shipped of to the institution or to jail.

It would be expensive but, honestly, if the state was willing to pay for round the clock care for over 7,000 people in Allegheny County (plus a few surrounding counties) in 1967, then doing less for fewer than a thousand should be a no-brainer. Hell, with commercial real estate in the shitter you could easily take a few floors from a downtown office complex and use that to house the normal homeless. The problematic ones would have to be on an estate with grounds somewhere out in the countryside since you can't just bottle them up like it's a prison, and that could get expensive since the sites of the old ones are now all luxury homes, but hey, they shouldn't have gotten rid of them in the first place.

Peter Thiel in 2016-2017 had the ear of Trump. Too bad nothing came of it.

Ulbricht got his sentence because he refused a deal that would likely have seen him out in fewer than 20 years, possibly even in 10, so they made an example of him.

I hate how plea deals work. Do British, Canadian, or other European systems have this many plea deals involved?

England doesn't use plea bargaining - it is technically illegal, although pre-sentencing guidelines it was possible to do informal plea bargains of the "We will drop the grievous bodily harm charge if you plead guilty to actual bodily harm" type. These no longer work because the sentencing guidelines (like the US Federal ones) tell judges to sentence based on the offending behaviour, not the specific crime the defendant was convicted of.

The current guideline for guilty pleas is that you get a third off the sentence if you plead guilty at the first opportunity (equivalent to pleading guilty at the arraignment in the US system), and between a quarter and a tenth off if you plead guilty later than that but before the opening of the trial. No negotiation.

Pleas don't generally exist in civil law so plea bargaining is therefore rare/non-existent.

The prosecuted can confess and that might affect sentencing but it doesn't really impact the trial beyond the confession being entered into evidence. The trial will proceed regardless and someone might even be found not guilty despite their confession.

Pleas don't generally exist in civil law so plea bargaining is therefore rare/non-existent.

Isn't that just an out-of-court settlement?

I'm talking about criminal cases, not civil cases. Out of court settlements for civil cases exist in both civil and common law.

I believe plea bargain by definition pertains to criminal law, but I might be wrong.

Thanks for the clarification.

they made an example of him.

this practice is so clearly injust that I really have trouble with how so many people accept it as required praxis. Is "being made an example out of" really just something people accept in our anarcho tyranny society that it can be said as a matter of course? We're seriously playing duck duck goose with decades of people's lives in the balance?

Ulbricht's sentence was based off of the idea that he ordered killings, which was shown "by a preponderance of evidence." This is not how we are supposed to do criminal law in the US; I have no idea how or why none of the appeals went anywhere. And no matter what you think of selling drugs, no one gets a double life sentence just for that.

which is a moral rather than a purely legal question

It's also a question of fairness--I don't believe that anyone else involved with the original or subsequent silk roads got anywhere near as long a sentence.

If the guy was still flailing it’s reasonable to assume something bad would happen if he let go as well. I mean I think he was trying to keep the guy from attacking other people and until he’s not struggling I can at least understand why that might make penny think he’s just getting more pissed off.

When being strangled to death, continued flailing is more a sign of not being dead/unconscious yet than of still being a threat.

this is why defund the police is so stupid, even if you believe in social justice. Because vigilantism is possibly worse . the police are trained at dealing with these sorts of rowdy passengers.

the police are trained at dealing with these sorts of rowdy passengers

Are supposed to be trained.

They do get training; and that training, however far it may fall from perfection, does make a difference. I would bet that the 20th percentile policeman is better at restraining people like Neely than the 80th percentile vigilante, even assuming that both have the same equipment and the same amount of backup.

Yeah. This is comparing farmers to professional soldiers. The cop might have restrained 20 Neelys, the vigilante two.

This is part of why I think using force in self defense in response to verbal threats (if that's what happened) is really bad. If you make threats and someone starts trying to restrain you in a chokehold are you expected to de-escelate and hope they stop when you're unconscious because you recognize you're in the wrong for issuing threats?

I mean, if you're strangling someone to death, I think that they would flail about whether they're a 'good guy' or a 'bad guy'.

This is why you should always wait until you have all the information before forming an opinion.

You will never have all the information. An impossible dream. Yesterday the incident happened, and people saw one set of facts, today charges are brought and more come out still, and tomorrow some new development will create new facts.

good point. the question is, how long should you wait; how much info is ideal?

how much info is ideal?

I've been to enough rodeos where my prejudices were thoroughly vindicated that I'm going for "Zero, my priors are great, judge purely from them".

We're a discussion forum, not a court of law. themotte.org has no standards of evidence, and that's fine.

Sure but it's still embarrassing to go off on a topic that it turns out later you're wrong about.

You weren't wrong about it, reality just failed you.

So retract my original argument in which I posit drugs played a role. This is why you should always wait until you have all the information before forming an opinion.

Why? Because sometimes you'll have to say, "ope, looks like my first impression was incorrect"? Perhaps someone that has any actual power should hang tight before having an opinion and perhaps someone that intends to take to the streets to burn this motherfucker down peacefully protest should wait for the all the facts, but I genuinely don't think I'm hurting anyone by saying to my wife, "ya know, I bet the belligerent vagrant was on meth or something".

I'll continue to reserve judgement on criminal culpability for Daniel Penny, but stick by the sentiment that the primary moral blame for this incident lies with the New York City policies that result in belligerent vagrants screaming at people on subways constantly. When that's the policy, you're going to get the occasional tussle that ends badly.

but I genuinely don't think I'm hurting anyone by saying to my wife, "ya know, I bet the belligerent vagrant was on meth or something".

This seems like a personal virtue that is, in practice, supererogatory - you have no power, so your snap judgment does nothing. But it would be better if you didn't since it would emulate the thinking we praise in those who have power.

I dont understand your theory of the case at all. It is that 15 years in prison is an appropriate sentence for... being inexperienced at restraining violent crazy people?

If they die? Yes.

He clearly committed manslaughter, so he gets the punishment for manslaughter.

So, in your theory, self defense and defense of other is only available to like, Jon Jones and Chuck Liddel?

I don't know what to say, dude.

Simply do not hold a choke for 15 minutes.

A potentially great insight from miles away with the benefit of hindsight...which also might be horribly wrong.

I don't have to have been their to know that doing the thing that always kills people would kill someone.

It's a simple application of physics and understanding of biology: when you deprive someone's brain of oxygen for 15 minutes, it stops working. You can tell when this happens because it's when they stop moving and they stop breathing and they shit their pants.

Except he never really stops moving and breathing

Given that the dude was found fully a corpse on the scene, I find that hard to believe.

There are countries that don't even have Good Samaritan laws and where you can be held liable for death or injury caused by your inept first aid.

There's no such law for defense of others. So yes, if your defensive actions result in death or injury, the court will determine if your actions were permissible.

whether this was self defense is what's up for debate. if all he was doing was schizo ranting then does that really justify a chokehold?

does that really justify a chokehold?

Yes

I wouldn't call it ranting, I would call it menacing, and I think it does justify being restrained. A chokehold is probably the only restraint the majority of humans know for use against humans that aren't children.

There appears to me, to be a fairly common sentiment among people less familiar with violence (and possibly pejoratively I think this is more common on the American left) that violence is some sort of dial you can perfectly calibrate. There is a reason all combat sports are conducted, essentially, on a mat, with a very restrictive moveset, and almost every kid starts before puberty so they cant really hurt each other. But even then MMA does not, in any real way, reflect streetfighting.

In real fights basically everything is potentially lethal. A slap? Well, by a weak woman, probably not, but a real one by a man, for sure. I could rupture your eardrum, while dealing punch-adjacent force, which will cause you to fall. Have I gotten to falling? Anytime someone is forced to the ground they are at risk of dying. Its called head trauma, and its nothing like Hollywood portrayals. Hit someone over the head with a whiskey bottle and they hit the ground. Big chance you've just committed murder. Even if the guy is just in a full nelson for 15 minutes there's a decent chance they are going to have permanent problems, including death. Am I a big rear naked choke guy? Nope. I suck at it comparatively to my favorite, the hammerlock and armbar series of moves. This makes sense, I wrestled at a high level for over a dozen year. But still if I put a guy like this in a hammerlock for 15 minutes he's going to destroy his arm. And the internal bleeding, on a guy with that health profile, we are talking amputation as a >50% probability, and death is certainly not off the table.

Muscle tissue is far more resistant to ischemia than the brain. You are irreversibly brain damaged in five minutes without oxygen and dead in ten. With muscles...the times are measured in hours.

While true, it seems fairly tangential. Like George Floyd, this person more than not, likely died because they came into the incident in such a depleted physical condition. While a cop obviously has the option of just throwing on some cuffs and then taking a deep drag on a cigarette, that wasn't available to our civvies here.

Eh...like, maybe if he was a fit healthy dude, sure, he'd have survived. Same for George Floyd. This being said, both of these guys weren't exceptionally unhealthy or fragile. This is more like a crapshoot: if it took 9 minutes to kill Floyd maybe his hypothetical football-playing 17yo Boy Scout nephew might've survived for 12. Neither of these people were manhandling Grandpa or medically frail hospital patients.

A chokehold is probably the only restraint the majority of humans know for use against humans that aren't children.

Half Nelson or hammerlock are well known natural wrestling moves that are probably safer (for the receiver) than anything choke adjacent -- strictly inferior to the newer MMA tech from the giver's perspective, but as I said before if you want to wrestle bums on the subway you may need to accept some handicap if you want to minimize your legal liability.

Those are both common wrestling moves, but not a lot of people actually wrestle. I don't even think of the half nelson as a particularly good restraint, its good at turning people from their stomach to their back, which isn't useful in real life fights. Hammerlocks, are good, yes, but they are strictly supervised in actual wrestling because its so easy to destroy an arm. Like I said, if you hammerlock this guy for 15 minutes, he's losing his arm.

There were several 911 calls, including some about Neely. Nobody bothers to call for ordinary schizo ranting.

If they die? Yes.

So you get into a car accident, which results in the death.

You're cool with with doing 15 years?

Before you start talking about nuance, please see your comment.

What am I doing at the time?

If I'm drunk, or running a stop sign, or driving in the shoulder, or driving above the speed limit, or lane splitting, or making a disallowed turn: yes, I am fine with that.

If you don't want to do the time, simply do not do the crime.

Why? Neely has been attacking people for years and never got any significant punishment. He served 4 months for assaulting and kidnapping a 7 year old. He served no time at all for punching an old lady. Why is it suddenly so important to charge and punish Penny in particular? We should at most give him some nominal penalty like what Neely got. It's an absurd double standard to allow Neely to rampage around attacking people for his entire life and the the first time someone fights back we make them rot in prison.

By all means, institutionalize mentally ill vagrants.

Also by all means, punish extrajudicial killings. We can do both, NYC police got 10.3 BILLION this year.

Why is it suddenly so important to charge and punish Penny in particular?

Surely the fact that he killed someone should figure in the calculus somewhat, should it not? And in any other context, would you find compelling the argument, "sure, maybe Bob committed a serious crime, but we shouldn't charge him, because his victim was insufficiently punished for completely unrelated crimes"?

What if Joe was a dangerous criminal who escaped from death row, before running into Bob and getting killed in the altercation (Bob knew nothing of Joe’s history)? There’s no real loss here, so punishment would be gratuitous.

And I do think the previously revealed moral character of Joe and Bob should factor in our interpretation of the altercation. If Joe has proven himself unworthy of charity (in the motte sense) , then Bob’s words and actions against Joe should get the benefit of charity in the eyes of the law.

For something like 500 years, Anglo-American criminal law has considered the moral character of the victim, if unknown to the defendant, to be irrelevant to questions of self-defense. So if you are arguing for it to be taken into account in this case, you are arguing for a double standard to be applied.

Can you explain the rationale for the moral character being irrelevant?

Why double standard ? Don't you mean a different standard? Can you refer to, or imagine, a situation where I fall on the other side?

Can you explain the rationale for the moral character being irrelevant?

Note that I said that it is irrelevant if unknown to the defendant

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Along the same lines as "Mary Rice Davies applies" i increasingly feel like we need a "Joker's Dark Knight speach applies".

No one freaks out when a homeless schizophrenic attacks somone because its all part of a plan. But when an ostensible "normie" does so everyone loses thier fucking mind because it exoses the central lie that underpins the entire secular progressive/humanist worldview. Rousseau, Locke, Mill, Rawls, Et Al were wrong.

And that lie is? The equal moral worth and dignity of the two? No, that's not it, you like that one.

And that lie is?

That violence and ultimate agency/control resides with the state (or society) rather than with the individual. That the state of nature is "just".

Aren't you a fan of Hobbes? It's the same conclusion, just without the window dressing. The government keeps you from a state of nature. You owe it everything in return and it owes you nothing else. So if it wants you to refrain from acting against homeless schizophrenics, it is your duty to stoicly accept this and not act against homeless schizophrenics.

Hobbes, while he is the father of modern authoritarianism, would be considered a libertarian of all but anarchocapitalism in the modern era.

I don't see how. His social contract is "You accept this social contract which says that we, the sovereign, own you and can morally command you in any way we see fit. The only thing you get from that is you're no longer in a state of nature. If you reject this contract you're in a state of nature and we can do whatever we want to you, because that's how a state of nature works".

This is the standard leftist caricature of Hobbes yes, but as this case aptly illustrates, it completely fails to adress Hobbes' thesis.

Homeless schitzos menacing people is the state of nature. Upstanding citizens killing homeless schitzos out of hand is the state of nature.

The thing about social contracts that progressives do not seem to grasp is that they are reciprocal, imposing duties and privileges on both sides. A Hobbesian could easily argue that the City and State of New York rejected the contract first (or were at the very least derelict in their duties) because what happened on that subway was the state of nature and thus Sgt Penny was under no obligation to obey their rules.

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I am, and no it is not, because a core component of Hobbes' thesis is that violence and ultimately control resides with the individual not the state. Accordingly, a state that declines to protect the individual is derelict in its duties and is owed nothing.

In the Hobbesian view an individual chooses to obey the law in the hopes that others will do the same. The job of the cops is not to protect the public from criminals but to protect criminals (and those suspected of being criminals) from the public. The cops failed to protect Neely by failing to arrest him and keep him separate from the public.

A lot depends on what exactly happened in that subway car and everyone has gotten way over their skis on this. If someone inadvertently chokes off the blood supply of someone who was throwing glass bottles or metal cans that's a very different act than gradually choking out someone who issues nonspecific verbal threats and flung some papers. Is Neely vaguely muttering threats or is he up in a specific person's face telling them he's about the punch them out? Penny's self defense case hinges on a lot of information we just don't have.

I figured there was virtually no chance that Bragg wouldn't prosecute this guy. He's essentially the Sherman McCoy to Bragg's Abe Weiss - the Great White Defendant that every liberal prosecutor salivates over. If Mike Nifong was willing to commit malpractice for the chance to jail three preppy white boys over a she-said/they-weren't-even-there, why would a prosecutor like Alvin Bragg, a black man to boot, miss the chance to get this guy over an encounter that was caught on tape?

Politics aside, part of me thinks there's a sort of pseudo-theological aspect to all of this, in that American society revolves around the worship of men like Jordan Neely. They can never fail, they can only be failed; they are owed all they can reach merely by their existence; and a certain degree of impunity is simply understood to be attached to their actions, a degree that would never be tolerated of any other citizen. The black criminal is essentially America's God, and the blacker and more criminal he is, the greater his divinity. Killing Jordan Neely was worse than lèse-majesté- it was essentially deicide.

On the pseudo-theological note, and apparently to jive with the Neely debate, this twitter thread about George Stinney Jr's execution popped up in my TL. Now whether one believes teenagers should be tried as adults for violent crimes is a moral quandary I won't get into for the moment. But it's very telling how it's become accepted fact that Stinney was an innocent black boy wrongfully arrested and convicted of rape and murder of two young white girls by a racist court, even though the South Carolina Judge who vacated his conviction 7 decades later made it a point that her judgement pertained to the procedure, not his guilt (or lack thereof).

Matthew 25:34 NIV

"Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

I can see there being a theological implication of a homeless criminal saying he had nothing to eat or drink and being publicly strangled to death by a former soldier. He may have posed such an imminent threat to others that his killing was justified self defense but that wasn't in the viral video that provoked the response.

Like you I'm much more conflicted on this one than many other cases, including Floyd -- I think I'll just see how it goes, but for now an aside:

Holy heck the NIV sucks balls! I am not overly religious and will accept complaints about the technical inaccuracy of the KJV -- but FFS could an accurate translation not also be just a little bit more, IDK, stirring?

Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.

Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?

And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

Eh, I have the opposite aesthetic preference. I wasn't raised on the KJV so when I hear verses I know with the Ye's it feels kind of cringe and ren faire-y.

If you substituted the ye's for "you" would that do it? Jesus is on such a fucking roll in Matthew, the bland language just seems to wreck it:

But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in.

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows’ houses, and for a pretence make long prayer: therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation.

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.

Woe unto you, ye blind guides, which say, Whosoever shall swear by the temple, it is nothing; but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple, he is a debtor!

Ye fools and blind: for whether is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifieth the gold? And, Whosoever shall swear by the altar, it is nothing; but whosoever sweareth by the gift that is upon it, he is guilty.

Ye fools and blind: for whether is greater, the gift, or the altar that sanctifieth the gift? Whoso therefore shall swear by the altar, sweareth by it, and by all things thereon. And whoso shall swear by the temple, sweareth by it, and by him that dwelleth therein. And he that shall swear by heaven, sweareth by the throne of God, and by him that sitteth thereon.

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.

Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel.

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous, And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.

Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets. Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers.

Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?

The NIV is a dynamic equivalence translation. It definitely comes across as "soft" in places as a result. A good modern formal equivalence translation like the ESV won't have that problem.

Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’

Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’

And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

That is much better, thanks!

Why is the NIV so common these days?

It’s been common ever since it came around, because of its reading level being grade levels lower than more accurate or literary versions. Still, some people prefer it over those versions for whatever reason. My head pastor still uses the NIV1984, and I have to copy verses for the projection screens out of a PDF that’s technically illegal due to the copyright holder pulling the license.

I recommend the HCSB, a novel translation not based on a previous translation. (For example, the ESV is a revised RSV, which updated the ASV, which superseded the British AV, which rewrote the KJV, which cribbed a lot from Tyndale.) The HCSB was written to be a literary work as well as a good translation; it catches things like Jewish poetry forms and formats them accordingly.

Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

For I was hungry

and you gave Me something to eat;

I was thirsty

and you gave Me something to drink;

I was a stranger and you took Me in;

I was naked and you clothed Me;

I was sick and you took care of Me;

I was in prison and you visited Me.’

“Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You something to drink? When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or without clothes and clothe You? When did we see You sick, or in prison, and visit You?’

“And the King will answer them, ‘I assure you: Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me.’

I really haven't taken the opportunity to compare them.

Comparing 1 Peter 1:1-5 on a word-by-word level as a sample, the ASV and NIV both hit my high points, with the ESV and HCSB in the middle, with the LSB and CSB scoring last. Yet I like the flow of the ESV and HCSB better. Ultimately, I feel the LSB is a workmanlike attempt to recapture what the ASV already had and the ESV already did better, whereas the HCSB and CSB take turns being what the NIV was.

And since I spent three hours comparing six translations in Excel, here's my own eclectic translation of 1 Peter 1:1-5:

From: Petros, apostle of Iesou the Anointed

To: the Chosen, migrants of the Diaspora in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia; chosen according to Father God's foreknowledge, chosen through the Breath's cleansing, chosen to be obedient and to be sprinkled with Iesou's blood

A plethora of sweet favor and shalom upon you. May He be spoken well of, the God and Father of Iesou the Anointed our owner and better! In His abundant mercy He has had us born again into living hope (through the rising of Iesou the Anointed out of death), unto an inheritance unrusted, untainted, unfaded, secured for you in Heaven. It is you whom God's power guards through faith toward a deliverance already prepared to be unveiled at the edge of time.

I never see it out of baptist circles.

I think you have this precisely backwards, not that it makes life much better for the worshipped. White men are given maximum agency and the progressive stack can be run backwards from there to determine agency. A homeless black man is nearly minimally agentic, they would be less so only if they were also trans or some other identity minority, and thus can attempt to, with full intention, push others in front of trains and have this written off as simple non-agentic manifestations of latent society and be back out on the streets within a day of the incident. While a white man can, against their actual intention, kill a black homeless person while trying to restrain them and be held to the standard that this was intentional homicide. This interpretation seems to accurately reflect how society reacts to these two types of people and has something for everyone to like and hate.

A second degree manslaughter conviction is not that bad. only max 15 years for killing someone

Only. Only 15 years and a normal-life-ending felony record, for restraining a violent drug-addled mentally-ill person who the government refused to do anything about. If that's what you call "not that bad", what IS "that bad"? Crucifixion?

Man, that's an awful lot of euphemism, nonsense, and irrelevance crammed into such a short post.

  • -24

Make an argument; sneering is not an argument.

I can do that, but when are you going to make the same point to nybbler ?

Presumably, the mods will make that point when he doesn't make an argument. Reading his comment, I see:

  • A felony conviction is very bad,

  • there were mitigating circumstances in this case, and

  • the top level comment used a nonstandard definition of "bad".

You can believe whatever you want about the quality of the comment, but the arguments about the situation are there.

When he posts something that is nothing but low-effort sneering, like your post.

We don't mod people for making bad arguments (or arguments you don't like).

The comment I replied to is low-effort sneer that contains claims but no arguments.

I'm not interested in going round and round with your whining about why I modded Suzy but I didn't mod Johnny. If you disagree with my mod decision, feel free to appeal to Zorba. (Protip: reporting every mod comment that makes you angry multiple times is not an effective way to advance your case.)

I'm not interested in going round and round with your whining about why I modded Suzy but I didn't mod Johnny.

There are some things that moderators should be doing regardless of whether they are interested in them or not.

It's like having a restaurant owner who's "not interested" in making sure his food is stored at the right temperature.

More comments

The term whining here is uncalled for. That's a reflection on your irritation, not the complaint. One might also argue that for a mod to use such terms discourages active participation, to say nothing of direct feedback. Just a thought.

edit for typos

More comments

Since I was asked to elaborate: Just about every part of this comment is extremely low quality.

restraining

Excuse me? A 15 minute chokehold resulting in a dead person is "restraining"?

violent

This is not in evidence. Unless you mean his prior assault arrests, which were not known to anyone on the train and thus irrelevant.

drug-addled mentally-ill

Neither of these remotely justifies death.

Excuse me? A 15 minute chokehold resulting in a dead person is "restraining"?

Yes. Restraining a person sometimes causes their death, as it did in this case.

This is not in evidence. Unless you mean his prior assault arrests, which were not known to anyone on the train and thus irrelevant.

We have information -- like his prior conviction for assault -- that those on the train did not. On the other hand, they had information we did not, such as his exact behavior at the time. Our prior for Penny acting violently or in a threatening way on the train should indeed be affected by his previous arrests.

Neither of these remotely justifies death.

Death requires no justification. The question is whether Neely's behavior justified Penny's actions, not whether they justified the result.

Restraining a person sometimes causes their death, as it did in this case.

If Perry does get convicted of manslaughter, it is false that it would be for restraining someone. Death is an essential component. There is absolutely no reason to describe the events this way except to make it seem like Perry didn't do anything wrong, without addressing any of the relevant facts.

Our prior for Penny acting violently or in a threatening way on the train should indeed be affected by his previous arrests.

"Our" prior does not justify your claim that he was violent. This is at best extremely weak evidence; the only witness statement I saw claimed he was not violent, which while obviously far from perfect is better evidence.

The question is whether Neely's behavior justified Penny's actions, not whether they justified the result.

This is just bizarre. Are you of the opinion that the consequences (or at least, expected consequences) of an action, have nothing to do with whether they are justified? I suppose this would be consistent with your idea that drivers shouldn't be held responsible for driving recklessly.

Are you of the opinion that the consequences (or at least, expected consequences) of an action, have nothing to do with whether they are justified?

It is Penny's actions which are justified or unjustified, not what followed from them. It is true that he might be facing assault or strangulation charges rather than manslaughter if Neely hadn't die, but it is not Neely's death which requires justification; it is Penny's actions which led to that death. The distinction is important; skipping over it is how you get to arguments like "Neely's behavior didn't justify killing him". The question is whether Penny's actions in putting him in a chokehold and thereby risking Neely's death were justified, not whether Neely's death was justified.

You made a big deal about the severity of the punishment. Whether his actions were justified is not dependent on whether someone died, but the level of punishment, if a crime was committed, very much does depend on whether someone died. Why did you bother to make a big deal about the size of the punishment? Either he was justified and there will be no punishment, or he wasn't and is guilty killing another person, in which case a significant punishment is clearly appropriate.

The question is whether Penny's actions in putting him in a chokehold and thereby risking Neely's death were justified, not whether Neely's death was justified.

I think this is just semantic games. We have legal standards for when civilians can use lethal force (for what I hope are obvious reasons) which amount to "it is justified to kill this person." Using lethal force does not always result in death, but death has to be a justifiable outcome in order for the use of deadly force to be legitimate.

Only 15 years and a normal-life-ending felony record, for restraining a violent drug-addled mentally-ill person who the government refused to do anything about.

There are mentally ill people when I go down the street. some of them yell at pedestrians. I would love if someone could do something about it, but that's not the job of citizens even if he is a major burden on society and net-negative value. I cannot just go up to one of those guys and choke him out, not that I could or would choose to take that risk.

It wasn't on the street though. They were captives in the actual environment this took place.

Changes things.

that is a good point. Subways are a hotbed of culture war, . You got many people of diverse backgrounds confined to this small metal tube, same for airplanes. Most passengers are behaved; it only takes one to fuck things up for everyone.

At some point, people need to live reality on reality's terms and realize that the New York City policy, culture, and values are all pretty clear that being screamed at, threatened, and occasionally assaulted by vagrants is normal and that doing anything about it will result in consequences for the person that interfered with the normal state of affairs. The options for New York City residents are to accept the normalcy of cowering before their moral betters or electing to leave. I have plenty of complaints about the local politics in my area, but the local expectation isn't that lunatics get to berate normal people and ruin public spaces. I would strongly suggest moving to a place like that for anyone in New York that is sick of garbage strewn on the streets and vagrants disrupting their work commute.

What sort of indicators would be most salient when evaluating where to move to?

If I were moving right now, I would care about demographics, population change, and economic freedom, but none of that would substitute for just visiting and seeing what I think.

How the state you are moving to treats gun rights is usually a good indicator. Castle Doctrine and Stand Your Ground laws are another further indicator. But the really big indicators are social, not legal.

I mean, there is another option - take simple steps to anonymize yourself before intervening, and if things go wrong flee the scene. A motivated modern police force can absolutely catch you if they decide to pursue the case, but they have a lot of similarly sad cases on their plates. A single extra "mentally ill vagrant dies in a scuffle he likely started, suspect disappears" isn't going to attract undue law-enforcement resources, and it's going to be suppressed in the media rather than being shouted on the street corners. "Blue-voting city fails its most vulnerable, again" isn't a narrative that pays the bills like "Outgroup member murders innocent in broad daylight", and the boys in blue have even less motivation to track you down in the absence of public outcry.

The downsides I can think of are that if you do get caught you'll be punished more severely, and that certain anonymizing tactics might make you seem like the aggressor and be on the wrong side of further bystander intervention. For the former, I'm not familiar enough with US/NYC law to know how badly, but since it seems probable that Penny is going to jail for a long time, a few more years doesn't seem like a good tradeoff against something like a 90% chance of a clean getaway. For the latter - well, this seems to come up rarely enough that two separate people in a train car being willing to get their hands dirty seems unlikely, and a brawl between unrelated belligerents is less likely to inspire heroics than one-sided harassment.

I mean, there is another option - take simple steps to anonymize yourself before intervening, and if things go wrong flee the scene.

Not possible using a train/subway system due to CCTV. Even if you went into some toilets and did a full change of clothing and masked up, they would back trace your movements when analyzing footage and probably be able to figure out who you were (height/build). This is in a homicide case anyway where cops are diligent about their investigations. Simple assault and maybe they wouldn't bother.

Any time someone dies they're going to be looking for you. There's a lot of minor crime in New York but not a lot of killing, relatively speaking.

That can work for something like a fistfight. Maybe even if the vagrant is in the hospital but isn't terribly injured. Bodies always have drawn law enforcement attention.

You have to be the change you want to see.

I'm going to throw out a theory, which is wild speculation but I feel the need to include because it strikes me as obvious.

The fifteen minutes duration increases the odds that this is drug related. Daniel Penny almost certainly did not intend to murder Neely, from the video Neely is still struggling minutes into being choked. Instead it seems likely that Penny attempted to choke Neely unconscious so as to avoid violence, failed to properly execute the maneuver, and instead had Neely in a restricted breathe restraint for several minutes. You can tell because the hold should knock out anyone, if properly applied, within seconds; Neely continued to struggle against three men holding him down for minutes. If Neely had stopped struggling, even if Penny wanted to kill him, it seems unlikely that the other two strangers would have continued to restrain him. Under the stress of the incident, combined with likely drugs or other underlying issues and the restricted breathe, Neely had some kind of heart attack etc.

Penny was not intentionally setting out to kill Neely, instead he was negligent in applying a less-than-lethal restraint and Neely died as a result. So the legal (and moral) question becomes twofold: Was Penny entitled to use less-than-lethal restraints against Neely? And was Penny Negligent or Reckless in how he applied those restraints?

Unfortunately, every detail of this will end up in the public sphere. A few points I am very curious to see:

-- How much did Neely actually know about applying a Rear Naked Choke to a resisting opponent? Was he an active BJJ enthusiast? Was this something he learned briefly ten years ago but never really used? Or perhaps he had never received actual training, but watched MMA videos on youtube sometimes and though it looked easy enough? If he was a purple belt, it increases the probability he intentionally killed Neely because negligence is less likely; but it also makes his choice to try seem more appropriate, because it is something he knew how to do. If he saw it once on Youtube and thought he could pull it off irl, it makes negligence more likely, but also makes the decision to try it seem more reckless.

-- How long, exactly, was Neely struggling for? When did he cease to struggle? How long after he ceased to struggle was the hold released?

-- Unfortunately for Penny, if he is like 90%+ of people his age, his diary that he places in the hands of third party corporations that will hand it over at the first problem is going to come into this. As Hoffmeister noted in his post on the topic, if Penny has posts like many on here indicating that he thinks the homeless are subhuman scum that need to be cleared off the streets, we will know soon. This is quite likely where the story will hinge. Prosecution will aim to portray him as "looking for a fight" and looking for an excuse to hurt or kill someone.

-- The prosecution was smart to charge him with a lower homicide felony rather than Murder 1, that's why Rittenhouse got off. While I think Rittenhouse was more or less entirely justified in what he did, he probably could have been convicted of negligent manslaughter on the theory that he made some procedural mistake in going somewhere he shouldn't have, but he was never going to get convicted of premeditated murder. Penny's case will push the idea that he responded appropriately to what Neely did/said, and that he never intended to kill him, but other causes (drugs) lead to Neely's death.

-- Whether Neely was a capital A Addict I have no idea, but if they don't find signs of drug use in his system, I'll be shocked.

-- The various Death Wish style masturbatory fantasies that are floating around the internet are totally inappropriate to what happened. This has nothing to do with whether homeless people ought to be murdered, because that was not what anyone intended to do. It has to do with whether one has the right to use reasonable less-than-lethal force to protect oneself and others, and remain protected if the egg-shell-victim happens to die.

So the legal (and moral) question becomes twofold: Was Penny entitled to use less-than-lethal restraints against Neely? And was Penny Negligent or Reckless in how he applied those restraints?

I think this actually isn't going to be legally an issue. Instead, the state will argue that a chokehold is deadly force, which I believe is established law in New York. But that's a bit of a double-edged sword; having established that a chokehold is deadly force, it becomes much harder (though not impossible) for the state to argue that Neely was reckless in applying it.

If the state chooses to argue that Penny intended to kill Neely, I predict an acquittal.

They've already not chosen that argument, by charging with 2nd degree manslaughter rather than some form of murder.

Well, that's why they're not arguing that. They're arguing that he caused the death by acting recklessly; by putting Neely in a chokehold he ignored a substantial and unjustifiable risk. The problem for Penny is that to get an acquittal he has to argue that the risk was justified, which is a tall order. New York law already recognizes that chokeholds are a form of deadly force, and claiming deadly force was justified is effectively the same as claiming that he would have been justified in shooting Neely on the spot.

having established that a chokehold is deadly force, it becomes much harder (though not impossible) for the state to argue that Neely was reckless in applying it.

If anything, the opposite is true. In New York, under Penal Law 125.15 "A person is guilty of manslaughter in the second degree when: 1. He recklessly causes the death of another person; or ....".

Under Penal Law 15.05, "A person acts recklessly with respect to a result or to a circumstance described by a statute defining an offense when he is aware of and consciously disregards a substantial and unjustifiable risk that such result will occur or that such circumstance exists. The risk must be of such nature and degree that disregard thereof constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of conduct that a reasonable person would observe in the situation."

So, IF he used deadly force, that strengthens the argument that he disregarded a substantial and unjustified risk. Of course, he might not have knowingly used deadly force -- eg he was using force which he thought did not carry a risk of death. Or, his use of force might have been justified.

Are all methods of "deadly force" really treated as a single risk category legally? Hard to believe a chokehold would be treated the same as shooting someone with a firearm.

I believe that the key issue is the intent to use deadly force. Eg Calif Criminal Jury Inst 505 says that for self-defense, the defendant must actually believe that deadly force was necessary. If he has that belief it doesn’t matter what form the deadly force takes.

No. You've ignored the most important part, which is "unjustified". If a chokehold is deadly force, then to successfully use the self-defense argument Penny must show that deadly force was justified. But once he's done that, the fact that Neely died doesn't show recklessness.

You've ignored the most important part, which is "unjustified

I literally said, "Or, his use of force might have been justified."

The point is that it is EASIER to prove recklessness if deadly force is used, not harder, as you said. Deadly force obviously carries a greater "risk that such result will occur" -- the result referred to is the "result . . . described by a statute defining an offense[,]" which in the case of manslaughter is the risk of death. Obviously, deadly force carries a greater risk of death than does non-deadly force.

Again, none of this means he is guilty. As I said, "Of course, he might not have knowingly used deadly force -- eg he was using force which he thought did not carry a risk of death. Or, his use of force might have been justified." But it does mean that you were incorrect when you said that arguing that a chokehold is deadly force makes it harder for the DA to secure a manslaughter conviction.

But it does mean that you were incorrect when you said that arguing that a chokehold is deadly force makes it harder for the DA to secure a manslaughter conviction.

What I said is that it is a double-edged sword. If a chokehold is not legally deadly force, and Penny was justified in applying non-deadly physical force, and Neely died as a result, the prosecution can argue that he applied the force in a reckless manner and killed Penny. But if a chokehold IS legally deadly force, and Penny was justified in applying deadly physical force (a higher bar, which is one edge of the sword) then the fact that Neely died as a result of such force is only expected (since it's deadly force), not evidence of recklessness (the other edge of the sword).

There is no double edge. If the People argue that the chokehold was deadly force (note that although there is NY authority that the use of a knife is deadly force as a matter of law, People v Kerley, 154 AD3d 1074, 1075 (2017), I don't see any such authority re chokeholds, though I only looked briefly), then the People have two arguments:

  1. If the jury finds that the chokehold was deadly force, it must convict because Penny was not justified use of deadly force; and

  2. If the jury finds that chokehold was not deadly force, it must nevertheless convict because it was so dangerous that its use constituted recklessness.

If they instead concede that it was not deadly force, then they only have argument #2.

There is no way that Penny is helped by a jury finding that the chokehold was deadly force. The more extreme or dangerous Penny's actions were, the easier it will be for the People to win.

As Hoffmeister noted in his post on the topic, if Penny has posts like many on here indicating that he thinks the homeless are subhuman scum that need to be cleared off the streets, we will know soon. This is quite likely where the story will hinge. Prosecution will aim to portray him as "looking for a fight" and looking for an excuse to hurt or kill someone.

Stuff like this generally isn't admissable as evidence (it wasn't in the Rittenhouse case, for instance). The fact is that idle words made weeks or months in advance are not the same as intent or premeditation.

While true, these cases are also tried in the media. My parents, with their steady diet of CNN and MSNBC, were sad when Rittenhouse got off because he they thought he was a "white supremacist" who shot people in cold blood.

It's tough to find a jury that is insulated from the news media, and people can also lie to get on a jury.

If the media tars Neely as motivated by hate, he will have a tough time getting a fair trial regardless of what happens in the courtroom.

The context you seem to be missing is that Alvin Bragg is effectively a cartoon charactichure of the GOP's bogeyman of the "Soros funded Prosecutor". Dude was all over the news a couple months back for charging a Bodega-owner with assault and unlawful possession of a handgun for wrestling a gun away from a would-be robber.

If any thing Im surprised that Bragg displayed the restraint he did by only charging Sgt Penny with manslaughter and not murder 2 at a bare minimum.

Dude was all over the news a couple months back for charging a Bodega-owner with assault and unlawful possession of a handgun for wrestling a gun away from a would-be robber.

Weren't those charges eventually dropped?

Largely due to the backlash.

But Bragg is fundamentally against self defense as a concept (eg charging and even up charging re self defense) while generally doing everything in his power to take it easy on career criminals. Bragg is truly a despicable person.

I’m surprised no-one mentioned the way this incident has been covered on the /r/NYC subreddit. Given that it’s a deep blue city and Reddit is a deep blue site, you’d think everyone would be up in arms about Neely’s death. But the dominant mood is dramatically more pro-Penny than here, for heaven’s sake. Multiple posters saying that he did what needed to be done, people have a right not to be hassled by psychopaths on their commute, even some highly upvoted comments calling out progressivism by name as the ideology that created this problem. I’m utterly bemused and perplexed. Am I missing something?

On a related note, if Trump is canny, he’ll make his candidacy about law and order this time. The democrats can’t plausibly reclaim that particular political mantle after the prominence of Defund The Police, and there are enough true cop-haters along the Democrat activist base that you’d never get message discipline on the issue. And while I don’t have good polling on the issue, my sense from reading the city subs on Reddit is that crime is creeping up voters’ list of priorities. Oh, and as an issue it’s less alienating than immigration for many Latino voters, while being able to be plausibly connected to immigration with Trump’s base (“I’ve been gone four years and we have chaos in the streets of our cities, chaos on the border”).

It's not just that it's a place about a deep blue city on a deep blue site, it's that the site routinely censors opinions contrary to the mainstream. I am genuinely surprised that Reddit is allowing opinions in favor of Penny and hasn't banned them under the guise of, say, encouraging violence. If you had asked me to predict /r/NYC's reaction beforehand, I would have 100% failed.

Meanwhile, the left-leaning person who would normally be the dissident in this case, Freddie deBoer, has come out strongly against Penny, saying:

The first thing I want to say about Jordan Neely is that his killing was a terrible crime and I hope his assailant is arrested and indicted. I don’t know what the right charges are, I don’t know what the right punishment is, but you can’t just choke someone to death like that.

It's almost like opposite day.

Whatever the cause, it almost gives me hope that at least the very people living in dense urban areas (whoever's left and hasn't moved out, anyway) are willing to address the problem of not just crime, but also harassment, filth, and general unpleasantness that plagues public transit, where urbanists don't want to or don't even acknowledge the problem.

Almost. The pessimistic side of me says that it's too little, too late, and support on Reddit won't change the outcome of Penny's trial, nor the broader institutional failures that even led to this situation happening in the first place.

I am genuinely surprised that Reddit is allowing opinions in favor of Penny and hasn't banned them under the guise of, say, encouraging violence. If you had asked me to predict /r/NYC's reaction beforehand, I would have 100% failed.

The mods keep locking and deleting the threads (without comment). But I wasn't surprised that /r/NYC came out mostly in favor of Penny, though I wouldn't have expected it to be as lopsided as it is. People ride the subway. Pretty much everyone there has had the experience of a Neely type ranting at them; some of them not just a Neely type but Neely himself. And some there have had such people physically attack them.

Whatever the cause, it almost gives me hope that at least the very people living in dense urban areas (whoever's left and hasn't moved out, anyway) are willing to address the problem of not just crime, but also harassment, filth, and general unpleasantness that plagues public transit, where urbanists don't want to or don't even acknowledge the problem.

Unfortunately they'll do anything about it except vote for policies and politicians who will do something about it. It took much worse than this to get New Yorkers to first vote for a Republican and then for a party-switching authoritarian.

The democrats can’t plausibly reclaim that particular political mantle after the prominence of Defund The Police, and there are enough true cop-haters along the Democrat activist base that you’d never get message discipline on the issue.

I mean Biden managed to neutralise it well enough last time, and he has distanced himself pretty clearly from that side of the party. If he felt so inclined, with no real primary challenge this time, he could start leaning into the 'I am the Democratic party' sort of thing even more, stress his opposition to radical measures throughout his career. Perhaps the crime bill thing even becomes a plus! In any case it's not as if the President has that much power over matters of law and order, so what is even Trump's positive case here? There's just not much he can credibly propose.

In any case it's not as if the President has that much power over matters of law and order, so what is even Trump's positive case here? There's just not much he can credibly propose.

The President doesn't have direct power over many things presidential campaigns are run on. That hasn't stopped anybody from making absurd promises. (More charitably, the POTUS may not have direct authority over this or that, but he has a lot of leverage and an implicit role as party leader that lets him push policies that are outside the strict limits of his office).

I think the distinction here is that a President can credibly claim to promise to enact federal legislation (still a bit dubious given his party may have a slim or no majority but still) given how prominent they generally are in directing the legislative activity of their own party these days. Law and order though is not even federal level, mostly anyway, so the influence becomes more obscure. He can as you say use the bully pulpit but that is hardly the stuff Presidential campaigns are made of. 'If I am elected, I will ask state prosecutors very nicely to please crack down, or something'.

But it’s relatively easy to point out Biden uses his FBI not to supplement law and order but to harass political opponents which further undermines law and order.

That is, democrats politicize Law and Order at the local and federal level.

I’m surprised no-one mentioned the way this incident has been covered on the /r/NYC subreddit. Given that it’s a deep blue city and Reddit is a deep blue site, you’d think everyone would be up in arms about Neely’s death. But the dominant mood is dramatically more pro-Penny than here, for heaven’s sake. Multiple posters saying that he did what needed to be done, people have a right not to be hassled by psychopaths on their commute, even some highly upvoted comments calling out progressivism by name as the ideology that created this problem. I’m utterly bemused and perplexed. Am I missing something?

I have observed that city-specific subs tend to be more right-leaning compared to the broader subs and reddit overall. Probably some self-selection going on. NYC has woke types, but also Bloomberg-type neoliberals who are still considered 'blue'.

There's an old saying that "Everyone is conservative about what he knows best.". That's good evidence in favor of the saying in regard to people's home subs.

I have observed that city-specific subs tend to be more right-leaning compared to the broader subs and reddit overall.

Really? Maybe this is specific to Canada, but I find the opposite. Almost all city-specific subreddits are very left-wing.

There seems to be some strong portion of American (presumably-otherwise-liberal) urbanites who express a strong hatred of the homeless, overriding all other possible concerns of liberal propriety.

Similarly I have a brother who is deeply progressive in just about every possible way, yet after he lived in Koreatown in LA for several years (for our foreign friends, Koreatown has had a distinct lack of Koreans since the Rodney King riots in the 90's) he has said things about Hispanics that would make /pol/ blush.

I don’t know. This says that Koreatown was only 10 percent Korean in 1990, while this says that it was 15 pct Korean in 2000 and 17.5 percent Korean in 2010. Of course they might be defining the borders differently, but still it is clearly still the heart of the Korean American community in LA (which of course has the largest Korean American pop in the US.

Koreatown

Mostly unrelated to the point, but this Korean BBQ in Ktown is one of the top five meals I've ever had and I cannot endorse going there strongly enough to anyone that happens to be in the LA area.

Sounds great. But I hope you also stop by Jitlada.

I didn't and haven't been back to LA recently. On the list now though! Thanks :-)

Yw. But only order off the southern Thai menu in the back.

Guess I was wrong then. Though it makes sense why I mostly saw Hispanics whenever I went to visit my brother, didn't realize it was less than 20% Korean.

Not homeless per se, but the honeless who make life miserable for everyone else. That is, no one hates someone that lives in a shelter but is (1) either working or seeking employment and (2) trying to get out of the shelter. But the people who shit on the sidewalks, harass people on the train, etc.? Those people suck.

Am I missing something?

As I said over there, a conservative is a radical leftist who rides the subway. Most people in /r/NYC ride the subway. They've run into the Neely types, doing everything from panhandling to menacing.

It’s really simple- if you live in NYC and use public transit you get hassled or violently threatened by people like Neely fairly regularly (not every day but often enough).

It’s not pleasant and for men it’s emasculating and for women frightening.

Hm. In the 11 years I have lived in NYC, I have taken the subway every day, except during the early days of COVID, but I can't recall every being being harassed or verbally threatened by homeless people. Nor do I recall friends complaining about it. I have certainly had my senses assaulted by smelly homeless guys once in a while, but that's it.

We’ve discussed this before & I will just have to say that you must be lucky since I have been menaced by crazy homeless people a couple times (both times late at night past 2am) since moving to NYC last year.

Well, I am rarely on the subway that late. I am sure it is more likely at that hour. But my point is that this trope that people are constantly being menaced on the subway is just silly. It would be like me thinking that people are constantly in fear of being shot in open carry states.

I have lived in Manhattan for close to ten years now, taken the subway some unknown thousands of times, and I see this quite regularly. Just a couple of weeks ago I was in a 2 train that was packed like sardines, and I was standing near a couple of women who were doing their best to ignore the drunk hissing in their ears right behind them (this guy actually had a bottle of something and was taking swigs from it). I've never been assaulted myself, but that's probably because I'm a man. I know women who have been assaulted or harassed on the subway - one of my paralegals was stalked by a random vagrant, and had to get out before her stop and run from the station.

Aesthetically what bothers me isn't just the smell, it's the fact that an astonishing number of these people often have open, suppurating wounds that they don't even seem perturbed by. I vividly recall this morbidly obese woman sprawling herself out over a whole set of seats on the train to Astoria one day, and her leg was hideously swollen and visibly rotting. She was too stoned to care.

Yeah, I meant to say that I am rarely on the train at times when people are returning from bars drunk, and the last time I was on the train at 3 am some drunk kid threw up on the floor. But OTOH, I have never heard of anyone being run over by a drunk driver on the subway.


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