Italian man 'goes to war' against Italian government & EU bureaucrats

[Garnier Fructis]

I didn't really put any thought into making the poll, nor did I know how I was going to vote when setting it up.

Not well thought out polls always generate conversation away from the main point, as a general note for the future.

[Grizzly Willy]

I didn't really put any thought into making the poll, nor did I know how I was going to vote when setting it up.

You could have voted both. It doesn't matter whether or not you think he's a hero, he still committed a crime.

[N-7]

I know, but I don't actually think of him as a hero. But I do think that in this supercharged polarized environment, if you voted "criminal," you would only be supporting the EU and "progressivism." In other words, it's a protest vote.

No, I would be supporting justice. You voted on a very clear poll (your own poll if I might add) with "He's a hero." option. Spin it however you like but the truth is clear to anyone who wants to see it.

People over the world are respecting this man, for whatever reason. Here's a few quotes from people on another forum I go to

Yeah if you search hard enough in the internet, you will find people supporting anything including war criminals or genocides against certain people. By the way I am not implying that his crime is severe as those, but my point is if you search hard enough you will find people who support anything.

[Sivick]

while i sympathize with his plight he didn't shoot corrupt politicians or dirty bankers, no he shot innocent police officers.

[Thage]

By definition, the man is a criminal. So is Jason Todd, an antihero in DC Comics who, unlike his one-time mentor Batman, believes that one death to save a thousand lives is legitimate justification for murdering other violent criminals in vigilante crimefighting. The irony of a violent criminal using that justification to excuse his killing other violent criminals is not lost on himself, the other Gotham vigilantes, or the Gotham police force.

Along the same train of thought, even if this man was actually going for corrupt politicians and other people who screwed his life over, he's a criminal. Neither the law nor his fellow man put the power of judge, jury, and executioner into his hands, and there was no guarantee that the people he was going after were actually guilty of their perceived crimes--as other posters have noted, Italy's economy and government have been flatlining for years, even before they joined the EU, due to corruption and mismanagement. All the people he was going after were guilty of were trying to fix the problem that landed in their laps like a ton of bricks right on the johnson.

[Sivick]

so he's definitely not batman

[Thage]

so he's definitely not batman

I'm pretty sure Kurt Russel is Batman by night.

[GreatOak]

No, as much as I dislike the EU this isn't the answer. He's a criminal and shouldn't be celebrated for making serious threats and acts of unwarranted violence.

[Slummish]

Maybe this "hero" should have done some research. There's a reason Italy, Greece and Cyprus are in trouble. It's called tax evasion. Tax evasion carried out on a massive scale by more than 60% of each of these respective countries' citizens; and it's been going on for more than six decades. When a nation's revenue stream is interrupted, yet the citizens require an increasing number of services due to natural rates of population growth, something has to give.

Italy's primary economic woes are the debt, low productivity, corruption and to a lesser extent, its cultural divides. However, the first three of these respective woes have all been exacerbated by the failure of Italian property owners to report and pay the proper amounts of the taxation they legitimately owe. And, now they're fucked.

Shooting a few cops or politicians just shows how out-of-touch the regular Italian is when it comes to what's plaguing his nation's economy.

That's just like Americans blaming Wall Street for causing the housing bubble when all Wall Street did was benefit from the stupidity and avarice of the citizenry.

More than half of America still doesn't get it; even after the very-near-collapse of our own economy. We want more deregulation, smaller government and want to pay lower taxes when the only thing that will fix our economy is more oversight, bigger government and higher taxes.

It would be great if everyone were required to spend a year in college understanding macroeconomics, microeconomics, financial institutions, markets, central banking and international economics.

[Manabomb]

At the time of writing this thread I would like to point out that 52 people are hypocrites. I really do hate to sound like an "amurican", but filthy bureaucrats running a country when they haven't been voted in, corporations influencing political figures into making laws so the rich can become richer, all of these things plague the entire world at this point. The last time I tried to talk peacefully in a civil manner with a rich or "top 1% person" over politics I got wine spit in my face.

I would like to live in a perfect world where every problem could be talked at and worked through between political figures, the top 1% rich, the middle class and the poor, but to say if you were in that mans position of losing everything and wouldn't resort to violence simply means you'd like to think of the same perfect world. Besides, violence is the only thing that makes them pay attention. That or dollar signs.

[Garnier Fructis]

It would be great if everyone were required to spend a year in college understanding macroeconomics, microeconomics, financial institutions, markets, central banking and international economics.

Forgive me for going off topic, but I would like to add that it is rather easy to avoid taking economics at all because some colleges lump political science and economics together for general education requirements. This is something that colleges should re-evaluate, so less people graduate with a piss poor understanding of economics (as I will do in a few years, though I didn't avoid economics on purpose).

[Exac]

"Italian Terrorist Attempted Rampage Stopped, Culprit's Identity Withheld"

[Grizzly Willy]

At the time of writing this thread I would like to point out that 52 people are hypocrites. I really do hate to sound like an "amurican", but filthy bureaucrats running a country when they haven't been voted in, corporations influencing political figures into making laws so the rich can become richer, all of these things plague the entire world at this point. The last time I tried to talk peacefully in a civil manner with a rich or "top 1% person" over politics I got wine spit in my face.

I would like to live in a perfect world where every problem could be talked at and worked through between political figures, the top 1% rich, the middle class and the poor, but to say if you were in that mans position of losing everything and wouldn't resort to violence simply means you'd like to think of the same perfect world. Besides, violence is the only thing that makes them pay attention. That or dollar signs.

Don't see how it's hypocritical to call him a criminal. He did commit a crime.

[N-7]

Don't see how it's hypocritical to call him a criminal. He did commit a crime.

It is hypocritical because it doesn't fit his agenda.

[Powerogue]

Criminal with good intent. How is their country being lead by an unelected bureaucrat fair?

I'm fairly certain a man in power that wasn't elected, that's running the country into the ground, is an oppressive dictator that needs to be rousted from his position.

Still, I have little context on this situation, such as how bad it is in Italy and how much of that is the bureaucrat's fault.

[Elegiac]

When all levels of government are corrupt, does the law have any moral merit?

Yes. People ought to follow the law.

[Nakura Chambers]

Yes. People ought to follow the law.

We just as much responsibility to break unjust laws, as we do to follow just ones.

[Elegiac]

We just as much responsibility to break unjust laws, as we do to follow just ones.

And what if everyone broke laws they perceived to be unjust? There would be no point to the rule of law. The only instance in which breaking the law is "acceptable" is if you're willing to accept the consequences.

Yes, I know that whole "obligation to revolution" shtick, but the fact of the matter is that violent revolution is rarely if ever the answer.

[N-7]

We just as much responsibility to break unjust laws, as we do to follow just ones.

So, attacking police officers somehow break 'unjust laws'?

[Elegiac]

If laws are enforced selectively in favor of a corrupt ruling elite and there is no indication that the corrupt elite will be removed from power, it is pretty much our duty to take up arms against them. In some places in southern Europe, this is the exact situation.

Whatever. Just be aware that 90% of the time such revolutions create tyrannies worse than the ones that preceded them.