Slippery slope in practice: Now It’s Okay to Punch Nazis and White Male Libertarians

[Deleted]

Now It’s Okay to Punch Nazis and White Male Libertarians. That Escalated Quickly.
Slippery slopes: sometimes real.

Robby Soave

Well, that was fast.

First, a black bloc protester punched alt-right figure and white-nationalist sympathizer Richard Spencer during inauguration weekend, and some people defended this blatant exercise of violent censorship on the grounds that Spencer is a fascist and as such should not enjoy free speech right. (The Nation's Natasha Lennard called it "pure kinetic beauty.")

Some weeks later, protesters at the University of California, Berkeley, smashed windows and set a large fire in order to prevent Milo Yiannopoulos from speaking on campus. Yiannopoulos is not as extreme as Spencer—he does not identify as a white nationalist or a member of the alt-right—but nevertheless holds a number of deplorable views and is closely associated with Breitbart and Trump-ism. Again, the black bloc said that defending people from fascism requires Yiannopoulos to be silenced by the mob.

The day after, similarly-aligned people tried to prevent Gavin McInnes from speaking at New York University. Black bloc protesters maced him as he left the building. McInnes, a former Fox News personality aligned with Trump and Yiannopoulos, certainly does make ugly and offensive statements. But was violence the best answer to those statements? Some say yes.

Today, I couldn't help but notice this, from Mike Monteiro, a design expert and occasional writer:



Is he kidding? I can't tell. No clarification was offered. I emailed and tweeted at him. He did not respond. If it's a joke, at the very least he thinks it's funny to entertain the idea.

So how's that for goal-post shifting? First, we decide it's okay to attack Nazis. Then we decide it's okay to punch people who aren't Nazis but are awful and sort of remind us of Nazis. Then it becomes okay to punch the people who say Nazis and Milo are bad but we shouldn't punch them. You know those slippery-slope arguments people are always rolling their eyes at? Well, there's the slippery slope for you. And we'll be normalizing a whole lot of violence as we slide.

Meanwhile, the shut down of Yiannopoulos at Berkeley was so wildly successful that conservative students have been cowed into silence. Just kidding: They're actually bringing Milo back to campus, and Alex Jones.

As I wrote previously, research shows us that violent resistance is not the most effective tactic for stopping Trump, and runs the risk of making the broader public more sympathetic to the kinds of bad policies the Trump administration would like to enact. Violence is the language that fascists understand best.

Thoughts on this?
I mean, obviously, it is a good thing to attack nazis on all fronts - but it should be on legal grounds.

[Immitis]

its always okay to punch nazis. im a jew im an expert on this

[Daddotron]

Nazi = National Socialist German Worker`s Part, meaning it`s socialist...

Get it? Conservatives aren`t socialist....and Hitler was a huge socialist.... Please learn more and write less dumb stuff

and violence is always bad and never leads to free speech, it only leads to totalitarianism of some variety

Trump might be a bad politician but he is self serving and does not answer to anyone. We can safely assume this because no one would ever start a presidency this badly and there is no standing army in your town right now.

God Bless America

[Mysterymask]

Do these trolls want us to build an atomic safe space bunker for them?
Holy shit, what a whining. We do not need an entire essay every time someone says something on Twitter that they find offensive.

Imagine if the other side would do this, write an entire story every time someone advocates for a Holocaust or ethnic cleansing. The internet would double in size within a year.

Are you kidding like 90% of the clickbait articles is either complaining what Joe Somebody said on Twitter or applauding a bunch of people who said replied to said person on Twitter....or copy pasting a reddit post and calling it news.

[Deleted]

Wasn't the NAZI guy all about gentle ethnic cleansing or something ? Sorry for the face man, but eat a fist. That guy isn't famous for having his rights trampled on, he is famous for getting punched in the face.


On another note, NAZIs love free speech. As an exclusive thing to themselves.

[Tomservo]

If it's ok to punch nazis, then it's ok to punch communists as both ideologies have killed millions.

[ati87]

If Captain Amerika can punch old hitler then we can punch his followers....

on a serious note

Those that are working towards taking away other peoples right don't deserve those rights themselves.

[Deleted]

It is obviously not okay to just go around and punch anyone because you do not like their opinions.
If they are threatening you and you are in a valid self-defence situation it's of course a different matter - but otherwise? No.

Apart from the fact that putting "White Male Libertarians" together with (Neo-)Nazis is utterly ridiculous.

[Daddotron]

On another note, NAZIs love free speech. As an exclusive thing to themselves.[/QUOTE]

Please read about what a Nazi is and don`t continue to spread wrong information. Nazi`s burned books and controlled all media in Germany, newspapers, radio and movies/TV. THEY DID NOT ALLOW AND OR BELIEVE IN FREE SPEECH. They wanted no political opposition and killed those who spoke against them.

It is vital to the US the free flow of ideas is not impeded by violence or ignorance. Discord and discussion are what is needed now, tempered with an inward looking eye.

[willtron]

You can't be racist to white people, duh.

Wouldn't you want to punch Nazis that refuse to talk about free speech though?

[NED funded]

You cannot just punch people in the face its illegal. Spencer kinectic beauty has more to do so th the fact that he advocates ethnic cleansing.

[Deletedaccount1]

Save yourself a few IQ points and stay far away from Twitter. Never seen so many idiots on a single site except maybe the official WoW forums.

[Ryme]

Save yourself a few IQ points and stay far away from Twitter. Never seen so many idiots on a single site except maybe the official WoW forums.

Sage advise, it's been a cesspit for years now.

[minteK917]

Just punch everyone.

[Machismo]

It's not OK to punch anyone who is not an immediate threat to someone else. That being said, I don't feel sorry for white nationalists who get punched in the face.

As for the three douchebags, none of them are libertarians, and they are all monstrous asshats. Anyone who takes them seriously is a fucking moron.

[SirBeef]

Nazi = National Socialist German Worker`s Part, meaning it`s socialist...

Get it? Conservatives aren`t socialist

Yeah they are. The love the military and police, the two largest socialism programs we have. The are also in favor of corporate welfare by subsidizing billion dollor companies with tax payer money. They are definitely have many socialist leanings.

[Vankrys]

i think the only times it's ok to punch someone is self defense (or defense of someone possibly, friend and family for sure).

The best way to deal with someone whose ideas you disagree with is to offer counter ideas and rebuttals.

[Elba]

punched alt-right figure and white-nationalist sympathizer Richard Spencer

Lol. He's a Nazi.

this blatant exercise of violent censorship

That's not what censorship is, buddy.


But seriously, white libertarians are the worst. "Let's be nice to the Nazis. Maybe this time they won't gas anybody. :3"

[Machismo]

Nazi = National Socialist German Worker`s Part, meaning it`s socialist...

Get it? Conservatives aren`t socialist....and Hitler was a huge socialist.... Please learn more and write less dumb stuff

and violence is always bad and never leads to free speech, it only leads to totalitarianism of some variety

Trump might be a bad politician but he is self serving and does not answer to anyone. We can safely assume this because no one would ever start a presidency this badly and there is no standing army in your town right now.

God Bless America

Conservatives love their socialism.

[Elba]

Also, OP. Provide source link when copy pasting articles.