Talking doesn't work VIOLENCE..

Or even just "a government ". Which Frantz Fanon elegantly articulates in his book on colonial and anti-colonial violence The Wretched of the Earth.



http://www.openanthropology.org/fanonviolence.htm



https://warriorpublications.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/colonization-decolonization.pdf

 

If we all lived believing "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth". The entire human race would be blind and toothless. (an old Jewish proverb)

 

What like 3,000+ years of recorded human history with outbreaks of violence scattered throughout & yet ya'll still think it's the right answer........

"The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over & over & expecting different results." probably Albert Einstein

 

What are you even talking about? I think you missed the last bit of this conversation. We're passed the point of confusing the violence of states and empires with the so-called "violence" of those fighting against the empires.

 

Semantics brother. Regardless it boils down to does violence have a beneficial or a detrimental effect on humanity. Scientifically it has benefits, however that is only because we as a species don't have any desire to balance our urges. Temperin' of our urges, balancin' if you'd rather, is the only way to bring what peace most want.

Is that the most essential way to be? Only time will tell, man. Ok yeah I turned my new years up some so I'll stop after this. Change is necessary. At the barest minimum scientifically this is shown to be true. We've tried one way of effecting change, we aren't satisfied with it's results. High time to try another wouldn't you say brother?

Peace

 

Violence is not the way to settle anything. If it were, then the strong arm rules. Of course, if someone is attacking you physically, you have to defend yourself . . . unless you can outrun them. And if anybody disagrees with me about that, we can go outside and talk about it in a language I'm sure you'll understand.

 

For your first point, what's your definition of "violence". These debates are usually around the states definition, which is anything that challenges its legitimacy. So you say the urge of self-defense is an urge we need to get rid of? Doesn't seem like a good idea in my books.

As for your second point of "trying another way to effect change". Dogmatic pacifists have dominated the "activist" scene for a few decades now and their movements have failed miserably unless there have been a diversity of tactics used. So yes, I agree it's "High time to try another wouldn't you say brother?"

 

"Pacifists tell us that violence only begets violence. This is manifestly not true. Violence can beget many things. Violence can beget submission, as when a master beats a slave (some slaves will eventually fight back, in which case this violence will beget more violence; but some slaves will submit for the rest of their lives, as we see; and some will even create a religion or spirituality that attempts to make a virtue of their submission, as we also see; some will write and others repeat that their freedom must not come at the expense of others; some will speak of the need to love their oppressors; and some will say that the meek shall inherit what’s left of the earth). Violence can beget material wealth, as when a robber or a capitalist (insofar as we can make a meaningful distinction) steals from someone. Violence can beget violence, as when someone attacks someone who fights back. Violence can beget a cessation of violence, as when someone fights off or kills an assailant (it’s utterly nonsensical as well as insulting to say that a woman who kills a rapist is begetting more violence).

Pacifists tell us, “We must be the change we to see.” This ultimately meaningless statement manifests the magical thinking and narcissism we’ve come to expect from dogmatic pacifists. I can change myself all i want, and if dams still stand, salmon still die. If global warming proceeds apace, birds still starve. If factory trawlers still run, oceans still suffer. If factory farms still pollute, dead zones still grow. If vivisection labs still remain, animals are still tortured.

They tell us that if you use violence against exploiters, you become like they are. This cliche is, once again, absurd, with no relation to the real world. It is based on the flawed notion that all violence is the same. It is obscene to suggest that a woman who kills a man attempting to rape her becomes like a rapist. It is obscene to suggest that by fighting back Tecumseh became like those who were stealing his people’s land. It is obscene to suggest that the Jews who fought back against their exterminators at Auschwitz/Birkenau, Treblinka, and Sobibor became like the Nazis. It is obscene to suggest that a tiger who kills a human at a zoo becomes like one of her captors." - Pacifism as Pathology (An Introduction)

 

Isaac Asimov author of Fantastic Voyage and the Foundation series was quoted as saying “Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.”


Someone also once said “Violence is the last refuge of the retarded” - interesting

 

So how does self-defense make one "retarded" (if one was to think that was a bad thing).

Instead of posting bumper sticker slogans, can someone please use some intelligence to articulate a counter-response to the arguments already made. Otherwise folks might start viewing the wrong group as "retarded" (for want of a non-ableist term).

 

Lol, bumper sticker slogans.
That's what I'm calling the 2/3 mark of a night out from now on. Bumper Slogan Mark

 

It's just stupid to try and talk people into violence against the system. If you start plotting violent overthrow of the government, for one thing, they'll arrest you just for discussing it in too much depth. We cannot organize, except in secret.

So what a post like this does is really just kind of blind and aimless. You're just telling people to take a violent approach to things, to get angry. But then anybody can become a perceived threat. You really want some dummy to go fight a hapless cop and get arrested because the media is full of shit? Where does that get anyone?

Are people unable to fight back in this day and age? I dunno. Usually violence just happens. It isn't really planned. Some people will take too much and they'll strike back. Or some people will just have an agenda and they'll strike back. Corporate America has to play its cards right, of course. You can't just introduce martial law into a city, or there will be an uprising. Though now we're starting to see even police with like, miniature tanks on the streets.

But, I mean, don't worry. I'm sure there will be plenty of violence. But organizing that shit is just a pipe dream until there is out and out civil war.

 

^ I agree.

And random chaotic violence is a great excuse to arm police, bring in new laws, take away more freedoms.

 

They honestly do have to be careful with how far they go with that kind of oppression, though. They don't want people to rise up. They just want us all to be contented consumers, IMO. That's the ultimate aim of the people at the top: to keep the money flowing into their pockets. You can't do that if the people aren't content. I don't know why they have to try and brainwash us at the same time. It really shows a lack of respect.

I mean, we want your products. We buy your products. It's like they have something to hide, so they're trying to brainwash us all into being complacent. Probably what they have to hide is that, essentially, they don't give a flying fuck about us. The people at the top, I mean.

Sometimes I wonder, though, if they wouldn't think it was their duty to keep the size of the population under control as well. But essentially all that really matters to them is that there is an underclass of people in the world they can be superior to. Personally I don't think they're aiming for population control, because it is preferable to them to be superior to a large mass of people...to be a select few. The more people they're better than the merrier. It's just a lifestyle of extravagance they wish to maintain.

 

Semantics yet again, man The type of violence is irrelevant, the fact that no type has ever achieved a universally beneficial outcome irrefutable. Self defense is only necessary because people find reasons to harm one another. To remove a tree you cut the roots not the branches.

Please provide a list of each time since the 60's a group or person has used a peaceful approach to address issues presented that hasn't turned violent. Peace has only truly been given a chance a handful of times throughout human history. To declare it incapable without sufficient evidence seems rather foolish to me, man.

Peace
RH

 

Actually, I bet there are a hell of a lot of products that we never would have wanted if they hadn't taught us to.

 

Yeah, of course, but I don't understand profit margins and what not. Losses and gains.

 

...um o_o
*shrug*

 

This isn't a thread on armed struggle. The stance I'm taking here is the need of a diversity of tactics. Which has been needed in every movement that's ever existed. From the defense of ecosystems to the 8-hour workday. Technically you're right, what most pacifists call violence isn't even violence in any degree.

So you're just making a utopian argument? Okay I gotcha.

"I don’t deny the obviously admirable emotional content of the pacifist perspective. Surely we can all agree that the world should become a place of cooperation, peace, and harmony. Indeed, it would be nice if everything would just get better while nobody got hurt, including the oppressor who (temporarily and misguidedly) makes everything bad. Emotional niceties, however, do not render a viable politics. As with most delusions designed to avoid rather than confront unpleasant truths the pacifist fantasy is inevitably doomed to failure by circumstance." - Ward Churchill, Pacifism as Pathology

But to start with, if you've been to any activist movement since the 80's lead by predominantly white people you'd see it have strictly non-violent characteristics . But if you're asking for a list of how dogmatic pacifists have ruined countless movements, here's the start:

Many could be added before and after this (he covers earlier movements in his first book, How Nonviolence Protects the State). And much analysis can be gained from studying the tactics of newer movements such as Elsipogtog, Standing Rock, Climate March/COP, Women's March, Charlottesville and Unist'ot'en for example. If any of these movements failed, it was because of dogmatic pacifists.

Personally I don't have the patience or will to compile you a list of all the strictly nonviolent groups out there, but there are hundreds if not thousands. And individuals would be in the tens of thousands, at least. You just don't hear about them much because they never do anything. But they tend to look a bit like this:

 

You do realize that not only did neither of your lists provide anything related to my request, but in fact simply bolstered my point? I certainly hope so. As your lists show ACTUAL non violent protest has only been achieved a handful of times & furthermore it too would appear to have quite the high rate of success.

You argue against what you do not know, what you cannot know, because you've almost never seen it & when you have you've ignored it.