Streetlight, what is it exactly that you want in terms of government-type? You're not a liberal, but you say you're not a fascist either. Do you support democracy? Do you just want very considerable restrictions on free speech?

They’re idiots, as far as white supremacists go. They don’t even realize that their leader is a black Cuban. — NOS4A2

They've got one of those Dave Chapelle, black white supremacist scenarios going - the black Cuban is obviously blind and doesn't know he's black and the proud boys leadership make sure to cover his head everytime he meets with the other proud boys so they don't know.

In all seriousness though the term "white supremacist" as well as "racist" - racist especially - have become absolutely meaningless these days. It use to mean actual Nazis and KKK, but now it's basically just all conservatives and probably libertarians. It's really a shame what's happened to political discourse lately, it's barely worth it anymore. I'm worried about someone just being labeled a racist for whatever reason and therefore being denied a platform. It's the ultimate insult today. Shut them down. Don't let the racist speak.

When those interested in philosophy cannot exchange ideas with each other, all is lost. Sounds dramatic, but there's a truth to it.

(And I still have confidence on the administrators following the rules of the forum equally with everyone.) — ssu

Sure, but I would ask myself whether those who use that type of language are actually interested in a discussion or if they're just more interested in venting.

Anyway, you do you. I can't help but notice that the insults here always seem to flow from the left to those on the right though.

There's our Aussie moderator doing his job of moderating a Philosophy Forum. — ssu

No one suggested this is an "issue only with the black and minorities" you dumb fucker — Maw

You might want to just not engage with people who are talking to you like that. I, for one, don't.

Pointing out examples of white victims misses(or devalues) the point in much the same way that "All lives matter" does... — creativesoul

Well that's too bad because if you're trying to effect change it might come in handy to show those largely (but not entirely) white suburbanites that police violence actually effects people like them.

Someone else mentioned up thread, in a way better than I can recount from memory, how one of the founding principles of analytic philosophy was the rejection of system-building — Pfhorrest

Interesting - I've never heard that explicitly said or taught, but come to think of it it does make sense to me intuitively.

So politically, I'm a socialist because I'm a libertarian, and I'm a libertarian because of my deontological normative ethics (something like the non-aggression principle that you're probably familiar with), and my deontological ethics hinges on there being things that are objectively right or wrong (if it's not actually wrong to aggress upon people, but just "unpopular" or "illegal" or something, then the whole politics falls apart), and that account of things being objectively right or wrong can't be explained without explaining what "right" and "wrong" (etc) even mean, which is an account of moral semantics, which of mine hinges on the concept of speech-acts, but in any case all moral semantics, being semantics, hinge on some linguistic concepts or other. — Pfhorrest

Yes, I'm very familiar with NAP. It's very popular among right-libertarians as well. Personally, it's not what I follow and I've actually debated some right libertarians or anarcho-capitalists on the NAP a few years back. Since I reject NAP - or any deontologic/principles-based grounding for my libertarian-leaning beliefs I don't consider myself a full-blooded libertarian. I prefer to describe myself as libertarian-leaning more due to the values that libertarianism encompasses, and I suppose these values come from reflecting on my own way of being and conception of truth in society. I feel strongly about encouraging entrepreneurship and investing and that goes beyond me.

I'll first mention that I completely agree with you when it comes to your assessment of analytic philosophy today. When I think back to the system builders I think back to really the mid 19th century with Schopenhauer, Hegel, Kant, and a few other who were really very ambitious, and we don't really see that anymore, and I think part of the reason is just because there's so much knowledge out there that I just don't see how anyone can put forth something like that today, but I know your project and I do wish you luck.

For example, I can easily see myself in a political argument ending up talking about speech-acts and other philosophy of language stuff. — Pfhorrest

Interesting, could you explain please? Maybe cite an example?

I don't know, personally, if the entirety of analytic philosophy is useless to society - probably not, but a lot of it is. Philosophers very often vastly disagree on different central questions, so there's not much unity in the field in contrast to many other fields where there is widespread agreement on the basics that they can teach students. Even in the rare cases that there is widespread agreement, like with the Gettier paper, no one outside of philosophy really seems to care and there doesn't seem to be direct applications for it.

I feel bad sometimes for studying philosophy. Other fields are focusing on actual problems like how to stop COVID or how to help countries with serious economic problems while philosophers shut them selves off from the outside world to go play in their own heads or provide extensive commentary on a long dead philosopher that no one cares to read and often requires a second language to fully understand. It sometimes makes talking with them about contemporary issues extremely frustrating as facts and evidence clash their a priori presuppositions. Every once in a while though the old armchair philosopher will come down from his ivory tower and become strong proponents for a cause, if not lead the charge themselves like Peter Singer.

The way I interpret this is that the first guy has a loser's mindset. He'd rather protect his own ego and simply follow what the instructions (i.e. learn the "right" way) say than actually learn how to do his craft better. Then when someone upstages him he just gets resentful and bitter instead of either trying to learn from the guy or look inward and critically examining his own approach to the javelin instead of just regarding it as flawless because he knows the instructions. He thinks he knows the craft because he seems to be possess a limited amount of knowledge that he gained from the instruction manual, it's classic amateur thinking he is expert.

I see this in poker a lot. Nobody cares how you think the game "should" be played - everyone thinks they're decent or an expert. Learn when people get the better of you and leave your ego at the door. At least that's the way I read it.

"Empowering divisive political rhetoric" - that's a good one. Nah, Streetlight and I are beyond rational political discourse with each other at this point. We don't seriously discuss politics with each other because our fundamental values are so different and I think we both know that. There's no real discussion to be had, so we either joke around or insult each other depending on our mood. "Comrade" is just me keeping things light.

Left-wingers call each other comrade all the time. You could even call a democratic socialist "comrade" it doesn't matter. I wouldn't call a centrist Democrat "comrade" but then again I'm pretty sure Streetlight isn't a centrist Democratic.

I wouldn't call you comrade.

Why don't we ask Streetlight what he is politically and from there I'll determine if "comrade" is appropriate? @StreetlightX

Far left. I don't know Streetlight's political position exactly but I'd wager either socialist or communist, thus the "comrade."

I think it’s safe to say that if right-wing mobs were parading through cities looting and burning we’d have a national discussion on the topic. Until then... — NOS4A2

No doubt about it.

I think a lot of our discussion just concerns what qualifies as "right wing." Traditionally the far right refers to Nazism or other extreme, racist, authoritarian, nationalistic movements but if we remove the authoritarianism and racism but leave the love of guns then what? I guess we can call racism "right wing" - sure, whatever - but there's a line made in the conservative movement between those who are more racial and those who aren't. I haven't defended racists and I haven't stood against going after violent groups regardless of political affiliation if they've been linked to violent acts. The sins of one group don't excuse the sins of another.

Department of Homeland Security had this to say:

In June 2020, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) tweeted in reply to a Politico[49] article about the boogaloo movement that an intelligence bulletin released by the agency "does NOT identify the Boogaloo movement as left-wing OR right-wing" and stated that "they are simply violent extremists from both ends of the ideological spectrum".

A lot of American "right wing" violence, like Timothy McVeigh, is just anti-government. I don't know if it's fair to call this right wing and place it in the same camp as like Hitler. We could use some clarity here unless we just want to count everything from Waco to Hitler as right wing.

If you'd read the two FBI links I shared you'd know lone wolfs first, then white supremacist groups and ultra-national groups. Boogaloo is an obvious, militant, far right group that has been involved in various incidents and two killings just in the past year. — Benkei

Are you aware that there are pro-BLM boogaloos? There are left-wing boogaloos too, the only thing the organization has as a binding principle is that they're pro-gun and anti-government. You can say, like with antifa, that there are people within the movement that are bad but it's simply not true to label the entire movement as Nazis or white supremacists.

We often simply group anti-government activists as right wingers but this has never entirely made sense to me. I mean who's largely anti-police right now?

Everyone not on the Trump Train is a communist, right? The programing has really stuck. — praxis

Yes, I refer to all non-Trumpers as communists. It's just part of my programming as a non-liberal. Ya got me.

But hey, who would have known that in this particular instance it's actually right? Streetlight is very far left if we're going by the typical political spectrum and I don't think he would deny that.

So where are the organizations behind this? Lets go after them. Nobody likes right wing terrorism, but other attacks happen and we just don't call them terrorism. To the best of my knowledge, as I mentioned earlier, many of these "right wing" attacks are lone wolf attacks where the attackers were radicalized over the internet so unless you want to shut down parts of the internet I don't know what to tell you.



Thank you for the insightful response. I'll be sure to check with you about the facts before I post next time, comrade.

I'm denying your allegation that Antifa as a group goes out of its way to target journalists. Apart from your really, really low standard of what consitutes a journalist. And let's put things in perspective here: https://www.rcfp.org/black-lives-matter-press-freedom/ — Benkei

I don't believe antifa as a group goes out of its way to target journalists, but this partially just due to the fact that there is no "antifa as a group" on a large, national scale. Isn't it just a patchwork of local organizations? Just curious, do you consider any conservative journalists - say, Ben Shapiro or Ann Coulter - as "legitimate" journalists? Are there any smaller conservative journalists who you like/would consider a "real" journalist? Plenty of oppressive organizations may not have gone "out of their way" to target journalists but they still did.

I mentioned this last time but the police is a separate discussion. Conservative journalists don't really have links to the police. If you consider the police your opponent just because they do something wrong doesn't mean you therefore get to do it.

I know you didn't. So you agree the actual threat to the USA are far right extremists? — Benkei

I don't like right wing extremists and I have no interest in defending them. That said, my impression about right-wing violence in the US is that it's largely lone wolf attacks but if there was a unified group behind, say, the Dylan Roof shooting or the El Paso wal-mart shooting I'd be more than happy to target those groups but in the absence of there being those groups it's kind of a dead trail. For instance it's my impression that Roof got radicalized over the internet, but I don't know of any group behind it and what are we going to do, shut off the racism side of the internet? I guess the most present group is the boogaloos but you've got also pro-BLM and left wing boogaloo's so it's not that simple to just label all boogaloo's right wing extremists. They almost seem like more libertarian extremists if that's a thing.

I'm happy to talk about right wing extremism with you, but you've got to admit today the far left tends to be more visible today. I don't like either of them. It's not a matter of choosing to like one as a counterbalance to the other.

If we say the game was a stalemate, then we are changing the rules of chess. A checkmate is only possible if someone wins and loses, so how could the game be a stalemate? — MSC

I feel like you might be a bit confused here. There are only two ways anyone wins a game of chess: 1) Checkmate or 2) Resignation. A stalemate occurs if checkmate is no longer possible or the two players agree to a stalemate.

Chess player here so I gotta jump in.

If you're playing against yourself and one side wins then you're both the winner and the loser. You can think of chess kind of like walking in a very dark forest - a bad player can only see very, very little ahead of them, maybe just a few inches past their feet, while a good player has a much better flashlight or vision (whichever you want to call it) and is able not just to see further ahead, but with much greater precision and detail.

So if you're playing against yourself it's basically like you're trying to find or capture yourself in a dark forest with only a flashlight. You can make the moves that seem good to you, but you're likely gonna screw up at some point and now it's just a matter of whether you - on the other side of the board - can capitalize on that. If you capitalize on your opponent's mistake you should mostly just be winning, that's how chess is.

They're comedians not journalists according to their own patreon page. We are talking about these guys right? https://www.facebook.com/TheColoredCons/ — Benkei

They use to be Operation Coldfront. If you look through their youtube archives they're actually doing journalism/reporting and they report antifa assaults on numerous occasions (some of these are captured on camera). Are you really going to try to push the thesis that the far left just never gets out of hand? Are you really ready to die on the hill that the far left just doesn't assault journalists, ever? What are they, saints?

And we're not talking about the police but we should. You come up with journalists that aren't journalists to prove a point that doesn't exist. I'm pointing you to the actual problem--> a police force that's either dumb enough to attack journalists or so insulated from repercussions that they think they can get away with it. Probably a combination of both. — Benkei

I don't defend the police 100% I think most of the country is on board with some type of reform whether that means more training or better oversight.... It's just a different discussion and tbh this discussion is already super long and I don't really feel like making it longer but I'm definitely on board with some reforms.

The guy is a troll a verified liar and a likely criminal. As a result, I'm on the fence as to whether it was wrong to hit him in the face. Seems fair play to me. The guy who hit him should pay a fine though because he broke the law. — Benkei

And no I didn't see his medical records. But as I explained, if someone claims SHA and is up and about the next day, then he doesn't have SHA, he's simply lying. I don't need to see his medical records for that - all I need to do is google! — Benkei

Alright, we've actually found a difference in values between us here. Even if Ngo is a verified liar and troll I'd never support initiating violence against him. In America we can sue for cases like this. I'm a little alarmed that you seem to support a mob descending on a someone looking to document the far left... but I don't know, if you're fine with mobs initiating violence against people - in this case a physically small gay minority - then I don't know what else to say here. I guess we can move on. Us arguing over the extent of his injuries is somewhat ridiculous. In America you're free to deny the holocaust. You're free to compare antifa to stalinist murderers. It doesn't matter - we don't attack people even if they're maliciously lying.

You're happy to extend a definition to fit your preconceived conclusions. Check. — Benkei

You're chasing ghosts with Antifa. — Benkei

It's not about my preconceived notions, this is about how to best handle the word "antifa". I'm honestly leaving the choice up to you as to how to proceed: If you want me to use "antifa and the far left" because you want to doubt the extent of antifa we can do that. My general target here is really just the militant far left. I don't care if they have an antifa membership card or not.

I don't think antifa is a centrally-organized group. Maybe they have small, local organizations but if we're talking about who shows up at marches and who marches under the banner and who identifies with the ideology our conception of antifa can expand. I think it's best to describe it as more of a movement, with the black clad marchers as a part of the movement rather than an official member of an organization.

I have problems associating "far left" with white supremacy and patriotism. Seems like a typical right wing thing to me. — Benkei

I've never associated the far left with white supremacy or patriotism.

It's interesting to think about. I don't think such a service is possible, and I think the closest thing you're going to get to relieving psychological pain is drugs. If such a service were a thing people could charge good money for it.

I've already answered what I thought about Ngo being hit. It's in my previous post.

My problem with your comments was, that you claim multiple journalists were assaulted by Antifa. I haven't seen one example of it and the one you did give is a bad example for various reasons. Meanwhile, there was a lot of footage of journalists being assaulted by police in the beginning of the BLM protests. — Benkei

You said that it was criminal which is not the same thing as saying that it was wrong. Do you think it was wrong and that it shouldn't have happened?

For multiple journalists you've got Ngo and I said the "colored conservatives" which is a small youtube channel of conservative journalists/reporters. Those are a few I can name off the top of my head but I'm sure there's more. Antifa also routinely shouts down and tries to shut down conservative speakers on college campuses so it really should be no surprise that they've got an anti-conservative journalist bent. I'm sure there are more journalists who have faced assaults or threats; it fits with their view of "fighting fascism."

We're not talking about the police either and I don't see how it's relevant to the discussion. The police doing bad things doesn't justify groups in opposition to the police also doing bad things.

With real partisan talking points; once you scratch the surface most of it turns out to be untrue. Andy Ngo does not deserve to milk this situation and he certainly shouldn't be lying about his injuries. The guy that hit him should be fined. The rest is just milkshakes and spaghetti spray which a provocateur and probable criminal like Ngo deserved. — Benkei

Have you seen the medical reports on Andy Ngo? How do you know that he's lying about injuries? I've seen interviews with him and his speech definitely seems off and likely indicates some form of brain or face damage. I don't know how you can immediately conclude that he's lying. I don't even know how Rolling Stones can conclude it unless they've seen the medical reports. There were actually two separate assaults on Andy Ngo, according to Andy Ngo, but then we go down this rabbit hole of you probably not believing Andy Ngo and etc. etc.

If you look on the video though there were numerous men who attacked him with fists and hit him with objects. You can't dispute that. I feel like we should move on from this point because it's not too important to our central discussion.

Your identification of people being clad in black being part of Antifa is problematic because likely to be wrong. — Benkei

I never said everyone clad in black is antifa, but some % of them are likely to be. The truth is we're just dealing with uncertainty and this makes plenty of people uncomfortable. I'm happy to extend the definition/our conception of antifa to militant far-left groups in general, here in the states we just mostly refer to that group or groups as "antifa." Would you be more satisfied if we referred to them as far left militants? There's also quite a bit of documentary footage and literature out there about these groups. I think the umbrella term used here is just the "antifascist movement." They consider themselves warriors, fighters.

While it's true that some lone wolfs may identify as Antifa, it is not the case that Antifa falls within either category the FBI is really worried about. — Benkei

Antifa isn't destabilizing the government anytime soon. I've never claimed them to be a massive threat to US national security. And yes, like you've said earlier they're often difficult to identify and we can doubt whether random people dressed in black and assaulting others are antifa - but whether we like it or not that's the clothing we've come to associate them with. It could be some other far left group, who knows. The crips and the bloods and other gangs have their own dress codes and we could see people in these dress codes committing crimes but we'll never know for certain whether it's them until much later after they've been arrested and interrogated. I don't think antifa's violence is a real security threat to the US, but the way they go after conservative speakers and try to shut down discourse is disconcerting.

One of the things you mentioned, protests, isn't a problem and by law the people have a right to protest. The majority of the protests have indeed been peaceful. This brings me to another point, ANTIFA is an ideology, a statement you and I have both agreed with. So individuals who identify as ANTIFA, are not members of a group but are individuals espousing a belief in an ideology.

Pro-Life is also an Ideology. Do you think every pro-lifer spends their time outside of abortion clinics shouting profanities at employees and scared women seeking abortions? I'm Pro-Life, but I don't do that. I also identify as ANTIFA (Now don't rush to judge or throw the baby out with the bathwater because what I have to say is monumentally important and it would benefit you and everyone on all sides of all ideological debates to hear it) but I am not out Looting or burning or assaulting anyone and even if Trump wins a second term, I still probably won't be doing any of that. I'm human and I've been angry at times and when we get angry we think of doing stupid things, sometimes we do those stupid things to different degrees. I wouldn't judge you in the slightest if you told me that the thought hadn't crossed your mind to go out and assault people you see protesting. We all have those kinds of thoughts from time to time, especially about the things that mean a lot to us.

Why is this? Because the modal quality of my ANTIFA ideology and my Pro-life Ideology are personal and based on my individuality, just like ANTIFA who are out on the streets looting and burning, and the ones PEACEFULLY protesting... Or, like you. In the last few messages to me you have expressed ANTIFA ideology, yet you're not out looting and burning either. Instead you are having a collaborative, open, equal, equitable and honest conversation on the internet with people who disagree with you. On a philosophy forum no less. You might say that the Modal quality of our ANTIFA beliefs are like a super hard Titanium alloy, while the looters and burners are but lithium, a soft metal. — MSC

Yeah the protests are not a problem. I didn't mean it to appear that I thought the protests were a problem.

I believe antifa is both an ideology and a group, but not a centralized group as far as I can tell. It seems to be organized more on a regional/local basis. If we're going strictly by ideology then in the original sense of the word I'd consider myself an antifascist (as any decent person should be) - my issue is that the antifa of, say, the 1930s is not the same as the antifa of 2017-2020.

I think we need to be really careful in regard to whether we refer to it as an ideology or a group. My criticism is really geared towards the group - the (mostly) men who clad themselves in black and assault journalists and burn down stores and harass business owners. There's been many, many incidences where this has been documented.

but I am not out Looting or burning or assaulting anyone and even if Trump wins a second term, I still probably won't be doing any of that. I'm human and I've been angry at times and when we get angry we think of doing stupid things, sometimes we do those stupid things to different degrees. I wouldn't judge you in the slightest if you told me that the thought hadn't crossed your mind to go out and assault people you see protesting. We all have those kinds of thoughts from time to time, especially about the things that mean a lot to us.

Sure, I don't think anyone is to blame for their thoughts. You can certainly be blameworthy if you actually execute on those thoughts/fantasies though. To be perfectly honest, I've never fantasized about hurting the protesters though. I don't see anything wrong with protesting. I'm not mad at the protesters, but if you look at the facts of the destruction I think it's been pretty widespread. I know it's happened all across the country and now parts of my home city of Boston (entire blocks, many, many stores) have been destroyed. I don't even fantasize about hurting the rioters I just wish they would stop or maybe that there would be a stronger police response.

Instead you are having a collaborative, open, equal, equitable and honest conversation on the internet with people who disagree with you. On a philosophy forum no less. You might say that the Modal quality of our ANTIFA beliefs are like a super hard Titanium alloy, while the looters and burners are but lithium, a soft metal. — MSC

Yeah, this has been a surprisingly pleasant discussion. And I agree with you -- from a purely philosophical standpoint, I could very well be considered an anti-fascist. In the original sense of the word I think I am. However, I'd just really advise you to be careful identifying yourself with that movement because they are a group -- literature has been written on the group -- and they're not a democratic movement that supports open, free discussions. They very routinely shout down and try to shut down conservative speakers on college campuses. I honestly don't think the movement believes in free speech. They believe in de-platforming and not allowing conservative speakers to express their ideas because anything outside of their little box is labeled "fascist." I know you might just consider me
paranoid conservative, but I would encourage you to familiarize yourself with the group a little, not just the philosophy.

You really need to work on your reading comprehension.

The answer is multi-variable and complicated. I just can't give a simple, easy answer. I think this is an important discussion to have, but is a slightly different from the subject of police shootings. The two are related, but obviously cutting that crime rate would decrease the number of black bodies at the hands of police.

I hate to say it but probably because they commit a disproportionate amount of the crimes and in turn have a disproportionate amount of contact with the police.

Unarmed. You cited the source, didn't you read it? — Kenosha Kid

The bigger picture here is that there were 14 unarmed black people killed by June of 2019. The article mentioned this was 63% lower than the number in 2015, so presumably in 2015 we're talking like 25 deaths of unarmed blacks.... in the entire year....of a country of over 300 million, of which over 30 million are black.

Yet your point this entire time is that there is an epidemic, that white cops just walk up and shoot black people without consequence because they just hate black people. The numbers we're dealing with are so small here... imagine if there were 4 unarmed white men killed and 3 unarmed black men killed yearly. Sure the number is disproportionate, guess you win....?

I guess statistics weren't that important after all. — Kenosha Kid

No you just need to do a more thorough job and dig into it a little more.

How do you get by being so angry all the time? Must be hard.

Statistics are easy to find. You are twice as likely to be shot dead by police if you are black. Beyond statistics, there's a large number of reported cases, often filmed, showing police brutality against black people. There are remarkably few white George Floyd's. — Kenosha Kid

You realize there's a ton of dead white people you haven't heard of? There's also a ton of dead indigenous people you haven't heard of. Nobody cares unless it's a black man killed by a white police officer. There's actually a bunch of white George Floyds the media just doesn't care about them.

Twice more likely to be shot dead? Are they armed? Are you committing a crime? Are they a suspect for a crime? Why are they being shot? Did they surrender?

Does 14 shooting deaths of unarmed black in late June of 2019 constitute an epidemic? If there were 4 white men and 3 black men shot in the entirety of any given year you could also claim there was an epidemic of racist police officers murdering black people disproportionately. Very good use of statistics!

Blacks are also commit a disproportionate number of assaults and murders so they're unfortunately more likely to be in this type of situation where police are looking for a black suspect. You also only cited national statistics which may not be representative of where the bulk of the shootings are taking place.

The Heather MacDonald article? Where? You realize her thesis is that there's no epidemic of shootings of unarmed black people?

You gotta cite your sources man because that's not what mine are telling me.

Again, recognising no difference between lawful and inevitable killing and utterly unnecessarily murder. My issue is not that police kill. It is that police particularly murder black people. — Kenosha Kid

It's nearly impossible if not outright impossible to find stats on this. You've got some work to do if you're going to make this case.

And that's very telling. — Kenosha Kid

Jesus christ you are hyper-sensitive regarding a normal use of language.

and I can't imagine you have not been privy to much evidence -- that decent, non-racist, non-fascist white people are very much outraged by unjustifiable and particular police violence against black communities. — Kenosha Kid

Again, you need to find the statistics which prove that cops are just randomly murdering black people -- and only black people -- for no apparent reason/no apparent cause -- simply because they are black. And not only does this happen, but that this happens at an extremely high rate.

It is only against black people too - not any other race.

EDIT: The cops shoot around 1k people a year, the vast majority of whom are armed.

According to stats this year regarding unarmed victims:

"As of the June 22 update, the Washington Post’s database of fatal police shootings showed 14 unarmed Black victims and 25 unarmed white victims in 2019. The database does not include those killed by other means, like George Floyd."

No, I found it strange how you only mentioned black people being killed by police on numerous occasions despite more white people being killed by cops and there being no mention of any other race. I couldn't tell if you're just a black person concerned with issues within the black community (understandable) or some random white guy/non-black who's basically just virtue-signaling by only taking notice of one politically salient race. It comes across as very bizarre and in any case you just continue to straw manning my positions so I'm out.

If I recognise my personality influenced me to see as I do and you recognise that your personality influenced you to see as you do and we both recognise that our personalities are partly constructed by factors over which we had no control, how does that change how we should see the subsequent differences in our positions if they were the result of these differences? — Judaka

I don't think there's an easy answer to this one. Even people with a shared, common, lifelong experience can view the issue quite differently. I think it's more accurate to say how we process those experiences/personal circumstances comprises our worldview rather than just experiencing/going through them.

In practice it's difficult if not near impossible to break through to someone and penetrate their psychological starting points through argumentation, so I've come to prefer discussions over argumentative battles in these forums. Discussion is less confrontational and it allows us to express these personal circumstances in a non-confrontational way. With me at least over time I've shifted away from direct confrontation and more towards just listening and understanding when it comes to disagreement. These core views can be changed but it's going to a slow process most likely.

If that is all you're aware of, aren't you making the assumption that they are Antifa? If you don't know either way then mighten they not be a false flag? Hypothetically. — MSC

True, you never know for sure. We've seen protests and lootings and burnings across the country and only some the perpetrators have been identified as ANTIFA. I certainly don't think everyone who is committing crimes here are antifa. It's nearly impossible to get perfect statistics about this, but it's likely a mix of antifa, other left wing radicals, opportunists, criminals, and who knows what else. I'm happy to extend my argument here to left wing radicals in general. If there are right wing radicals in there I'd be quick to condemn them too obviously. I certainly don't buy that the majority of people committing the lootings and riots are really right wing radicals though.

The thing that bothers me is that many are jumping to conclusions prior to police investigations being finished and are conjecturing all sorts. On both sides really. For all you or I know, there are personal disputes or normal crimes being labeled as Antifa or Right wing extremists. — MSC

Absolutely. All we know is that antifa members have been identified behind some of the looting and assaults, but there's certainly a lot of confusion.

Are you of the opinion that neo-nazis don't exist in the USA? Sincerely asking. — MSC

No I belive neo-nazis exist in some measure in the US. It's important to distinguish neo-nazis from just normal racists and neo-confederates though. All racists are not the same. Don't get me wrong, I hate racists - I do believe neo-Nazis exist in some quantity (certainly in the prison system) but all racists are not equal. Actual neo-nazis are the worst of the worst in my book.

Since we are talking about killings, what did you think about the killing of BLM activist Oluwatoyin Salau? — MSC

I would have to look into that one and get back to you later. Yesterday I was looking to Breonna Taylor (horrific what happened) and Jacob Blake, but I'll get to Salau at some point. I have no problem condemning police officers when they commit like an actual crime as is what likely happened with Taylor. It's certainly happened we really just need to wait for all the facts before rushing to judgment.

All I really want to know is whether you support the assault on Andy Ngo.

Of course rolling stones isn't going to like a conservative reporter/journalist. Who would have thought a heavily left wing publication would dislike a conservative reporter/journalist/hack etc.? If I were to reference the National Review how do you think they would view Ngo? How do you think conservative sites view Seth Abramson or Sam Seder? It's a constant thing coming from both sides to try to discredit the other. I'm not going to blindly bandwagon one side here. I don't even care about defending Ngo's journalistic integrity right now. It's irrelevant.

This is why I hate politics and I prefer philosophy. All I want to ask you is whether you condone the assault. It doesn't even matter if he's a legitimate journalist or not. If someone spreads lies and publishes them then you sue them. If you watch the videos he's attacked by many black clad men and the crowd really doesn't stop them. There's also been a number of assaults on other conservative journalists like the youtube channel "the colored conservatives" by men clad in black.

How do you think I would react if, say, the proud boys assaulted a liberal journalist? Do you think I would immediately jump to their defense by trying to discredit the liberal journalist? Shitty behavior is shitty behavior it doesn't matter what side it comes from. This shouldn't be political.

Antifa violence and fear thereof are simply not grounded in reality. — Benkei

I never said antifa started the forest fires. What I am aware of is tons of footage on youtube of black clad men either assualting journalists or looting/burning stores.

So the whole "both as bad as each other" narrative you are trying to push doesn't really make much sense as the very reasons and motivations behind the existence are entirely different. To put it simply, if there were no Fascists, there would be no Antifa. If there were no Antifa, we would still have fascists. — MSC

I don't care as much about an organization's stated, ideological goals as I care about their actual actions. We've seen journalists assaulted, business owners harassed, businesses looted and burned. We have seen murders as well, Aaron Danielson for instance. To document all of these instances would be an awful lot of work, and often when they are documented the journalists who document them are just smeared as frauds or fascists themselves, so it's often not really worth talking about.

I think many of these antifascists operate under the premise that the American system is rotten to it's very core and since it can't be reasonably reformed it needs to be destroyed and rebuilt. So the violence follows from this and there's no discussion to be had. If you're one of the believers in this premise then I don't see our discussion going very far.