Yeah, I'm sure the guy burning down someone's small business and looting television sets was doing it with the intention that it would stop police brutality.

You can't use "good intentions" to justify horrific actions.

The idea that you can do so is pretty fundamental in politics. It's how the federal government justified the US Civil War, for example, and how the Founding Fathers justified a lot of things that tend to get glossed over in grade school history books.

The debate ultimately hinges on sympathies. For someone who wholeheartedly supports BLM, the riots might be regarded as something that was regrettable, but also understandable. In the words of Martin Luther King, "A riot is the language of the unheard." The observation also works in the direction of the Capitol insurrection. The rioters were there because they believed that their opinion on the election was not being heard.

Deciding which group had more grounds to be angry is left as an exercise for the reader.

Violence is categorically bad, regardless of what the intentions are. Referring to violence as "doing things" purposely avoids recognizing this.

Violence is not categorically bad, I don't think. Rarely, violence is necessary in self defense. It might be the option of last resort, but sometimes violence can stop worse consequences.

I'm not justifying any particular actions that anyone has taken in specific, just objecting to the categorization that it is always bad. (For example, someone suffering from domestic violence might strike back in an effort to escape.)

It doesn't matter if violence is necessary, it is still bad

What does this mean? If something is necessary, is it not justifiable? If it is justifiable, how can it be bad?

If we're saying all violence is categorically bad, I guess you'll want to abolish the military and the police, too, right?

Violence is not categorically bad. Violence is a tactic that is sometimes necessary and sometimes good. For example if you are being attacked, it is completely justifiable to defend yourself, violently if necessary.

The BLM protests were explicitly non-violent. The riots that broke out were swiftly condemned and not supported by any organizing group. At no point did any leader express any kind of approval of violence. And most importantly, no one told the rioters that they love them and that they are special.

I'm sorry, but that's revisionist history.

Ariel Atkins - Chicago BLM leader:

"That is reparations,” Ariel Atkins, an organizer, told NBC Chicago. “Anything they wanted to take, they can take it"

She said that about a riot in which 13 police officers were injured, and at least one rioter fired at police.

This is just one example of many where BLM leaders justified (or glorified) violence.

Agreed. Additionally, it's important to recognize that "peaceful" does not mean the same thing as "non-violent". The protests were not necessarily peaceful -- they intended to be disruptive -- but they were explicitly non-violent.

>"peaceful" does not mean the same thing as "non-violent". The protests were not necessarily peaceful -- they intended to be disruptive

peaceful:

1. free from disturbance; tranquil.

2. not involving war or violence.

Yes, thank you for agreeing. There are two different definitions, and the first (free from disturbance) is the one used in this context. The protests aimed to be non peaceful (eg, causing disturbance) and non violent.

The protests were neither free of disturbance nor non violent (on the fringe)

You do realize that everyone has their own opinion on what is good and bad right? I cant believe how naive this statement is.

Golly it's just so hard to know who to trust. The crowds protesting racial injustice and police brutality? Or the literal, self identifying nazis, white supremacists, and cultish conspiracy theorists trying to kill political leaders.

Alas our moral non cognizance in a post modern perspective.

edit: to the below, really, no. There's no hyperbole. If your group features nazis, and your group is not making every effort to expel associations with said nazis, your group is, at best, nazi adjacent. Nazis are the hyperbolic euphemism of peak historical immorality. It is preposterous that anyone feels they're making a good faith argument throwing whatabout comparisons when the starting point is nazis.

Another issue is how any individual frames either side and bases good and bad off of that, often using hyperbole, inaccuracies, wide brushes of their opposing views.

Where are all these “nazis” you say that word a lot. “My group” I didnt know I was in a group. You certainly seem to assume a lot and form knee jerk conclusions. Actually proving my point quite well.

The ‘Camp Auschwitz’ hoody and the “6MWE” (6 million Jews wasn’t enough) not enough of a signpost for you?

Continuing to prove my point. "wide brushes of their opposing views" Thinking everyone who disagrees with you is a nazi because you saw a a guy with a t-shirt is something stupid people do.

Someone who thinks that the holocaust didn’t go far enough is, literally, a nazi.

The fact that this is something you’re in a state of active denial about is a ‘you’ problem, not a ‘me’ problem.

Talking about some remote person or group of people and pretending it represents a nonexistent large population is insanity. There have always been fringe groups on both sides. The issue at hand is you have no perspective after being gaslit and think everyone you disagree with is a "nazi".

No, I don’t believe everyone who disagrees with me is a nazi. However, if I see a group of people displaying actual nazi sentiments then I will assume that all the group are either actual nazis or cool with being associated with nazis.

Remember, the OG antifa were on the beaches at Normandy.

No, they were a Stalinist street gang: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifaschistische_Aktion

Who, that little group or 70 million Americans? What are we talking about here.

Voting for trump doesn't mean you endorse the capitol insurrectionists. The world is more nuanced than right vs. left. Wide brushes go both ways. If you decide otherwise, then yeah, you're tacitly aligning yourself with the nazis.

I severely doubt that 70 million Americans were holding anti-jewish flags / Confederate flags and beating officers with them on January 6th. I'm pretty sure that the vast majority of conservatives are horrified at what they saw that day.

But if you want to paint the viewpoints of the entire 70-million with that kind of hatred, that's on you, not me.

We are talking about the little group of seditionists, trying so desperately hard to convince people that a larger group agrees with their goals or their tactics.

70 million people cast a vote based on political affiliations. And their side lost, and they accepted that. The commonality with the seditionists ends there.

> 70 million people cast a vote based on political affiliations. And their side lost, and they accepted that.

Did they, now?

"A CNN poll, released on Sunday and conducted by SSRS between January 9 and 14, shows that 75 percent of Republicans do not think that Biden won the election legitimately, compared to 1 percent of Democrats and 36 percent of independents."[0]

[0] https://www.newsweek.com/republicans-joe-biden-won-election-...

> Where are all these “nazis” you say that word a lot.

How about this guy, self identifying neo nazi, who live streamed himself going into the capitol?

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politic...

I use "your" in the general sense. I don't know who you are.

But here's the thing, you can be a conservative and not align with the opinions of nazis. But if you look at the nazis, white supremacists, and other hate groups attacking the capitol; and say "I think they're working for a good cause", I'm going to make some assumptions.

If you stop and find yourself arguing similar talking points as nazi groups... I don't know what you expect to happen. This isn't hyperbole. These are literal nazi groups. We are so far removed from what should be a societally tolerable difference of opinion. It's not "conservatism" at play here.

> and your group is not making every effort to expel associations with said nazis

This was the most bothersome part to me. Trump talked about wanting to punch protestors, but tip-toed around actual Nazi's supporting him and coming to events. He would eventually denounce violence or hate after being prodded, but never seemed to be able to state plainly if someone is a Nazi, then GTFO.

Personally, if I'm in a group and literal Nazi's are also allowed in the group, that's not a group I'm going to remain a part of.

> never seemed to be able to state plainly if someone is a Nazi, then GTFO.

> Trump, Aug. 14, 2017: As I said on Saturday, we condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry, and violence. It has no place in America. And as I have said many times before: No matter the color of our skin... we must love each other, show affection for each other, and unite together in condemnation of hatred, bigotry, and violence... Racism is evil. And those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including the KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and other hate groups that are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans.

https://www.factcheck.org/2020/02/trump-has-condemned-white-...

Donald Trump has many qualities worth criticizing. You should do some basic research to make sure you're repeating real ones and not just nonsense from an echo chamber.

I’ve read that, yet he kept on walking the line. His initial statements always seemed to need clarification later. As I said, he always managed to denounce later after prodding.

From the summer: https://www.snopes.com/ap/2020/06/28/trump-tweets-video-with...

And this: https://www.npr.org/2020/06/18/880377872/facebook-removes-tr...

And then stuff like this: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-condemn-white-suprem...

When asked to condemn “white supremacists and right-wing militia groups,” Trump verbally articulated a willingness to do so (“Sure, I’m willing to do that”), but also prevaricated, delayed, and bristled at the request, for example asking “Who do you want me to condemn?” when the terms of the request had already been made clear, and saying “Give me a name, go ahead.” He also swiftly shifted focus from white supremacists (the subject of the moderator’s question to him) to a condemnation of “the left wing.”

While it can be argued that Trump did not unequivocally refuse to condemn white supremacists, he undoubtedly demonstrated a reluctance to do so, one that will be very worrying to many voters. When Trump ultimately got around to issuing his version of the condemnation requested by Wallace and Biden, it was shrouded in ambiguity (“Proud Boys? Stand back and stand by”) and followed by another rapid shift in focus to “antifa and the Left.” Whatever Trump did say, he did not condemn white supremacists.

Unfortunately, because of the pandemic I’ve probably watched, read, and listened to more Trump than his supporters. The only echo chamber I’m in is his own material. His hesitancy around the white supremacist topic has always been alarming.

Also Donald :

"We love you" "You are patriots" "They love their country"

Sure, he did say that quote in 2017. That is clearly not the messaging that was consistently conveyed. Hell, you can just ask the hate groups themselves what they think trump thought of them.

Yes, that doesn't mean we have to respect all opinions equally. The lies about election fraud should not be tolerated even if some people are foolish enough to entertain them.

> doing things for good reasons is good and doing them for bad reasons is bad.

"Things are justified because I support them or unjustified because I don't support them".

This is how children and narcissists think. Reality is that a lot of arguments are really this with a layer or two of post-hoc justification though.

I can't tell if this post was meant as a joke, but if it wasn't it's either impressively self-aware or completely and utterly lacking self-awareness.

from my point of view, the jedi are evil

“The ends justify the means”?

Hacker news seems to really struggle with this, partly because there are still Trump supporters here somehow.

> somehow

Computing has long been an interplay of curious, light-hearted hacker types and business/military types. e.g. Woz/Yannes/Stoll/Stallman and Jobs/DARPA/Musk/Thiel.

I don't think the values of skill, sacrifice, daring, and greed (sorry if that offends anyone) that roughly underlie HN are effective filters to remove Trump values. In fact, they move the needle toward the business/military side. HN appreciates the fun hacks, but, by design, amplifies the business side.