Aurora Police Defend ‘Stand Down’ Orders; Twice Walked Away From Arresting Man Who Terrorized Apartment Residents

Revnak

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Pretty much this, the "founders" were two camps.

1. The jagholes who started the French and Indian War and profited off it, got their land grants revoked in the Proclamation of 1763, and were buttmad they were expected to pay for the war.

2. Smugglers, propagandists, and other scofflaws and rogues who made a shitload of money off the French and Indian War and subsequent taxation to pay for the war, and were buttmad the Brits wised up to their grift.

I mean God forbid anyone west of the Atlantic look too close at the fine print and notice the Boston Tea Party, for example, was a protest over a tax cut.
I used to hate the smugglers because their bullshit was so obvious and they all kinda wanted George Washington to become king then I learned that at least they hated slavery.
 

Terminal Blue

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Anyway I stand corrected, fuck Revolutions. They only bring misery in the end. They cause more problems then they fix.
I think people forget the scale of the problems that cause revolutions.

We remember the violence inflicted by revolutionaries, but we often don't remember the more subtle, insidious violence before the revolution, or the unchecked violence of counter-revolutionaries when the old order starts to crumble. In the grand scheme of things, revolutions are often not exceptionally violent against the background of a society where violence is an inseparable part of governance.
 

Eacaraxe

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I think people forget the scale of the problems that cause revolutions.

We remember the violence inflicted by revolutionaries, but we often don't remember the more subtle, insidious violence before the revolution...
It's probably more accurate to say a sense of selective memory is encouraged among the general public by those in power, who have a vested interest in staying in power.
 

Revnak

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I think people forget the scale of the problems that cause revolutions.

We remember the violence inflicted by revolutionaries, but we often don't remember the more subtle, insidious violence before the revolution, or the unchecked violence of counter-revolutionaries when the old order starts to crumble. In the grand scheme of things, revolutions are often not exceptionally violent against the background of a society where violence is an inseparable part of governance.
Personally like the Twain quote on this.
THERE were two “Reigns of Terror,” if we would but remember it and consider it; the one wrought murder in hot passion, the other in heartless cold blood; the one lasted mere months, the other had lasted a thousand years; the one inflicted death upon ten thousand persons, the other upon a hundred millions; but our shudders are all for the “horrors” of the minor Terror, the momentary Terror, so to speak; whereas, what is the horror of swift death by the axe, compared with lifelong death from hunger, cold, insult, cruelty, and heart-break? What is swift death by lightning compared with death by slow fire at the stake? A city cemetery could contain the coffins filled by that brief Terror which we have all been so diligently taught to shiver at and mourn over; but all France could hardly contain the coffins filled by that older and real Terror—that unspeakably bitter and awful Terror which none of us has been taught to see in its vastness or pity as it deserves.
 

Specter Von Baren

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What right does one terror have to claim moral superiority when it is just as capable of terrible acts and is only less so due to the shortness with which it existed?

Also let's not forget that the French Revolution led to the Napoleonic Wars and that was no less bloody than the wars before it.
 

tstorm823

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What right does one terror have to claim moral superiority when it is just as capable of terrible acts and is only less so due to the shortness with which it existed?

Also let's not forget that the French Revolution led to the Napoleonic Wars and that was no less bloody than the wars before it.
The implication Revnak wants to be made is that the short terror somehow ended the longer one, as though monarchy was the source of all pain and suffering in the human condition.
 
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Revnak

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What right does one terror have to claim moral superiority when it is just as capable of terrible acts and is only less so due to the shortness with which it existed?

Also let's not forget that the French Revolution led to the Napoleonic Wars and that was no less bloody than the wars before it.
I feel like you’re misreading if you think two bad things are the same and ignoring the massive difference in scale. Also, the status quo of European politics created WWI, a far more disastrous conflict than the Napoleonic Wars.
 
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Revnak

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The implication Revnak wants to be made is that the short terror somehow ended the longer one, as though monarchy was the source of all pain and suffering in the human condition.
There is something exceedingly ridiculous in the composition of monarchy; it first excludes a man from the means of information, yet empowers him to act in cases where the highest judgment is required. The state of a king shuts him from the world, yet the business of a king requires him to know it thoroughly; wherefore the different parts, by unnaturally opposing and destroying each other, prove the whole character to be absurd and useless.
 
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Houseman

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I think that humanity has tried too many times and failed too many times. Nothing they do will ever succeed. It is all vanity and striving after the wind. Revolution won't fix anything. A different President won't fix anything. Only God can fix everything. I'm just along for the ride, drifting along the river without trying to change its course.
 

Revnak

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I love being mocked for actually caring about democracy. It’s fucking hilarious. “Radical authoritarian socialist thinks votes should matter. They hate us for our freedom to have zero say in our lives.” What the hell guys, your one argument over the Marxists was supposed to be that we’re supposedly “the road to serfdom.” If you can’t even ideologically stand by democracy, what even do you believe in? Not changing things? Do you just hate anything new? Are you that much of a parody of conservatism?
 

Revnak

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I think that humanity has tried too many times and failed too many times. Nothing they do will ever succeed. It is all vanity and striving after the wind. Revolution won't fix anything. A different President won't fix anything. Only God can fix everything. I'm just along for the ride, drifting along the river without trying to change its course.
An absolutely cowardly interpretation of the gospel and the message of salvation if you believe that there is no ability or responsibility for people to improve the world around them. A pure idealism. You may as well have formed a religion around Plato’s Cave for all the reality surrounding your convictions.
 
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Houseman

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if you believe that there is no ability or responsibility for people to improve the world around them
1 John 2:15 "Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him... The world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God lives forever."

1 John 5:19 "We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one."

John 15:19 "If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you."

I dunno, seems reasonable to me.

See also: https://forums.escapistmagazine.com...christians-be-involved-in-politics.234/page-2, where zero actually engaged in interpreting the bible.
 
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Revnak

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1 John 2:15 "Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him... The world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God lives forever."

1 John 5:19 "We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one."

John 15:19 "If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you."

I dunno, seems reasonable to me.
Man, almost as if that’s not what “the world” means in those translations. If “the world“ did mean everything that exists, then to love another human being would be a sin. The world describes a fallen reality and the associated sins and problems. It doesn’t imply that the message of Salvation is to be delivered by sitting on a mountaintop contemplating how existence is suffering. In the world but not of the world.
Edit - but in all honesty, I’ll quit debating theology with you while I’m ahead. Your interpretations of biblical texts have always been interesting to say the least.
 

Houseman

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The world describes a fallen reality and the associated sins and problems.
I agree with you.

It doesn’t imply that the message of Salvation is to be delivered by sitting on a mountaintop contemplating how existence is suffering
I never said it did.

You seem to be making a lot of unwarranted assumptions. Empty your cup, grasshopper.
 

MrCalavera

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I think that humanity has tried too many times and failed too many times. Nothing they do will ever succeed. It is all vanity and striving after the wind. Revolution won't fix anything. A different President won't fix anything. Only God can fix everything. I'm just along for the ride, drifting along the river without trying to change its course.
Cool.
I for one would gladly support followers of this philosophy, if by their own advice they'd remove themselves from political discourse, anytime the Left/Liberals(or the Right for that matter, why not?) pushes for the change of status quo.
 
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Silvanus

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Baby steps. If electoralists get incrementalism, so should we.

But more seriously, the pressure is the point. No Marxist worth a damn would make the argument that organizing is solely valid when it is done for revolutionary efforts. Direct Action in favor of reforms builds solidarity and community. It proves to people that things can be done. It shows that voting in replaceable careerists is not in fact the only option. It makes future organizing easier by bettering the conditions of the people.
Alright, but what's the chain of events here between the direct action and the reform? Are we talking about placing pressure on incumbents to enact reform, or are we talking about organising voting drives & campaigns to replace them (still via the existing democratic process)?

Electoralist strategies betray all that. Remember that Minneapolis had repeatedly elected reformist mayors who did absolutely nothing to reform the police. It took fire to change that. Direct Action is the only way to change American policing, electoralism will get us nowhere.
That depends on what you mean by "electoralism". The only changes to criminal justice in Minneapolis have been enacted by the existing structures reacting to pressures.
 

Silvanus

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Bugger all other than Shay's Rebellion, Bleeding Kansas, John Brown's attack on Harper's Ferry, the New York draft riots, the Bonus Army, the Coal Wars, and the Black Panthers, you mean.
Without exception, the lasting legacy and impact of these events was in pressure exerted on various US governmental agencies or the State governments. Not in their overthrow and replacement, which was not even the intention.


Whether it succeeds or fails, quite contrary to what you would claim the peasants arming themselves and burning shit seems to have a shockingly-high success rate at pressuring politicians to enact policy.
Yes. Pressuring politicians to enact policy, exactly. D'you actually understand what I was arguing?

You seem to miss the fact "the ballot or the bullet" worked, because "the bullet" in fact was the alternative and civil rights activists had the means, capability, will, and intent to use them, should the government not accede to allowing the ballot. And here we are fifty years later in a political climate in which some of the most systemically white supremacist policy in post-bellum US history -- gun control -- has been thoroughly captured by the "left". And by stunning coincidence, the government's since reversed its position on "the ballot" and has preemptively chosen to employ "the bullet" for its own sake. Exactly how do you expect this to play out?
I'm unsure why you're asking me, to be frank, because it sounds to me like you've fundamentally misunderstood what I'm arguing, or written in your own stand-in to argue against.
 

Revnak

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Alright, but what's the chain of events here between the direct action and the reform? Are we talking about placing pressure on incumbents to enact reform, or are we talking about organising voting drives & campaigns to replace them (still via the existing democratic process)?
The former primarily, the latter as a last recourse, at least in the US where our political system is so absurdly irrepresentative.

That depends on what you mean by "electoralism". The only changes to criminal justice in Minneapolis have been enacted by the existing structures reacting to pressures.
Yes. Bending the existing structures with external pressure rather than utilizing and supporting the existing structures falls well outside of electoralism.
 
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Avnger

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Yes. Bending the existing structures with external pressure rather than utilizing and supporting the existing structures falls well outside of electoralism.
This is a distinction without a difference in a democratic system particularly when the electorate are the ones causing the "external" pressure (as in this case).