About those peaceful antifa protests...

[CountDeMoney]

I think it's reasonable to hold that both are problems significant enough to warrant discussion and condemnation without engaging in whataboutism. IMO both represent serious societal dysfunction.

Agreed. What annoys me the most is the double standards.

What double standard?

That there's favoritism shown against a handful of extremists committing counter-protests versus a superior number of established racist extremists, Klansmen and neo-Nazis espousing philosophies of hate, segregation and politics of racial superiority that has challenged the rule of law with violence dating to the 19th century.

It offends his sense of fair play.

[Sophie Scholl]

Both silence and moral equivalency implies at best ambivalence and at worst consent--none of which are acceptable options for any President of the United States.

He shouldn't have had to comment on such a minor event at all. I don't recall Obama's feet being held to the fire every time a black person somewhere did something bad.

As for moral equivalency, political violence is political violence, regardless of the alleged ideology of the perpetrator.

Rampant means "flourishing" and "unchecked."  Please link to examples of such flourishing and unchecked rampancy nationwide.

I'm not interested in playing word games. Read up on the "Battle of Berkeley" for an example of what I mean.

...and yet he did choose to comment on the situation in Charlottesville.  In Press Conferences.  Three times.  If a black person was dressed to resemble Obama's preferred clothing style, was part of a group who had vocally and actively voiced support for Obama, was part of a demonstration featuring members sporting Obama election clothing, Obama quotes on signs, and Obama quotes in chant, I think you have have seen him comment on such a situation.  Alas, we have only speculation of an alternate reality to do so.  Maybe Tim can draw us a map of the fallout of such an event or events.  The "Battle of Berkeley" being considered a battle is a joke.  It might be a rallying cry to the alt right, but it certainly is an amped up bullshit name for such an event.

[Camerus]

I think it's reasonable to hold that both are problems significant enough to warrant discussion and condemnation without engaging in whataboutism. IMO both represent serious societal dysfunction.

Sure it is possible. But it was only done this time once somebody got murdered by a far right nut case. Suddenly we all had to denounce everybody else for some reason. Just so the far right doesn't feel like they are unjustly blamed for something.

I'm not sure I follow you here, so apologies if my response seems like a non-sequitur, but plenty of people were denouncing the antifa before the events in Charlottesville, e.g. following the riots preventing notorious troll Milo Yannopolis from speaking.  However, I agree their prominence on the national stage increased greatly once Trump began his mealy-mouth equivocations.   

I don't think anybody is really all that worried about those antifa clowns. But hey if they are that concerned I don't think anybody will complain if criminals are arrested. Because I have to say that repeatedly for some reason. Just so there is no 'double standard'.

I disagree.  I do think unease about the antifa is warranted.  Obviously they are a very small minority that hardly represents most people out counter-protesting Nazi morans (who are themselves a very small group).  However, antifa does use the lexicon of progressives and has targeted conservative thinkers at universities (not just Nazis).  I think this makes people justifiably nervous about free speech as well as progressive capture of intellectual space at universities (and a perceived willingness among some to use violence or intimidation to enforce it).  Further, if one makes the "antifa are random criminals without bona fide political ties" argument, that person is still left with having to explain why they only show up to disrupt right-wing events.

However, I don't think the "double standard" language is very useful, since one should easily be able to call out the bullshit of one without having to mention the other in the same breath, for fear of offending one or another tribe.  It also suggests a kind of equivalency between the two that obscures the significant number of differences.

[11B4V]

Antifa's finest

https://mobile.twitter.com/KATUNews/status/907027788946841600/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.foxnews.com%2Fus%2F2017%2F09%2F10%2Fantifa-throws-smoke-and-projectiles-at-police-at-portland-rallies-7-arrested.html

[CountDeMoney]

Would you feel better if they were wearing white polos and khakis with tiki torches?

[Valmy]

If you extend your definition of 'fascists' to include the police I think I can see where they might have deviated a bit from what Jacob said.

[11B4V]

Would you feel better if they were wearing white polos and khakis with tiki torches?

No, but at least comb their hair.

[11B4V]

But I get why they wear masks.

[jimmy olsen]

If you extend your definition of 'fascists' to include the police I think I can see where they might have deviated a bit from what Jacob said.

Now why would they think that? 

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/25/us/charlottesville-protest-police.html?mcubz=0

http://languish.org/forums/index.php/topic,11783.0.html

[Eddie Teach]

Tim's been listening to N.W.A.

[CountDeMoney]

Tim's been listening to N.W.A.

He obviously knows more about cops than you do.

[Eddie Teach]

We don't hear enough stories about your time in the Brown shirts, Seedy.

[CountDeMoney]

You haven't been nightsticked enough for that mouth of yours, punk.

[garbon]

You haven't been nightsticked enough for that mouth of yours, punk.

Gay BDSM dialogue?

[CountDeMoney]

This is why we can't have white things.  Damned lefties, making white supremacists get all violent.

'Kill them': Three men charged in shooting after Richard Spencer speech
By Susan Svrluga and Lori Rozsa October 20 at 8:40 PM
The Amazon Washington Post

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Three men were charged with attempted homicide after they argued with a group of people protesting a white nationalist's speech and fired a shot at them, police said Friday.

About 90 minutes after Richard Spencer's speech Thursday at the University of Florida — which generated so much controversy that the governor declared a state of emergency days before the event — a silver Jeep pulled up to six to eight protesters near a bus stop and confronted them, according to Gainesville Police Department spokesman Sgt. Ben Tobias.

The men, whom police identified as white nationalists, threatened the group, making Nazi salutes and shouting chants about Hitler, police said.

One of the people in the group, who were in their 20s and heading home after protesting, hit the Jeep with a baton. It pulled over.

Tyler Tenbrink, 28, of Richmond, Tex., jumped out with a gun, authorities said. According to the Alachua County sheriff's arrest report, Colton Fears, 28, and William Fears, 30, of Pasadena, Tex., encouraged Tenbrink to shoot, yelling, "I'm going to f—— kill you," "Kill them" and "Shoot them."

Tenbrink fired a single shot that missed the people, police said, and hit a nearby building.

"Once the altercation began, it started ramping up very quickly until the gunshot," Tobias said.

Wesley Durrance, a 2016 graduate of UF, had just said goodbye to his friends — who were sitting at the bus stop with their signs from the protest — when he heard a loud pop. "Clearly a gunshot," he said.

He turned around and saw chaos. "Some people were running, one of my friends was still sitting there, my friend who was shot at was standing there," Durrance said. "Everybody was freaking out, but he was pretty calm, considering. I mean, they had just tried to kill him."

The men then fled in the Jeep, but one of the people who had been targeted got the license plate number and reported it to police. An off-duty sheriff's deputy who had worked at the Spencer event searched for and found the Jeep.

Gainesville police confirmed Friday that the arrests were related to the event.

Tobias said all three admitted to having been involved in the shooting when they were stopped by police on Interstate 75 about 15 miles north of Gainesville. Tenbrink admitted he was the shooter, according to the Alachua County sheriff's arrest report.

Spencer's speech was repeatedly disrupted by people shouting at him, but the protests outside remained largely peaceful, despite tensions between his supporters and more than 2,500 counterprotesters.

"I hesitate to make a comment on an incident that just happened," Spencer said Friday evening. "If it actually happened as it is described in the news, then it is an absolutely terrible incident and it can't be defended. But I think we should all remember that it is a developing story."

He urged supporters to avoid violence.

"There are time when one can rightfully defend oneself, but these kinds of confrontations should be avoided. The eyes of the world are upon us, and we need to behave in the way that is of the highest standards," Spencer said.

Tenbrink told The Washington Post on Thursday that he came from Houston to hear the speech. "I came here to support Spencer because after Charlottesville, the radical left threatened my family and children because I was seen and photographed in Charlottesville," Tenbrink said, referring to the "Unite the Right" rally in August that ended in violence.

"The man's got the brass to say what nobody else will."

Tenbrink said from inside the event venue that all he cares about are the 14 words, a reference to a white-supremacist slogan: "We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children."

"That doesn't mean I hate all black people I see," Tenbrink said.

"And homosexuals, if they want to be homosexual, keep it to yourself. Nobody wants to see that s—," he said.

The Gainesville Sun reported that William Fears had told the paper Thursday that he believed James Fields, the man accused of driving his car into a crowd of people protesting the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, killing one woman and injuring others, wasn't unjustified.

William Fears told The Washington Post in August that he came to Charlottesville equipped for violence — and found it. He threw and took punches.

"It was like a war . . . it was an eerie feeling," Fears said after he had gone home to Texas and his job as a construction worker. "Things are life and death now, and if you're involved in this movement, you have to be willing to die for it now . . ."

"If I'm killed, that's fine," he said. "Maybe I'll be a martyr or something, or remembered."

At least two of the three who were arrested in Gainesville have demonstrated connections to extremist groups, police said.

All three men have attended white supremacist events, according to the Anti-Defamation League, and all three were at the torchlight march and the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville.

Spencer's speech was his first on a university campus since he led a torchlight march through the University of Virginia in August, with followers chanting, "You will not replace us" and "Jews will not replace us." That was the beginning of a weekend of clashes between white nationalists and white supremacists on one side and counterprotesters on the other that turned fatal in Charlottesville the next day.

After that violence, University of Florida officials denied Spencer's request to speak on campus — as did several other public universities — "amid serious concerns for safety."

Spencer, who leads the National Policy Institute, was not invited by the university or a student group. UF leaders have repeatedly rejected his message as hateful. But under threat of a lawsuit, university officials acknowledged Spencer's First Amendment right to speak at a campus venue they rent out, and began planning extensive security.

Gov. Rick Scott (R) declared a state of emergency in the days before the speech. More than 1,000 law-enforcement officers converged on campus, and the public university expects its total costs for security measures to exceed $600,000.

Tenbrink, Colton Fears and William Fears were charged with attempted homicide and were in the Alachua County Jail on Friday. Tenbrink faces additional charges for possession of a firearm by a felon.