this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2023
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lennybird

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The vast majority of domestic terrorist, political, hate-crime violence has been committed by the Right. This is not a "both sides" issue.


Let me unpack this further and not mince words:

You see, conservatives have always been responsible for the VAST majority of violence in our nation, from the treasonous confederates fighting for slavery, causing the deaths of hundreds of thousands, not to mention those whom they exploited; then you've got the 4,000+ documented lynchings per NAACP, clinic bombings, and all the hate crimes on Hispanics and Muslims and Sikhs (who look Muslim... not really).

Remember the Oklahoma City bomber that killed a bunch children in a daycare with his attack, Timothy McVeigh? He was a lunatic nut-job who disagreed with law-enforcement and their crackdown on Waco and Ruby Ridge and all those lunatic soverign citizens/religious nut-jobs/"free folk". Ultra right-wing conservative extremists.

Basically, he was the same sort of moron as the Bundy crew terrorists who did an armed takeover of a Federal facility in Oregon while also holding their ground against law-enforcement in Nevada (Watch this Documentary covering these terrorists).

It's places like ~~td~~ red-hat-snowflake-zone that instigate domestic terrorism. And fun fact: For the past 16+ years, radical right-wing conservative groups have been a larger threat per the FBI than any other domestic group. Moreover, radical right-wingers have killed far more people in the U.S. since Trump's election than any foreigner or Muslim.

And whaddyaknow, Stephen Paddock, the Las Vegas shooter was both a gun nut and of the exact same breed as Bundy and McVeigh:

Another woman recalled overhearing a man that looked like Paddock talking to another man at a restaurant in las Vegas days before the massacre. She told police that Paddock was ranting about two separate events that took place in the 1990s. One was the standoff at Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in 1992, where a right-wing activist resisting federal weapons charges moved with his family to a remote cabin, leading to an 11-day armed standoff with authorities. The other was the 51-day standoff in Waco, Texas, between a Christian cult and police, which led to the deaths of more than 80 people, including 22 children.

and

One man told the FBI and police that less than one month before the massacre, Paddock responded to his online ad selling schematics which showed how to transform your semi-automatic rifle to make it fire like an automatic weapon. “Somebody has to wake up the American public and get them to arm themselves,” the man recalled Paddock saying during their meeting outside a Las Vegas sporting goods store. “Sometimes sacrifices have to be made.”

(Very odd, also, how Vegas police tried to keep these documents locked up.)

These kind of people are amped up by the rhetoric from Trump. When Trump tells them to commit violence at his rallies (Source 1 Source 2), eventually, someone will do it. Not long ago, we had a "Florida Man who Threatened to Kill Democrats and 'Weak Republicans' Over Kavanaugh Nomination", saying:

“I can’t do this by myself, I need more conservatives going into liberal homes at night killing them in their sleep,” Patrick said.

From Snopes:

Over the past decade, extremists of every stripe have killed 372 Americans. 74 percent of those killings were committed by right wing extremists. Only 2 percent of those deaths were at the hands of left wing extremists. Mayo told us:

"I don’t want to give moral equivalence to the two sides because one side is fighting against white supremacy. On the Antifa side, they’ve never murdered anyone but there have been many murders done by white supremacists, so we have to be concerned about that movement."*

Another report released in 2019 (PDF Warning), analyzing 2018 extremist attacks noted the following:

2018 was a particularly active year for right-wing extremist murders: Every single extremist killing - from Pittsburgh to Parkland - had a link to right-wing extremism

In 2018, domestic extremists killed at least 50 people in the U.S., a sharp increase from the 37 extremist-related murders documented in 2017, though still lower than the totals for 2015 (70) and 2016 (72). The 50 deaths make 2018 the fourth-deadliest year on record for domestic extremist-related killings since 1970.

Of these killings, 78% were perpetrated by white-supremacists, 16% by anti-government extremists, 4% by "incel" extremists, and 2% by domestic Islamist extremists

Literally all right-wing in nature (Yes, the 2% Islamic extremism is also right-wing).

When the right-wing psycho emboldened by Trump supporters chanting with Lowes tiki-torches, "jews will not replace us" ran over peaceful protesters, killing one, what did Trump do? Muddy the waters and say it was "both sides." No.

Of course, you have the MAGABomber and the Pittsburgh lunatic as just more examples of right-wing extremism recently, among countless others I cannot keep up with.

There are no US deaths associated with any action that could be accurately described as, "Anti-Fascist."*

That, however, doesn't stop right-wing extremists from posing as Antifa to make them seem more violent than they really are and to rally support to their own cause. Here's another example.

Conservatives love to pretend that those tree-huggin' bleedin'-heart peace-lovin' anti-gun hippies are somehow deranged murderers!! Whoops. Are they snowflakes, or they are they literally Hitler...? So when they point to cases of liberal violence, sometimes they're right, but as always they play the game of false-equivalence (I literally had two separate Trump supporters equating leftists protesting by blocking highways and boycotting restaurants supportive of Trump to the murders of the right). If they want to play the game of who can list the most tragedies, the statistics outright prove I'll win in showing conservatives are more violent in America.

Meanwhile, you had 45% of Americans somehow approving President Trump, 23% of Republicans who wouldn't prosecute Trump if he shot James Comey in cold blood (page 47)—then you have 43% of Republicans as of 2015 who are still so incredibly ignorant that they believe Obama is a Muslim, 51% of Republicans as of 2017 who still think Obama is Kenyan-born. If you cannot connect the dots between the blatant ignorance and hatred revealed by these studies, and the increased tick in violence at this point today—then you're frankly not paying attention.

When it comes down to it, that really is the problem: people aren't paying attention. People aren't calling out ignorance when they see it, and letting it slide and being "polite" and holding your tongue leaves these people into delusions that they have it all figured out. Meanwhile Fox News, Right-Wing Radio, the Bannon/Jones-types of the internet and so forth feed this uninformed audience what they want to hear; they're gullible and easily manipulated into believing whatever is needed in the moment for political expediency. Why do these talking-heads manipulate your crazy Uncle, your conspiracy-loving teenage neighbor, your dad on long trips? Like most corrupt things, it's about money & power. They're profiting off ignorance and fear. It's a scary tragic reality.

This all should all lead to a big question: Why does the Conservative Ideology inherently attract or create more violence? We should all be wondering that, but some of my thoughts on this can be read here.

UPDATE: * Note: While the facts are still be uncovered, a self-proclaimed Anti-Fascist shot a right-wing extremist in Portland. Assuming it wasn't self-defense as the man claimed in his interview before he was killed by police, the "politically-motivated murder count" is:

Antifa: 1

Right-wing Fascists: Hundreds. (thousands if you count right-wing foreign extremists or want to go back in our history).

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[–] Deftdrummer -2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So extremely fucking ignorant.

[–] lennybird 1 points 1 year ago

Oh really. How so?