I’m not arguing that at all. I don’t think the conflict was avoidable, given Hitler’s ambitions. But Chamberlain didn’t know the scale and scope of what Hitler had planned, and coming off the heels of WWI, I can’t blame him for trying to avert another war.

I agree with your first point - there is no eradicating it completely through any means. But the idea that we can face down this threat in our own country through violence as the primary weapon is terrifying, and not because I think they would win. They would lose, eventually, but they would inflict a lot of carnage…

I’m not defending them, and don’t pretend like I am. I’m not on board with your myopic, black and white vision of the world and how you deal with entrenched hatred and racism.

I’m with you to a certain extent, but there’s no way to fight an idea with violence. You have to fight it with other ideas, for years, often. Richard Spencer’s ideology isn’t defeated and it won’t be even if he gets hit in the face every day for the rest of his life (though that would be some meager justice).

I’m all for giving feedback to networks to NOT GIVE THIS RACIST, ABUSIVE FUCK AIRTIME.

Again, we’re pretending like a goal has been achieved? Like he’s going to be come a shut-in now and relinquish his sash and crown as the belle of the alt-right ball? Since when is a scared animal not a dangerous animal?

No, it’s not useless. Again, I draw on the civil rights example because it worked so well. Through years of nonviolent resistance, rhetoric, and politicking, civil rights activists were able to fundamentally change the way the nation regarded them. It’s not that racism was wiped away, or that no minority ever…

And we all know WWII eradicated Nazi ideology, right? Don’t have to worry about that anym... wait...

We are two days out from him getting punched. What do you think that does to him in the long term? Makes him retreat from society? (One can only hope!) Or does it make him and his... let’s just call them low-emotional-quotient... followers more ready to meet anticipated violence with violence?

This is their exact same ideology with different words swapped in. That concerns me.

I’m all for not tolerating them. Punching them in the face does nothing but make us on the left feel good momentarily about our remarkably shitty political climate; it does nothing to advance the larger goal of a more equitable, just society.

And you go ask GW Bush how his war on an entire ideology went. Did we win those hearts and minds yet?

Thank you for that thoughtful reply. I agree with you about the use of violence. I don’t know what the tipping point is either, but I do know you can’t beat an ideology with violence. It takes sustained discourse, education, exposure to other kinds of people, and even then it may not be enough. But that doesn’t mean…

And we all know Nazism was eradicated from the face of the earth, never to rear its ugly head again, right? All those books Hitler burned, those ideas were just erased from history, right?

I’d have a hell of a lot better chance at convincing them than punching them in the face would. But it wouldn’t be fast or easy or get a bunch of retweets so it wouldn’t be as good as punching. It wouldn’t make me feel victorious for a moment, it wouldn’t feed my sense of superiority, so it wouldn’t be worth doing,…

As I have said so many times in this thread, you cannot beat these guys at their own game. They will burn the world to the ground in pursuit of their goals. I cannot, for the life of me, figure out why people seem to think one punch has dealt a fatal blow to this ideology. Or that more punches (or shots) would.…

Thank you! Something useful!

Right there with you.

You have a very myopic view of history and how peace is built and sustained, and how progress on any issue is made.

People do care what he thinks. Some very unstable people believe the white race must assume its rightful place as ruler of the world and other races must be brought to heel. So yeah, I worry about what those people think and how they react to shit like this.