https://www.reddit.com/r/TrueAnon/comments/1qpnj18/a_glimpse_into_the_life_of_the_man_who_attacked/ (thread has some sources about his past that lines this timeline up)
What a pathetic loser.
https://www.reddit.com/r/TrueAnon/comments/1qpnj18/a_glimpse_into_the_life_of_the_man_who_attacked/ (thread has some sources about his past that lines this timeline up)
What a pathetic loser.
We’re discussing this in the context that he just made an attack with some unknown substance against the only leftwing politician with any principles at all in the USA. This isn’t some hapless political prisoner from your hypothetical dream world. This is reality where he’s an unhinged racist and fascist who uses violence against women, POC and the left. Self-defense. Her guards should have shot him 3 times in the face when he drew the syringe and lunged towards her.
Okay. One can put down a rabid animal and still pity it for the tragedy it is. Understanding what drove it to harmful behavior and trying to cure and prevent rabies doesn’t mean we don’t put down rabid animals, neither does it make someone counter revolutionary or weak to pity reactionaries driven to psychosis by the material conditions around them. They’re still culpable, and they’re still legitimate targets of self-defensive violence. But they’re also human, and I’d wish for a world where they didn’t have to suffer that way. Shame on me I guess.
Would the fash rehabilitators sing a different tune if he brought the Glock with him instead of the syringe?
No. It would be awful to see all the same. In your hypothetical, a wretched creature was hurt and twisted into a thrashing animal, and lashes out hurting another person. One can rightfully see the necessity for self-defensive violence without being contradictory in wishing it wasn’t necessary and pitying the creature lashing out in pain. I see the likes of Steven Miller, Noem, Bovino, Bannon, and others as far more culpable for creating the stream of propaganda driving already suffering people to violent psychosis. They can hang, whereas the propagandized can be reeducated.
There are tens of thousands of people who have been negatively affected by this person, starting with his two daughters, his two ex-wives, and the thousands of people he endangered while driving drunk, who I feel sorry more for, and after expending my spoons to feel sorry for tens of thousands of people, I do not have any left over to feel sorry for him.
Then I suggest the reeducation/punishment committee be staffed with people who have more spoons? Not trying to be belittling here, but it’s your metaphor. Sneering at your comrades who see a hurt human acting out in a way that hurts others and manage to find pity in the situation isn’t going to help the people who have been hurt either. Executing those who have hurt others might satisfy an urge for revenge, and inarguably it can prevent them from harming more in the future. But reeducation accomplishes the same and allows the offender the opportunity for reconstructive and pro social labor. I’m personally involved in restorative justice initiatives so finding sympathy for and helping offenders, even violent ones, rehabilitate and try to live more pro social lives is just another day for me. Whether someone is driven to their harm by poverty or propaganda, I don’t think either party is as culpable as the capitalist class and propagandists who force others into that condition. Unless you’re eschewing restorative justice as a model, I don’t see how you can coherently hold your position with communist principles more widely.