wanted to pardon Pelosi's attacker. — Christoffer

Is that so? I didn’t know that.

Meanwhile, in another part of the forest at about the same time: 3 kids wounded including the shooter who died, in just another High School shooting. Nothing to talk about here, not newsworthy at all - none of them had 1m followers or a history of ranting, so none of us cares a damn.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/shooting-reported-colorado-high-school-2-kids-transported/story?id=125452526

Is that so? I didn’t know that. — Wayfarer

"Pardon" was the wrong word, rather wanted a patriot to bail him out. Then rejecting that the right wing rhetoric had anything to do with pushing acts like this.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/paul-pelosi-charlie-kirk-bail-conspiracies-b2214680.html

On top of that he also called Kyle Rittenhouse “a hero to millions", so...

But now we live in a time when we're actively supplying weapons to Israel who is committing a genocide.

Yet the media harps on about the shame of what was a talking head and memorializing it. — Moliere

Yes. I don't know much about Kirk, but many unambiguously good people get killed around the world daily, particularly children, sometimes with the complicity of our government's, and the media often expects us not only to not feel bad about that but to support it. One can be against political assassinations while still bemoaning the fact that our media environment is composed merely of propaganda, any relationship of which to morality is purely incidental.

Also, I've looked through the thread I haven't found much in the way of ethical arguments one way or the other. The fact that it was a murder is irrelevant in the wider scope of things. E.g. for a Jewish person (or anyone) to have murdered Nazis in 1930s Germany would have been perfectly justified given the context. As I said before, I don't know Charlie Kirk enough to have any strong opinion of him, but I think part of @Moliere's point is to problematize the context and that's not in itself illegitimate, particularly given so much unjustifiable killing is legalized (e.g. the Gaza sniper example Moliere gave earlier).

EDIT: I am not saying America is Nazi Germany etc etc, only that it being a murder is not the end of the argument but the beginning.

(Last point: I'm not trying to provoke anyone here or disrespect Charlie Kirk's family etc. Charlie Kirk is more or less just a name to me. I'm trying to find a route to something rather coldly philosophical.)

I'm trying to find a route to something rather coldly philosophical.) — Baden

Are you asking when it's appropriate to add violence to your political activism?

Are you asking when it's appropriate to add violence to your political activism? — frank

Was operation Valkyrie political activism?

This is the question, when is it justified? What is justified? Is it ever justified? As a philosophical question, it is valid one as there's been many times in history it was very valid.

I think the more interesting discussion in terms of this specific assassination is why we have a rise of political violence. What is causing it? Of course we all know why; the rising polarization and extreme rhetoric driving radicalization.

So the follow-up question becomes, how do we stop this polarization and extreme rhetoric driving radicalization?

The solutions require an examination of what we allow in society, while still remaining free. This is the global problem for free societies to tackle in the coming years, because if they don't, they will become so polarized that political violence becomes a common practice. A form of room temperature war rather than a cold or hot one.

The assassination of political figures becomes retroactively justified and therefore simply justified depending on how history works out. The assassination of a Nazi functionary in 1934 by a Jewish sniper would likely have almost universally been condemned at the time. Now, I, and I suspect most of us, would consider the assassin a hero. This is just to say that what is obvious without problematizing a context or considering a possible future trajectory is not so obvious when you do so. I take @Moliere to be coming from that angle. The fact that this is about a real person who has really just been killed is unfortunate because it becomes understandably almost impossible to divorce oneself from the immediate tragedy of those who cared for that person. Maybe it's just all in bad taste to talk about it now. But I don't think @Moliere's thought process is completely wrong.

Another context we ought to problematize is context itself. Folks are very often going to react immediately based on political corner, no? When I first heard about Charlie Kirk, my immediate reaction was cold indifference, partly based of my limited knowledge that he was on the far right. But put me in a different context, e.g. in front of his family and, not being made of stone, I would have a very different attitude. Then, on here, I can take a purely intellectual stance. Same with Gaza, many on the right especially, dismiss, by default, the suffering there, but transport them next to a pile of rubble with Palestinian children suffocating beneath it, and it would most likely be a very different story. Contexts drive us and mislead us about the issues and about ourselves (to an extent deciding for us what is "obvious").

The assassination of a Nazi functionary in 1934 by a Jewish sniper would likely have almost universally been condemned at the time. Now, I, and I suspect most of us, would consider the assassin a hero. — Baden

And this is a problem with any discussion about politics and war. It demands a great deal of understanding of society to be able to say that a current event is justified or not. It requires both an understanding of history and psychology as well as philosophy.

To be able to understand current events without being wrapped up in biases and fallacies produced by the herd of people pushing and pulling on culture, or lesser intelligent people influencing media and social media into extreme bubbles, is extremely hard.

The fact that this is about a real person who has really just been killed is unfortunate because it becomes understandably almost impossible to divorce oneself from the immediate tragedy of those who cared for that person. Maybe it's just all in bad taste to talk about it now. — Baden

I disagree to some degree. I think it's important to discuss it because a person like Kirk, so involved in spreading the kind of hate he did, will easily become a martyr for that hate, whitewashed through the shallow charade of people ignoring what he stood for in order to score political points. I also think that this forum is exactly the place to discuss something like this, because here we discuss the philosophical ramifications of what is going on in the world... rather than what the rest of the internet is doing at the moment surrounding this event. And because of this, I think that a truly civil discussion like this is extremely important to have surrounding something like an assassination of a public figure of this importance to the current political climate.

I also think that this forum is exactly the place to discuss something like this, because here we discuss the philosophical ramifications of what is going on in the world... rather than what the rest of the internet is doing at the moment surrounding this event. And because of this, I think that a truly civil discussion like this is extremely important to have surrounding something like an assassination of a public figure of this importance to the current political climate. — Christoffer

Fair point. And I did get involved, so, performatively, I agree.

Precisely. Not good, or bad, or indifferent -- it's just the weather report.

And Gaza's weather reports are passed over.

The fact that this is about a real person who has really just been killed is unfortunate because it becomes understandably almost impossible to divorce oneself from the immediate tragedy of those who cared for that person. Maybe it's just all in bad taste to talk about it now. — Baden

Maybe so-- but then there are many people celebrating in bad taste in addition to condemning in bad taste.

There's a sense in which I want to say it's screamingly obvious that killing is wrong. And so we can condemn political assassination and genocide equally. But there's also a sense in which this viewpoint is incredibly naive -- not that the person who espouses such and such is so (a person can be a principled pacifist, for instance), but that it quite literally ignores a huge part of how decisions are made in our political world.

So the question is -- if killing is screamingly obvious, how do we get to a justification of the ": But..." one utilizes in justifying killing.

Malcolm X is a good example of a person who used political violence and its threat as a tool for liberation. A Jewish sniper killing a Nazi is similar. But, as you noted, these are in retrospect -- they only become heroes in the stories we tell of them after.

The reality in the moment is that we live with killing without thinking about killing because "that's just the way things are": Why argue that the moon shouldn't spin around the Earth?

Why argue that we must support Israel for our national interests in the Middle East? These are just the way of things.

But, surely, insofar that we can answer the question philosophically at all, we'd have to have some consistent basis for when that isn't just "Because I gave myself permission this one time" -- which is what the appeal to law looks like to me, except with a few extra steps "Because we talked about it and said this was when it's OK"


****

I suppose I see these questions are a bit more activated by current events, but yes I'm hoping to touch a philosophical ground somewhere. In a lot of ways this mirrors my argument for moral anti-realism: In the world we happen to inhabit even murder is justifiable, under the right conditions. Were the world to have morality as a part of it it seems to me that we'd live in a world where we have finally found ways to negotiate our differences without the tools of murder.

But we don't live in that world, and so such ideals seem to float above in some transcendental world away from us.

So how do we deal with the world we find ourselves in, imperfect and callous as it is?

But put me in a different context, e.g. in front of his family and, not being made of stone, I would have a very different attitude. Then, on here, I can take a purely intellectual stance. Same with Gaza, many on the right especially dismiss, by default, the suffering there, but transport them next to a pile of rubble with Palestinian children suffocating beneath it, and it would most likely be a very different story. Contexts drive us and mislead us about the issues and about ourselves. — Baden

Of course... but we also need to remember that when a person becomes an influential figure in politics, especially with extreme views that indirectly hurt people in society. What is the morality around that context surrounding an event like this? Does the suffering of the family take away from the suffering caused by his influence? Context change depending on perspective, but I think it's also important to remember that when it comes to political violence, it's no longer just about the act itself, but where it came from, what it leads to, and what it means to the political situation of the world.

Those topics are really what we're talking about, not really him as a human being, not really dismissing the suffering of the family and relatives. The killing of a human being is a tragedy... but the killing of him as a representation of his political views and hateful viewpoints, is another form of act and another form of context that has philosophical and historical proportions worth discussing.

The killing of a human being is a tragedy... but the killing of him as a representation of his political views and hateful viewpoints, is another form of act and another form of context that has philosophical and historical proportions worth discussing. — Christoffer

That's more or less my point. Where do we get consistency?

So how do we deal with the world we find ourselves in, imperfect and callous as it is? — Moliere

By finding an apparently impossible consistency across contexts.

The assassination of political figures becomes retroactively justified and therefore simply justified depending on how history works out. — Baden

My view, for what it's worth, is that murder is never justifiable. Violence takes place in an amoral realm in which survival is the goal on both sides. The will to survive can't be justified and requires no excuse.

Sometime before we descend into bloody apehood, we have a chance to see if there is some better way to do things, or if we're going to need violence, can we at least coordinate it so that it's not doing more harm than good?

But thank you for not calling me a f***wit for expressing that. We had a mod who would have made any sane discussion of the topic impossible.

I guess you're a deontologist on this, which is fair enough. And I don't even know if I can agree with myself on the topic, so I'm not in the strongest position to argue.

I guess you're a deontologist on this — Baden

I'm a moral nihilist.

And I don't even know if I can agree with myself on the topic, — Baden

:grin:

I'm a moral nihilist. — frank

Wasn't expecting that...

Anyway, having researched Charlie Kirk, it appears many of his views (anti-semitic statements, racism, homophobia etc) are not all that far off from the bigotry level of early era Nazi party rabble rousers. Regardless, I don't condone the assassination.

My view, for what it's worth, is that murder is never justifiable. Violence takes place in an amoral realm in which survival is the goal on both sides. The will to survive can't be justified and requires no excuse.

Sometime before we descend into bloody apehood, we have a chance to see if there is some better way to do things, or if we're going to need violence, can we at least coordinate it so that it's not doing more harm than good? — frank

How does that rhyme with...

I'm a moral nihilist. — frank

Seems like you are arguing through a Kantian perspective, which is the opposite of a nihilist.

I would say that history shows lots of examples of situations which would have justified political violence. Events that would have saved a lot of good people. It's the prime example of how naive the Kantian perspective can sometimes be.

No one would deny that killing most of the upper elite of the Nazi party would have saved a lot of people, even if it happened before wartimes.

I think the more interesting question isn't if an obvious bad person who will obviously kill or cause deaths directly in the future deserves to be put out to save them, but rather what happens when someone is indirectly responsible for deaths and suffering.

I think there's very little talk about how hateful rhetoric slowly shifts society into a place where that hate becomes action onto those this hate was aimed at. Nazi Germany is always talked about in the context of what eventually happened, but society eroded its views on jews long before that and shifted society into a place where the suffering for jews became more commonplace.

No one really address the fact that when an influential elite spread hate speech that shift society, it actually hurts people down the line.

And if we are morally arguing that political violence to prevent innocent people from getting hurt, killed or suffer, is justified, then why do we not accept that for when hate speech rhetoric leads to such suffering and death? Is it because people are unable to logically connect hateful speech to people becoming radicalized under such speech, to those radicalized people actually carrying out that hate in action against the people that hate was aimed at?

Case point... Hitler never killed any jews himself, he never killed. Why do we consider him responsible? Because he orchestrated the thing, he pushed for it, he argued for it, he spread the hate, he influenced the nation.

So if the hate speech influence that leads to violence in society becomes the foundation for viewing an assassination of that influential person as morally good in order to stop that societal violence and decline into violence against a certain group of people; what does that mean? What context does such political violence against an influential person become valid?

What did he say about black people or "predominately black neighborhoods?" — Outlander

Yeah, 's analogy makes no sense. I guess when you're justifying murder you have to make up analogies that make no sense.

What did he say about black people or "predominately black neighborhoods?" Again, I never heard of the guy until just yesterday, so. Just curious as to what information or knowledge you have that makes that analogy valid in your mind. — Outlander

His Wiki page contains some of the racist, anti-semitic, and Islamaphobic statements he's made. Of course, he was (apparently) a more vocal, rather than a more extreme, version of a significant minority of Americans and his killing will likely radicalise these people further.

I'm a moral nihilist. — frank

Not necessarily at odds with deontology -- meta-ethical nihilist, deontological normativist is fairly close to how I think about morality in the ideal.

With the caveat being that if everyone actually does follow such and such a principle then it seems hard to deny that the moral commitments have a certain kind of truth to them -- but the world we live in doesn't really look like that.


You could still deny deontology, of course -- but then I'd want to know how :

My view, for what it's worth, is that murder is never justifiable. Violence takes place in an amoral realm in which survival is the goal on both sides. The will to survive can't be justified and requires no excuse. — frank

Parses political violence. "In self defense only"? In which case the American Revolution is immoral rather than amoral because it wasn't for survival but to claim a nation?

"In self defense only"? — Moliere

We're a violent species. Political violence is one of the many forms of jungle ape we manifest. Thus, there is no philosophy of political violence. Unless you know of one you'd like to flesh out?

I suppose what we could say is that there are situations in which ethical commitments apply, and situations in which they do not apply. When is what will be up for debate but given the prevalence of one of the basic precepts that is shared across many cultures -- like the prohibition against killing (sometimes) -- opens what we may term an amoral dialogue that is still normative.

It'd be insane to just say something like "Because he gave himself permission" (or, from early reports, is bullet casings had a video game meme -- so it looks like an inter-fascist dispute on its face, with a cynicism so deep that the killing was dressed up as a joke. Killing 31 year olds for fun, more or less)

But to take a stab at some rough amoral criteria that seems better than "just because it sounded like a good time": it seems there needs to be some kind of interest that is deemed important enough to utilize the harshest tool, and that all other options have been previously attempted to no amend.

There also seems to me to be a sense in which how much power one holds is relevant -- the case of the school shooter @unenlightened is obviously evil because there was even less of a reason: Truly senseless.

I suppose that is what I'm getting after, yes. We swim in violence on a daily basis. I want to make sense of what seems entirely senseless to me. Now, I see the world as absurd so it really could just terminate there -- in a kind of aporia. We should also be skeptical of any philosophy of violence that's more than a philosophy, i.e. it should not -- from a meta-philosophical perspective -- be a treatise advocating for violence but instead is seeking how it is we come to make these decisions.

For me to understand violence is a means of understanding how to negotiate towards non-violence.

Also I sometimes wonder if I'm just entirely barmy and it's really just OK that we kill and I should just accept that I'm the mad one. Which is when I start to feel rather numb.

For me to understand violence is a means of understanding how to negotiate towards non-violence. — Moliere

That stops working when you are dealing with people who are violently opposed to violence.

You and I, you have to understand, are the violent extremist left wing conspiracy that is directly promoting and funding this wave of violence sweeping the country; there is no talking to us, we have to be stopped by any means necessary. When you talk about non-violence you sound exactly like Putin.

To put it another way, there is a loss of faith, and we can only negotiate in good faith. We cannot negotiate as or with the faithless; there is no basis for communication, let alone negotiation. One does not try and negotiate with a dog, one is satisfied with obedience.

Fair.

I suppose the question then is, given this realization, how do we make the dog obey? Is a fascist the equivalent of a feral dog which has no other solution but to put it out of its misery? And if so, does it matter if the person who accomplishes the task is motivated wrongly if the dog is taken care of?

There's also something scary about this analogy: for them we are cockroaches, and to us they are dogs. In some ways perhaps just to retain a shred of humanity in a bad situation (since you don't just default to eliminating dogs, but do so with cockroaches).

That might be a better way to approach the question: Rather than looking at it like a justificatory process whereby we rationally decide when something which is absurd is permissible or not we can first accept that the act is evil.

But given the circumstances, at least from my perspective, violence becomes a necessary evil: that which must be done even if we know in the ideal it's not what we should want to do. In the case of fascists they only feign irony long enough to speak a message of hate. The hate and disgust of another group is the point. They advocate for murder with their mouths to incite the passions of people to commit murder for its own sake. Here I'm referring to 4Chan and related sights which actively post fascist memes that call for the death of people, spouts white-supremacist talking points, and so on.

So the question becomes: How do I retain my humanity in the face of necessary evil forced upon me? Is it even possible?

Here I want to clarify that I'm not contemplating being a random assassin as much as looking at the genocide in Gaza as a set of senseless murders that I'm already guilty for. Malcolm X was an example meant to demonstrate a sort of principled stance on political violence.

But these aren't his circumstances so the need to make sense of my situation remains.

Though perhaps it's best to see it as not exactly a rational process whereby I deduce the correct actions in accord with maxims. It's a situation which falls outside of deontological methods which tend to be absolute, and even if relativized they are absolutely relativized (except condition 1 being fulfilled, thou shalt..."

And perhaps I just need to lament the state of the world sometimes and certain events trigger that need in me, and there is nothing more here than that lament: a useless reflection we can forget when we get back to work.

I suppose the question then is, given this realization, how do we make the dog obey? Is a fascist the equivalent of a feral dog which has no other solution but to put it out of its misery? — Moliere

They are not the dogs, we are, in their eyes. It is a symmetrical understanding of each that the other is the dog.

The reason for this is economic. During the 20th Century, wealth was produced by mass production and sustained by mass consumption. This required a mass of 'wage slaves' that also functioned as consumers. But the advent of robots and 3d printing eliminates the need for mass production and consumption as everything can be made 'bespoke'. The masses are surplus to requirements, and are therefore being turned against each other. It becomes a dog eat dog world.

Neither ballot nor bullet will save us because we are the dogs of war fighting amongst ourselves. "Oh ye of little faith!"

The population will crash to the point where everyone becomes glad to see another human, of any kind, that is not a corpse. Love triumphs in the long run.

They are not the dogs, we are, in their eyes. It is a symmetrical understanding of each that the other is the dog. — unenlightened

I sort of wonder on that one, honestly. Even if I lick the boot I sort of feel like they'll laugh and dispose of me.

If only I could be a dog -- that'd be a worker-boss relationship.

Here we're talking about who they see as degenerates that need to be eliminated: people that associate with labor, have non-heterosexual desire, are of a different race, speak out of line or have spoken out of line, or is simply annoying.

I'm not the first in line but I am wondering if I'm even a dog to a fascist.

The reason for this is economic. During the 20th Century, wealth was produced by mass production and sustained by mass consumption. This required a mass of 'wage slaves' that also functioned as consumers. But the advent of robots and 3d printing eliminates the need for mass production and consumption as everything can be made 'bespoke'. The masses are surplus to requirements, and are therefore being turned against each other. It becomes a dog eat dog world.

This makes sense for a run-of-the-mill capitalist -- it's why the proliferation of bullshit jobs which have no future is larger than stable employment. There is still a need for manufacturing and automation but it's guided by the capitalist hand which pits us one against one another -- a violence.

Neither ballot nor bullet will save us because we are the dogs of war fighting amongst ourselves. "Oh ye of little faith!"

Often times I believe that. Especially for anyone I associate with now -- having been out of the game for some time I pretty much only have "regular" associates which makes for a much more peaceful work environment.

But then this sidesteps the question -- we can insist on pacifism, but it doesn't help me deal with the violence thrust upon me. In a way I want to understand this violence better in order to deal with it as a person who wants life to be seen as sacred, in the end.

The population will crash to the point where everyone becomes glad to see another human, of any kind, that is not a corpse. Love triumphs in the long run.

But will they just start up the same old story again?

I suppose I like to long for something a bit better than that.

A Slate columnist wrote a sensible take on X regarding the assassination:

I see no point in searching for left/right valence in Tyler Robinson. He fits the school shooter archetype: young, disaffected, ideologically amorphous, extremely online and raised in gun culture. The theater of such violence is just expanding to include political assassination.