this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2024
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Socialism
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(The interview is about whistleblowers and McCarthyism, so this is all a bit tangential.)
If a million people vote for Law A, but someone holds a gun to the representative's head demanding Law B, how exactly has the will of the people been respected? The whole point of democracy is that all authority is derived from the consent of the governed, not from the barrel of a gun. Violence is not the realization of democracy. It is a rejection of it. It cannot be protected by law the way free speech is. But political violence as the sole means to its own end is worse than a crime -- it is a mistake. When a large group of people use violence in this manner, nations call them terrorists, responding with force instead of hearing demands. (See also: outcomes of the Malheur Refuge Standoff.)
Use of direct action must be strategic, and it cannot be the only piece of the strategy.
There are three types of protest: the carrot, the stick, and the ultimatum. The carrot is meant to evangelize and raise awareness for a cause (MLK). The stick is direct intervention, sometimes violent (Malcolm X). The ultimatum is a demonstration of solidarity and conviction, an implicit show of how many people are willing to move from carrot to stick if they aren't heard (the March on Washington).
A successful protest movement needs all three. Leave one out, or overemphasize another, and the movement is worthless.
I also want to reiterate that this goes both ways. A blanket rejection of the legitimacy of disruptive action is every bit as counterproductive as the stance that violence is the only way to enact positive change.
Elected representatives will typically need to denounce any illegal acts to maintain plausible deniability, but that is in service of the "carrot" side of the equation, and shouldn't be taken as a strategic stance against the movement.