Ask Lemmy

I took a class on nonviolent protest in college. Covered the lives and work of ghandi, MLKJ, thoreau. Very enlightening.

If two parties are at odds with one another, and one on them is willing to use violence and the other isn't, the violent party wins.

Non violence works when people care about what you're going through. If the right people know and care they'll come in and do violence for you to make it stop. Or at least verifiably threaten violence. But violence is happening whether you did it or not.

Nazis don't give a shit about you, they're eager for violence. They want to exterminate entire classes of people. Non violence does not work on Nazis, we've already seen this play out once before.

Punched a Nazi in the jaw at a party once. He left and everyone was happier once he did. Fuck that Nazi and his sore Nazi jaw.

I don't think a lot of Lemmy users are out in the world doing much punching.

Make the world a better place

Punch a nazi in the face

I live in Germany. No punches are needed here, just call the cops and BAM off to jail with the idiot.

The main argument is that the means dictates the ends, so if we want a non violent (and non opressing) society, punching people won’t help.

And this failed logic is exactly why we are where we at right now, on the brink of the Fourth Reich rising across the US and Europe.

Because tolerant people have forgotten the most important thing about a tolerant society.

That it must be rigorously and viciously defended from those who seek to exploit the social contract to elevate their attacks on it, and it requires far more than words and wind to achieve that... again, as evidence of where we are now as a society. Because their ultimate goal is to undo the society we love, and replace it with oppression, fear, and hatred.

I became a leftist, because I got enough of the liberal "they go low, we go high" mantra. You never turn the other cheeck to a person, who will proceed to punch it again. In fact, if they once failed to do better in such cases, they're just want to abuse your fair game.

Non-violence is a nice ideal, but just that. There's only so much protests can do, if nazi germany had been met with non-violence, imagine what would have happened. Conversely, imagine how many lives would have been saved if Hitler had been stopped before becoming it's leader. It's the same thing with US politics, Trump is basically a neo nazi. This is undeniable if you read project 2025. The US is drifting further and further right, and that means closer and closer to becoming a new nazi germany. And besides all that, if someone is advocating for killing me, then I'm going to want them gone.

I'm not a naturally violent person and thankfully haven't found myself in a position where I've needed to defend myself or others from neo-nazis. But I'm sure I would if it came to it. Neo-nazis are few and far between in my country, but if I seen one get a kicking I wouldn't be standing in to help them.

I'm with you. Many of "them" want to get violent and are looking for a reason to do so. By throwing a punch, it provides justification for their violent actions. So many folks here indicate that you won't change somebody unless you fight them, but I've read and heard plenty of evidence to the contrary. One quick source is How One Man Convinced 200 Ku Klux Klan Members To Give Up Their Robes. I also heard an interview with a woman who grew up in a cult and how she learned how to "deprogram" people.

I like to think of it a lot like fishing. Once you get a fish on the hook, you can't just pull hard and bring 'em in. You need to set the hook and then reel them in slowly.

Spent enough time in the punk scene to know some people are very serious about it.

Tolerance ends with intolerance. Being nice and civil leads to things like the storming of the US Capital. If US Republicans, for example, felt no resistance then they would organize a crusade into Springfield Ohio.

It is because we live in a world of controversy and civil unrest that racists cannot simply commit massacres and lynchings like in the old days.

We have to show fangs, not bellies, to aggressive animals.

The anarchists cookbook is 99% misinformation, and outdated on top.

Anarchism isn't non-violent. To assume anti-oppression and pacifism are one and the same is to make the same mistake Engels makes in On Authority.

Authority is violent, but violence is not authority.

Edit: on this topic I'd recommend Anark's video on Power, where he explains that anarchism seeks to create a horizontal power structure. It is not the absence of power structures, it displaces oppressive power structures with egalitarian ones.

(transcribed from a series of tweets) - @iamragesparkle

I was at a shitty crustpunk bar once getting an after-work beer. One of those shitholes where the bartenders clearly hate you. So the bartender and I were ignoring one another when someone sits next to me and he immediately says, "no. get out."

And the dude next to me says, "hey i'm not doing anything, i'm a paying customer." and the bartender reaches under the counter for a bat or something and says, "out. now." and the dude leaves, kind of yelling. And he was dressed in a punk uniform, I noticed

Anyway, I asked what that was about and the bartender was like, "you didn't see his vest but it was all nazi shit. Iron crosses and stuff. You get to recognize them."

And i was like, ohok and he continues.

"you have to nip it in the bud immediately. These guys come in and it's always a nice, polite one. And you serve them because you don't want to cause a scene. And then they become a regular and after awhile they bring a friend. And that dude is cool too.

And then THEY bring friends and the friends bring friends and they stop being cool and then you realize, oh shit, this is a Nazi bar now. And it's too late because they're entrenched and if you try to kick them out, they cause a PROBLEM. So you have to shut them down.

And i was like, 'oh damn.' and he said "yeah, you have to ignore their reasonable arguments because their end goal is to be terrible, awful people."

And then he went back to ignoring me. But I haven't forgotten that at all.

The biggest advocates for non-violence are white cis heterosexual men. It is the failure to recognize the multifaceted nature of violence itself. Punching a Nazi can mean that other Nazis stop looking up to them, and they stop being able to effectively organize.

You should be selective and strategic with who you punch. Typically you will want to go for leadership, or the guy who offers a connection between two groups that you consider a risk.

That being said, you should also consider that you probably aren't going to have as much success punching a Nazi on their terms. A lot of them are into their gym and guns so it tends to be to your advantage to catch them alone when you are in a group. Sometimes the opportunity will come after one of their demonstrations when they are walking to their car. Other times, it can be useful to find where they live and work.

Punching Nazis isn't an everyday thing but its unrealistic to claim it isn't sometimes necessary. It works very effectively as part of a bigger picture. Alongside it, you can put stickers on their doors in the middle of the night. If the circumstances arise, you can do silly stuff like convincing one that another fascist is sleeping with his equally shitty wife.

Hey, you guys are going Nazi punching? Can I join?

Fascists don't respond to logic or reasoning, they know only violence so you should speak to them in a language they understand

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00131857.2018.1519772

Violence in a vacuum? Deplorable. Violence against a person preaching or encouraging violence? Questionable. Violence against a known fascist? Absolutely acceptable.

Fascists hide in the grey areas of free speech and often make arguments, much like this post OP, that twist ethics to support their rhetoric.

https://www.npr.org/2017/08/19/544641070/explaining-again-thenazis-true-evil

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functionalism%E2%80%93intentionalism_debate

You may want to investigate the original author of the anarchist cookbook William Powell. He later wanted to remove the book from publication.

https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Powell-American-writer

Also please do not follow any of the recipes, especially the match head bomb as they're all a great way to lose fingers

So in conclusion, considering your original points sound similar to the historical defense of fascists, and that book looks to carry the language of fascists.

How serious is the author of that book about not getting punched?

I'm surprised no one seems to have mentioned the Paradox of Tolerance. Essentially if you tolerate intolerance, the intolerants will eventually seize power and make an intolerant society, the only way a society can become truly tolerant is by being intolerant towards intolerance.

It's paradoxical, but makes absolute sense. If you allow Nazis to spread their ideology eventually there will be enough Nazis to be able to take the power by force, and when they do they'll setback all of the tolerance that was advanced. The only way to prevent it is by cutting the evil at the root and prevent Nazis from spreading their ideology.

Personally I believe that punching a person who hasn't tried to attack me or anyone is wrong. But the moment someone openly preaches that someone else must be exterminated they're inciting violence which can encourage others to act on it, to me, morally speaking, attacking that person is as much self defense as if they were commiting the act themselves.

Would I personally punch a person because they're spewing hate? Probably not, I would probably try to talk to them and understand their point of view and try to convince them otherwise, since I believe that punching them would make the person close himself to any reasoning from outside of his group, which would make him more Nazi than before. But I also don't think it's morally wrong to do so, it's just not the optimal way of dealing with it.

I am serious enough that I have punched nazis before and look forward to a time when I can punch nazis again.

Violence is necessary for a functioning society to address those that reject the social contract that are not amenable to rationale.

Some people are more dangerous alive than the disruption their death would have caused.

I appreciate and understand that you are a strict pacifist, and that you feel it is a worthwhile life to follow, and I agree with you.

The problem is, in order for most of the populace to be pacifists, there still needs to be agents of violence to remove the disruptors who wish to co-opt or destroy our society that are not amenable to words.

Your ideology cannot exist in the real word as it will be consumed by other ideologies that do not eschew violence.

They want my wife and children dead. If they are near my family, they pose an existential threat. I will leave saving the proverbial souls of neo Nazis to others. I am interested in establishing that my family is off limits and dangerous for them to so much as look at.

Would I throw a punch at a confirmed Nazi? Without hesitation.

Some people learn to shed the racism from their heart and become better people. Some will only get so far as keeping quiet because they are afraid. There will always be severely racist people. It is just as important that they feel unequivocally unwelcome as it is to change those who will change.

just like violence isn't applicable everywhere, non-violence isn't applicable everywhere.

back in the day, nazis used to get violently run out of shows because they tried to infiltrate the punk movement and punks said "Nazi punks fuck off" and then punched them until they left.

This is the way I've come to look at it: non-violence is ideal, but non-violence is one of many "languages." (Obviously here we're just talking about violence, but yknow some is political, some is social, etc.) Some people can speak many of these, some people only speak one or refuse to use others (like how you say you will only use nonviolence.)

The issue is that some people only speak one language, and aren't going to "understand" (be persuaded or moved by) others no matter what. A bigot only understands hate and emotion so they aren't going to be swayed from that position by logic or facts because they don't "speak" that language.

What I'm getting at, is that for people who only speak violence - non-violence doesn't mean anything to them except an easy target. They aren't going to consider your viewpoint because you won't fight back, they won't back down because "clearly you aren't a threat." They're going to violence until they reach their ends. With somebody like that, you have to "speak their language."

Of course on an individual level you (maybe) can get the police to handle it, but on a social level like dealing with nazis you have to keep them scared of return violence. They are violent by nature (the entire ideology is elimination of undesirables) and should be treated as such. Let them know that we punch nazis. Let them know they aren't the only ones with guns and unlike most of them we go to the range. Let them know if they wear iron crosses and shit they're getting kicked the fuck out. Fuck them, and let them know we'd be happy to fuck em up if they want to give us the opportunity.

I'm generally anti-violence myself, but I'm also a large guy so I'm lucky enough to be able to avoid it. I can't bring myself to be a pacifist though. Knocking some kid around is easy come take a swing at me and see how it goes. Shrug

I've never seen one but I tell you what, if I see one, I will beat the living fuck outa em