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Purgatory: Oops - your Trump presidency discussion thread.

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  • Immigratio
    "..removed all the violent protestors!.."

    Is there any evidence (or truth) that the protestors are more violent than the uniformed people sent there to stop the violence?

    Of course not. That would be pointless. If you are going in to stop violent protestors or fight a war against an aggressive enemy, you need to be more violent than the protestors or the enemy, or you will lose.

    I would hope that the violence applied by the authorities is sufficient to get the job done, otherwise good people will be put at risk.

    What level of violence do you think justifies unmarked vehicles with unidentified federal officers grabbing people at random off the street?

    They weren't random. They were on the streets in an area where rioting is taking place.

    If they weren't on the streets they couldn't have been arrested.

    Walking the streets of a free country is not a crime, nor is it violence. Neither is taking part in a protest. Are you really saying it's ok to kidnap people for being near part of a city where other people may or may not have been committing a crime?

    Stop being naive. You know that they were in an area where riots were ongoing. They were not there to have a nice pleasant evening stroll. If they were then they should have been sectioned once in custody.

    They might not have been committing the violence, but they were supporting those who were violent. They were offering the rioters "aid and comfort" in my view.

    They were not innocent in any way.
  • Immigratio
    "..removed all the violent protestors!.."

    Is there any evidence (or truth) that the protestors are more violent than the uniformed people sent there to stop the violence?

    Of course not. That would be pointless. If you are going in to stop violent protestors or fight a war against an aggressive enemy, you need to be more violent than the protestors or the enemy, or you will lose.

    I would hope that the violence applied by the authorities is sufficient to get the job done, otherwise good people will be put at risk.

    What level of violence do you think justifies unmarked vehicles with unidentified federal officers grabbing people at random off the street?

    They weren't random. They were on the streets in an area where rioting is taking place.

    If they weren't on the streets they couldn't have been arrested.

    Walking the streets of a free country is not a crime, nor is it violence. Neither is taking part in a protest. Are you really saying it's ok to kidnap people for being near part of a city where other people may or may not have been committing a crime?

    Stop being naive. You know that they were in an area where riots were ongoing. They were not there to have a nice pleasant evening stroll. If they were then they should have been sectioned once in custody.

    They might not have been committing the violence, but they were supporting those who were violent. They were offering the rioters "aid and comfort" in my view.

    They were not innocent in any way.

    And you know this how? Besides "offering aid and comfort to rioters" is not a federal crime in US, so far as I'm aware, even if you were correct.
  • CrœsosCrœsos Shipmate
    Stop being naive. You know that they were in an area where riots were ongoing. They were not there to have a nice pleasant evening stroll. If they were then they should have been sectioned once in custody.

    They might not have been committing the violence, but they were supporting those who were violent. They were offering the rioters "aid and comfort" in my view.

    They were not innocent in any way.

    Having not been convicted of anything, they are innocent in the legal sense of the term.

    BTW, how does this theory of police omnipotence meet the requirements of the Fourth Amendment? What you're advocating doesn't come anywhere near probable cause, as the term is usually understood.
  • To say "they're not innocent in any way" is absurd, and assumes omnipotence. Isn't it also legally incorrect? I suppose it's Trumpian justice.
  • amyboamybo Shipmate
    Golden Key wrote: »
    Thatcheright, if I correctly understand you to mean that she might be very ugly, that's an awful thing to say. Perhaps a remedial manners and/or ethics course would amend that posting problem?

    But I have good manners! I said I would didn't I, which is the reaction I'm sure she was after. I bet she wouldn't have got her kit off to prance around if she didn't look like she does.

    Do you really think most males on the planet who sees those images doesn't think about sex? She knew that before she started.

    My guess is she will be reveal her identity on social media in a few days time before beginning a career as an "influencer", which I believe is some kind of job these days.

    Wow, what a clear example of rape culture.
  • amybo wrote: »
    Golden Key wrote: »
    Thatcheright, if I correctly understand you to mean that she might be very ugly, that's an awful thing to say. Perhaps a remedial manners and/or ethics course would amend that posting problem?

    But I have good manners! I said I would didn't I, which is the reaction I'm sure she was after. I bet she wouldn't have got her kit off to prance around if she didn't look like she does.

    Do you really think most males on the planet who sees those images doesn't think about sex? She knew that before she started.

    My guess is she will be reveal her identity on social media in a few days time before beginning a career as an "influencer", which I believe is some kind of job these days.

    Wow, what a clear example of rape culture.

    Rape? What on Earth are you talking about? I guess it's something the woke-left invented but failed to make it stick in the real world because nobody cared enough about it because of its latent stupidity.
  • To say "they're not innocent in any way" is absurd, and assumes omnipotence. Isn't it also legally incorrect? I suppose it's Trumpian justice.

    Well, if they were innocent bystanders, just wandering around looking for a nice place to eat and just happened to drift into the midst of a riot, then I assume they were arrested so as to place them in some kind of protective custody until such time as they could be safely escorted back to their homes.
  • Penny SPenny S Shipmate
    I haven't come across that sort of male talk since the week before I left the Dover Congregational Youth Club in the 1960s. It was the week before, because it was the next week that the minister backed them up and joined in, in ecclesiastical language, when I complained, instead of creating a safe place for women.
  • Do you really think most males on the planet who sees those images doesn't think about sex? She knew that before she started.

    I'm looking at the back of a naked woman, sitting in the middle of the road in front of a line of armoured cops. Why would I be thinking about sex? There's nothing sexual about her pose, and the environment is certainly not sexy in any way. I'm sure a dirty tarmac road in front of a bunch of cops is someone's kink, but I'm pretty certain than dirty roads and a bunch of cops don't turn most people on.

    Do you have a similar problem seeing women at beaches and swimming pools, and being unable not to think about having sex with them?

    I'm with @amybo on this - I can't say it better than she did.
    amybo wrote: »
    Wow, what a clear example of rape culture.

  • To say "they're not innocent in any way" is absurd, and assumes omnipotence. Isn't it also legally incorrect? I suppose it's Trumpian justice.

    Well, if they were innocent bystanders, just wandering around looking for a nice place to eat and just happened to drift into the midst of a riot, then I assume they were arrested so as to place them in some kind of protective custody until such time as they could be safely escorted back to their homes.

    You assume? Why?
  • CrœsosCrœsos Shipmate
    The real interesting question is how long it's going to be before various private groups start impersonating police? The stripped-down "unforms" being used (camouflage outfits with no identifying markings other than a small, generic label saying "POLICE" on the front) seem like the kind of thing your local militia group could fake up pretty quickly, already having most of the basics on hand. How does someone know that the camo-wearing armed men trying to hustle them into an unmarked care aren't simply trying to kidnap them?
  • HugalHugal Shipmate
    To say "they're not innocent in any way" is absurd, and assumes omnipotence. Isn't it also legally incorrect? I suppose it's Trumpian justice.

    Well, if they were innocent bystanders, just wandering around looking for a nice place to eat and just happened to drift into the midst of a riot, then I assume they were arrested so as to place them in some kind of protective custody until such time as they could be safely escorted back to their homes.

    This is assumption not proof. Please back your statement up. How do you know they were not captured and tortured?
  • Do you really think most males on the planet who sees those images doesn't think about sex? She knew that before she started.

    I'm looking at the back of a naked woman, sitting in the middle of the road in front of a line of armoured cops. Why would I be thinking about sex? There's nothing sexual about her pose, and the environment is certainly not sexy in any way. I'm sure a dirty tarmac road in front of a bunch of cops is someone's kink, but I'm pretty certain than dirty roads and a bunch of cops don't turn most people on.

    Do you have a similar problem seeing women at beaches and swimming pools, and being unable not to think about having sex with them?

    Depends. If she's hot then pretty much no. If she isn't then yes. By the way, the amount of clothing is irrelevant. I can see a pretty woman in an office, on a street, in a pub restaurant etc and have the same thoughts. Why would I not.

    Like the overwhelming majority of men I have never acted out on those thoughts.

    I have done that all my life and have never succumbed to raping anyone.

    Oh, and guess what! In an office environment I have no trouble in treating them with respect and as an intelligent, valuable part of the workforce.

    Men throughout the millennia have looked at pretty women and had sexual thoughts. It goes with the testosterone. I think it is pretty naive to think it will ever change.
    I'm with @amybo on this - I can't say it better than she did.
    amybo wrote: »
    Wow, what a clear example of rape culture.

    I have no idea what it means, and frankly, I have no time for this or that "culture". They are pretty meaningless to most people.

    If I have been placed in some artificial culture dreamt up to lend support to someone's pet theory about why the world is awful, so be it. They are wrong and I couldn't care less anyway.
  • OhherOhher Shipmate

    I have done that all my life and have never succumbed to raping anyone.

    "Succumbed?" Why, you poor thing.

    Turning rapists into victims of their own (Perfectly natural! Understandable!) inbuilt desires is one of the oldest tricks in the book. About as old as rape itself.
  • W HyattW Hyatt Shipmate
    Crœsos wrote: »
    The real interesting question is how long it's going to be before various private groups start impersonating police? The stripped-down "unforms" being used (camouflage outfits with no identifying markings other than a small, generic label saying "POLICE" on the front) seem like the kind of thing your local militia group could fake up pretty quickly, already having most of the basics on hand. How does someone know that the camo-wearing armed men trying to hustle them into an unmarked care aren't simply trying to kidnap them?

    As my brother noted, we now have the beginnings of our very own Gestapo!
  • Depends. If she's hot then pretty much no. If she isn't then yes. By the way, the amount of clothing is irrelevant. I can see a pretty woman in an office, on a street, in a pub restaurant etc and have the same thoughts. Why would I not.

    I can recognize that the young woman in the photo is attractive without wanting to have sex with her, or imagining myself having sex with her. But then, I'm not interested in sex with random attractive bodies.
    Oh, and guess what! In an office environment I have no trouble in treating them with respect and as an intelligent, valuable part of the workforce.

    Does that include passing comment with your mates about how much you "would" with each of them?
    I have no idea what it means, and frankly, I have no time for this or that "culture". They are pretty meaningless to most people.

    It's the culture that normalizes the sexual objectification of women, and enables rapists. Most rapes aren't strangers lurking in the bushes. Most rapists are men who take a drunk woman upstairs at a party, or take her home after a night out, and think she owes him sex, because he paid for dinner, or assume that "come in for a coffee" means "wait for me to pass out, then have sex with my body", or think that "she let me sleep in her bed" means "she wants me to have sex with her".

    And these attitudes are enabled by the sort of attitude that views women as ambulant sex dolls, which is what you do when you pass comment on whether you "would" with each of them. Because rapists don't exist outside mainstream culture. Most rapists are a product of it.
  • I am more interested in the culture that believes that if you were within half a mile of a peaceful protest, you deserve to be kidnapped by unidentified federal agents and held without warrant or charge for an indefinite period of time. I thought the right were all about "rule of law"? Actually I knew that wasn't true. But they do claim it's true.
  • Simon ToadSimon Toad Shipmate
    edited July 2020
    mousethief wrote: »
    I am more interested in the culture that believes that if you were within half a mile of a peaceful protest, you deserve to be kidnapped by unidentified federal agents and held without warrant or charge for an indefinite period of time. I thought the right were all about "rule of law"? Actually I knew that wasn't true. But they do claim it's true.

    THIS!

    Thatcher's other comments are a red rag. I will ignore them for the moment, and do a hell call if I decide to take it further, where I can really let things rip.

    @Thatcheright

    What is the difference, once you start rounding up aiders and abetters of violence, between being present and perhaps cheering when an act of violence occurs, and commenting on a forum page like this, or in the comments to a relevant article on social media, that you think what the protesters are doing in setting fire to the offices of the Portland Police Union is a good thing?
  • @Thatcheright what you posted is exceedingly vile. You may not have "succumbed" to being a rapist, but what you posted is in the category of rape-enabling talk. You've also indicated that you think of sex and think everyone does in this situation. There's something very disturbing about this. Not okay at all. There's so far a Styx topic about it. http://forums.shipoffools.com/discussion/2742/thatcherright-on-the-trump-presidency-thread

    This isn't about being right or left. Not about being conservative, liberal. It's apolitical. It's rapey and indefensible as a corpus.
  • EutychusEutychus Shipmate
    admin mode/

    Can none of you read? This tangent does not belong on this thread, as ruled by a host. There is nothing to be gained by continuing it here, except giving @Thatcheright justification for continuing it and further derailing the thread. Take it to Hell if you must.

    (Without prejudice to further admin action)

    /admin mode
  • EutychusEutychus Shipmate
    admin mode/

    @Thatcheright your off-topic and deliberately disruptive provocations have earned you an indefinite suspension. To be clear, acting like a jerk here is not synonymous with your politics, but it is a C1 breach, and you've breached C1 once too many.

    To resume posting, you'll have to convince the admins that you are capable of engaging more constructively rather than constantly abusing your posting privileges to continue to act like a jerk.

    /admin mode

  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    T is going to have a Coronavirus briefing today. He reinstituted it after his internal surveys show the population is uncertain how the Federal government is involved in the fight. Any bets on who the briefing will be? Pence, BTW, is out of town today.
  • Isn't it likely that the use of stormtroopers is another Trump tactic, for the election. I assume he will push a law and order ticket, and say, look at these local authorities, too weak, whereas I'm bringing you real law and order. I guess this will delight the right wing, but anybody else?
  • CrœsosCrœsos Shipmate
    edited July 2020
    Isn't it likely that the use of stormtroopers is another Trump tactic, for the election. I assume he will push a law and order ticket, and say, look at these local authorities, too weak, whereas I'm bringing you real law and order. I guess this will delight the right wing, but anybody else?

    I mentioned that on another thread, so there's some of that in play. We know Trump likes to pretend to be a tough guy (as long as someone else does the dirty work) and his position that you have to "dominate" protesters is well documented. I'm not sure it's working like he thinks it should, which brings us to Trump's unfortunate tendency to double down on failed tactics. Gassing and shooting peaceful protesters at Lafayette Square was met with more condemnation than praise, so obviously the next step is to have secret police abducting people off the streets. What worries me is what the next doubling down is going to look like.

    The beatings police state tactics will continue until morale improves everyone loves Dear Leader.
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    edited July 2020
    There's a movie/book called "The Postman". I don't remember the circumstances; but America had completely broken down. Not sure there were even states, per se. However, there was a postman who provided some connection...and a little hope.

    And many people wanted someone called Richard P. Starkey for president.

    Some progress was made in fixing things...but I really hope we're not heading for something like that.

    :votive:

    Note: Some years back, probably during Dubyah's term, I saw bumperstickers saying "Richard P. Starkey For President".
    :)
  • EigonEigon Shipmate
    The book is by David Brin. The man wasn't even really a postman - he just found the uniform and drifted into the role.
  • Isn't it likely that the use of stormtroopers is another Trump tactic, for the election. I assume he will push a law and order ticket, and say, look at these local authorities, too weak, whereas I'm bringing you real law and order. I guess this will delight the right wing, but anybody else?

    A tactic for the election where the stormtroopers harrass or kidnap or attack people standing in line to vote in blue or purple districts.
  • RooKRooK Shipmate
    Just to float in, far too late, to comment as a Portland Oregon resident: there are absofuckinglutely no Portlanders wanting federal agents to snatch up peaceful protestors. Some of my friends were at a "moms rally" a couple nights ago, and they got tear gassed. The escalation tactics are disgusting and unnecessary.

    I mean, we were fucking marching with our goddamn kids - that's how peaceful 99% of people intend to be. Now this shit is obscene. If the Portland police were actually doing their intended function, they would be standing between the peaceful protestors and the fascist federal agents trying to intimidate them with violent tactics.

    The media fodder purpose of it all is contemptible beyond reckoning.
  • When I saw the news footage from Portland of the mothers forming a cordon between the "police" (= unidentifiable federal agents) and the protestors, and being subjected to flash bang, I was, disturbingly, reminded of las madres de la Plaza de Mayo.* In the context of the unmarked vans taking protestors for a joy ride, it's difficult not to see the parallels and be alarmed.

    Note to Trump, et al.: Do Not Fuck With Someone's Mother. Or a line of them. Because (a) mothers are tough, especially when their children are threatened, and (b) it makes other people very upset. Remember that the February 1917 Russian Revolution began with an International Women's Day march.

    I really have tried not to be alarmist, but I know am left to wonder: How far will this government go?

    *Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo were the women who protested weekly - sometimes more frequently - in the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires against the "Disappearing" of their children. ("Disappearing" often meant being brought to a naval academy, being drugged after torture, and dropped by helicopter into the South Atlantic.)
  • RooK wrote: »
    Just to float in, far too late, to comment as a Portland Oregon resident: there are absofuckinglutely no Portlanders wanting federal agents to snatch up peaceful protestors. Some of my friends were at a "moms rally" a couple nights ago, and they got tear gassed. The escalation tactics are disgusting and unnecessary.

    I mean, we were fucking marching with our goddamn kids - that's how peaceful 99% of people intend to be. Now this shit is obscene. If the Portland police were actually doing their intended function, they would be standing between the peaceful protestors and the fascist federal agents trying to intimidate them with violent tactics.

    The media fodder purpose of it all is contemptible beyond reckoning.

    I imagine they would be doing exactly that if the Federal agents had shaved heads, nazi tatts and wore Doctor Martins boots. They are performing the same role, trying to incite violence.

    Also, nothing is quite so reassuring to me as eye-witness postings on the Ship. I find nothing more reliable, especially from long-time posters and admin types. Thankyou very much for posting.
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    Re the line of moms, and the Mothers of the Disappeared:

    Actually, what I thought of was something similar that happened between Israel and...some other group. I don't remember details, but I think it was probably in the '80s or '90s. There were women--maybe from both sides--that did something similar.

    But yes, the Mothers of the Disappeared (the term I've heard most) are impressive. IIRC, I think some of their missing kids were adopted by high-level people--friends of the gov't, etc. I may, though, be conflating incidents.
  • I haven't looked it up GK, but I have memories both of the Mothers of the Dissappeared and that awful period in Argentine history, and I think you are right. You're right too about events in Israel. There are quite a few quiet peace projects trying to bring Israelis and Palestinians together. I was really happy to visit a kindergarten there with kids from both communities. It was sadly one of a very small number, if not the only one, in 2006.

    Also, there are the British women who stood up during the anti-nuke protests in that country. I have an idea that some of them are shipmates, but I'm not sure. I think I read something here and filed it away. I want to say Gretna Green, but that's where you used to go when you eloped.
  • BroJamesBroJames Purgatory Host
    You’re thinking of Greenham Common, I think.
  • ST - the locale is Greenham Common, not Gretna Green.

    GK - the children adopted by (largely) military families were not technically "disappeared" as such, just "orphans" and often discovered their true parentage by accident, if they learned it at all. I know of one case in which a woman discovered her parentage because as an adult she was tested for a genetic disorder, only to discover that she had very different parentage from what she had been led to believe. They were the infants of the disappeared, and, in some horrendous instances, the product of the disappearance process.

  • EigonEigon Shipmate
    One of my friends went to Greenham Common for a protest, but she wasn't one of the ones camping there.
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    I saw a TV reporter covering the Portland situation who said there was so much tear gas in the air that she was affected. One of her eyes was running, and her face was clearly in distress. From the broadcast, she looked like she was a couple of blocks away from the actual protest.
  • cheers again Rook. We only get bits and bobs here, unless you are willing to do a media trawl.
  • Penny SPenny S Shipmate
    I see that Chicago, Kansas City and Alberquerque are in the feds' sights, though Trump is saying its against criminals rather than protestors.
  • Penny S wrote: »
    I see that Chicago, Kansas City and Alberquerque are in the feds' sights, though Trump is saying its against criminals rather than protestors.

    I'm pretty sure that in Trump-speak "urban criminals" means "uppity n-words".
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    Oh, frack...

    "Mayor Of Portland, Oregon, First Booed By Protesters, Then Tear Gassed By Federal Agents" (HuffPost).

    :votive: for Portland Shipmates and everyone else there.
  • Penny S wrote: »
    I see that Chicago, Kansas City and Alberquerque are in the feds' sights, though Trump is saying its against criminals rather than protestors.

    I'm pretty sure that in Trump-speak "urban criminals" means "uppity n-words".

    I think you are 100% correct there.
  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    It seems T has just blinked--twice. At his daily news conference today, he announced HE is canceling the Jacksonville Republican Convention. Something about it not being safe there. And then he walked back somewhat about his insistence on the opening of all schools. While he still insists he wants them open, he is allowing the states and local districts to decide how to open.
  • HugalHugal Shipmate
    Is there an election over that side of the pond soon per chance? Not that I’m being cynical. Well yes ok I am.
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    Just saw on TV:
    Judge grants temporary restraining order against federal agents in Portland.

    (Approximate quote. Was in the news crawl at the bottom of the screen.)

    Yay!!!
  • An obvious point, which I have ignored up to now, is that the vast anti-terror apparatus which developed post 9/11 in the US, can be pivoted towards internal opposition. The right wing press can mobilize by denouncing and exaggerating protest groups, so that they resemble left wing conspiracies. Everything is in place, really, ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Fuhrer. (One people, one country, one leader). I used to doubt that fascism could come back to the West. Wait for the Reichstag fire.
  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    I am going to start a new thread on T's stormtroopers.
  • Gramps49 wrote: »
    I am going to start a new thread on T's stormtroopers.

    I don't really know if they mark a step-change, as I don't live there. But all the iconography, unmarked vans, goons with minimal ID, snatch squads, give off a proto-fascist vibe. But maybe Trump is testing it out.
  • An interesting psychological question, would Trump be prepared to enable fascism? I used to think no, but the goons look ominous. Ideally, of course, you need a fig-leaf of legal respectability, behind which the goons arrest opponents, people are jailed for spray-painting, and Trump goes all in.
  • CrœsosCrœsos Shipmate
    An interesting psychological question, would Trump be prepared to enable fascism?

    Would Donald Trump be willing to enable ethnonationalism, silence his critics, promise to restore a lost golden age of national greatness (MAGA!), blame the loss of that greatness on a shadowy conspiracy of outside, un-American subversives, undermine laws to consolidate power, and generally act in authoritarian ways?

    Seriously?

    When has Donald Trump not enabled fascism?
    I used to think no, but the goons look ominous.

    An interesting psychological question is why so many people can't seem to recognize fascism unless it's bestrewn with swastikas.
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