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Comment by epistasis | Hacker News Reader

This is precisely it. There have been insurrections before with zero consequences, such as in Wilmington where white supremacists were upset that Black people were allowed to be elected and take positions in government:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilmington_insurrection_of_1...

Yesterday there was a confederate flag in the capitol halls, something that didn't even happen during the US civil war. Pictures abound of neo-nazi symbols, like a T-shirt celebrating Auschwitz.

These people expect no consequences, and they are probably right. They are still upset that Obama got into the White House.

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You should probably mention Portland, Seattle, Kenosha, Chicago, New York as well. The other kind of insurrectionists seem to also have little to fear from the law.

There's a bit of a difference between people gathering and protesting or even rioting in <various big cities around US> and actually storming the US Capitol Building during the tally of Electoral College votes with the intention of, somehow in their twisted minds, preventing that tally and succession to the next democratically elected president.

Wow, what a double-standard.

Why is it that the left is allowed to express themselves through protest and civil disobedience but the right can't plant bombs and try to kidnap senators when they don't like the outcome of an election?

Sounds like you really want them to be different, at the very least.

One of the movements is petitioning the government for change. The counter-movement is plotting to kidnap politicians:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gretchen_Whitmer_kidnapping_pl...

The MAGA flavored anarchists and nihilists who stormed the US Capitol Building will hopefully be brought up on as many felonies as possible, tried in court, and ideally spend some real time in a real jail. Even better if they can also track down organizers - who perhaps weren't there - and charge them with racketeering or sedition. It was evil and it needs to be halted.

I also think the same thing needs to happen to the antifa flavored anarchists we were witness to throughout the summer. The endless attacks on businesses (big and small), federal buildings, lawlessness, looting, storming police precints, portland city council buildings, and general destruction should also result in as many felonies as possible.

Both groups "think" that sheer muscle and raw emotionalism in the street is a legitimate way to bully your preferred changes through. It's the same evil mindset and it needs to be called out and punished regardless of what flag they appear to operate under.

> Even better if they can also track down organizers

There is video of the rally prior where Trump, his son, Rudy Giuliani and others were inciting the mob to violence.

This is exactly what every good fascist says when their opponent speaks at political rallies.

If you can’t see both sides of the coin, why play around at flipping it?

Have just hit peak cultural relativism, where identifying the organizers of a fascist coup is the same thing as being a fascist?

I think we’re making the same point, but “organizers of a fascist coup” is a bit rich.

What we saw yesterday will be properly charged as entering a restricted building, violent entry and disorderly conduct on capitol grounds, in limited cases assault on a federal law enforcement officer, and in a single digit number of cases, second degree murder.

No charges will be laid for sedition, treason, or insurrection. Despite what you might read on CNN.

I would say the same thing for all the rioting that happened last year. Even though city blocks were illegally cordoned off and occupied for weeks. Just my prediction.

1. The overwhelming majority of protests in city blocks did not at all prevent the lawful operation of government or businesses (And those that have did so in a rather limited way). So far, this one is batting one thousand. Congress had to be evacuated. Its operations had to stop, as its members were instructed to shelter in place.

2. I disagree that those are proper charges. Context matters. A mob showing up at the capitol and smashing a few windows from the outside when nothing of note is happening is disorderly conduct.

A mob showing up at congress in the middle of a certification of an election, spurred on by cries that the election is stolen, and we need to do something, where members of the mob think they are participating in a revolution... Is a coup.

It's a naked attempt to prevent a lawful transfer of power. Just because it's a failed coup doesn't make it anything less than a coup.

If you really think that no buildings had to be evacuated during BLM protests I’m not sure what news you’ve been watching or why you want to participate in this discussion.

1. Police stations were burned to the ground. Federal courthouse under sustained assault for months. $2 billion in property damage, thousands of police injured.

2. Those are what people have actually been charged with yesterday. Similarly, just because a BLM protestor is screaming kill all cops! while throwing rocks at a police car, it doesn’t make an attempted murder charge appropriate. Nor should everyone standing around chanting the same thing in the vicinity be charged with attempted murder.

All I ask is for a little logical consistency instead of the absurd political flame war.

They stopped an election process at behest of the loser, by invading Congress - a branch of government that was seen as not sympathetic to Trump's desire to overturn the election.

He literally spoke to them right before the event, and insinuated they should take direct action, then waited for hours until he asked them to leave (while still claiming fraud and that their country was being stolen).

It's really annoying to have to point out this obvious context over and over to the people who are minimizing what happened.

If you have the transcript of what Trump said in his address before the protesters marched to the Capital building, I’d appreciate you pointing out the part which you think violates strict scrutiny under the 1st Amendment for “fighting words”.

The word “coup” doesn’t mean what you think it does. Interrupting a political process is not a coup. Protesting an election result is not a coup. Trespassing in the Capital building is not a coup. Posing for selfies and stealing Peliso’s lecturn is not a coup. And doing all 4 of these things at once is not a coup.

What it is? Mostly? Just extremely embarrassing for the people in power and the people who were supposed to protect them.

Calling it a coup mostly just covers for the raging embarrassment of being owned by Half Naked Viking Man.

You did not dispute a single thing I said.

All you did was drop your standards to the ground.

I hope you are proud of what you are defending.

You’re mistaken if you think I’m defending what happened at the Capital yesterday. I am an ardent supporter of the right to peacefully protest.

I am against any form of violent protest, and as a matter of scale, I’m much more offended by the dozens killed, hundreds maimed, and billions of dollars of damages over the summer than what happened yesterday.

The framing of this particular riot as a coup is nothing but a duplicitous political flame war, and I see the politicization of this riot is a coup versus that riot is a mostly peaceful protest as a dangerous gaslighting of the American people.

The looting was pretty much a direct consequence to how the police handled protests. When you have every cop in the damn city staring at people protesting police brutality with shield and beating stick in hand, opportunists quickly realized they could hit up the Nieman Marcus and make a few hundred on eBay or craigslist because all the police were focused on was testing the limit with protestors and using their shiny toys on people's eyeballs.

So you are saying that the difference is such that one group should not be prosecuted and the other group should? What criteria are you using to differentiate? Storming government buildings other than the Capital is OK?

How about we just prosecute everyone who breaks the law?

> So you are saying that the difference is such that one group should not be prosecuted and the other group should? What criteria are you using to differentiate? Storming government buildings other than the Capital is OK?

I said nothing of the sort and I don't know how you would interpret my words that way.

From the poster I responded to:

> The other kind of insurrectionists seem to also have little to fear from the law

My response was about the notion that protesters and rioters this summer were "insurrectionists", they were not. At least not as a general rule. Some of them, maybe, probably always are in political protests. But most of them were there to either create havoc (rioters) or protest for change to the way policing is conducted in the US (the protestors).

The people who went into the US Capitol Building on 6 January, 2021 were intending to prevent the carrying out of a legal process to certify the results of a democratic election and, in their minds, prevent the succession of the presidency. That makes them insurrectionists, not just protestors anymore, at least as regards the US Constitution and democratic process.

Besides, protestors and rioters in 2020 were prosecuted. And it's moronic or ignorant to say they weren't.

> Besides, protestors and rioters in 2020 were prosecuted. And it's moronic or ignorant to say they weren't.

That some people were prosecuted doesn't negate the overall acceptance by the left of the violent activity as legitimate political activism because it was in support of particular favored political opinions. The very clear message was that as long as you were spouting the approved political mantras the violent activities were OK.

Attempting to discern who is or who isn't an "insurrectionist" is a distraction. Trespassing, breaking and entering, looting, vandalism, destruction of property, arson, assault are all crimes that should be prosecuted and not excused if you are committing them while having the correct political thoughts.

BTW, yesterday's opportunists have to be the saddest lot of "insurrectionists" I've ever seen. They seemed more interested in posting selfies than overthrowing anything. They should be mocked mercilessly and prosecuted vigorously.

It's not just about a government building. Noone should care about that. If the building was empty, this would be trespass.

No, they were threatening and intimidating lawmakers that were in session to try to manipulate the election. This is an enormous difference.

Also pipe bombs shouldn't be ok. Not sure why this is being ignored.

> No, they were threatening and intimidating lawmakers that were in session to try to manipulate the election. This is an enormous difference.

Sure, it is a difference -- as in not identical. But what do you conclude from that difference? That crimes that are less serious than this should be excused when committed as an act of protest but these crimes are different and should not be excused?

The assertion is that there is a double standard between these types of events. That some riots are excused and yesterday's are not. You seem to be asserting that there isn't a double standard because the events were different in the way that you described and so it sounds like you are saying the different treatment is justified. No one is excusing yesterday's rioters but you seem to be excusing previous incidents of rioting because they were different.

>How about we just prosecute everyone who breaks the law?

That would be a novel and very welcome thing in America.

I do think we should prosecute people who break the law. Maybe not every single one of them, but a lot of them. I personally find the cause of BLM to be just and the cause of MAGA tremendously unjust, so if it were up to me I would show more leniency (within the bounds of the law) to the BLM group. Probably fortunately for all parties, though, it's not up to me.

This seems tremendously unjust to me.

You're suggesting that an arsonist, for example, should be treated differently if they burned a building down based on their political ideology?

How do you think the victims of these crimes are going to feel about your notion of "justice"?

I do think sometimes the intent of a person matters when they've committed crime. This is codified in U.S. law. Killing someone in self defense, killing someone because you're angry with them, and killing someone because they're gay and you don't like gay people: each the same crime, but treated differently in U.S. law. I don't know about arson, but I do think that for example occupying a government building because you want the elected officials there to take action on supporting human rights should be treated differently than occupying a government building because you want your favorite candidate to be president despite losing the election.

Oh for crying out loud. Is it not obvious that in both cases people should go to freaking jail? We do not need to agree on which is the worst crime. Are we so blinded by irrational partisanship that we allow criminals a pass if they are in anyway adjacent to whatever political tribe we belong to? God damn it. This sort of stupidity, of blind, intellectually dishonest allegiance to parties that could not care less for America is what is destroying the country. We are well on our way to at best paralysis and at worst civil war if we cannot step out of our bubbles and condemn bad behavior on its merits. What a pathetic ending for the greatest country of the last 100 years.

Did I say they shouldn't be in jail? Seriously, where in my words did I say that? Is it a coded message that I can't read but everyone else can?

I was commenting on your use of the term insurrection to describe what were, mostly, protests against police brutality (which were often met with acts of police brutality) and trying to establish that those actions were not the same as literally storming the Congress to prevent/delay the presidential election process (a much clearer act of insurrection, even if it was completely moronic and doomed from the start)>

You should probably mention the police as well. The terrorists wearing badges seem to also have little to fear from the law.

Indeed, that is why they protected their identities, covered their faces and were arrested on spurious charges by the ten thousands and key figures mysteriously ended up in burnt up cars half a year later.

This summer, and in previous years, law enforcement did in fact follow up later using videos and such to try to track people down. https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-06-02/not-so-f... One easy-to-find story discussing both this year and past situations in other cities. And it notes that many looters were wearing masks - because they knew they could face consequences.

If we take one step back, though, to what led to those protests this summer... we see police killing a black man for a minor offence.

Let's compare THAT police action with the police response to yesterday.

THAT'S America.

Are you suggesting that there weren't lots of arrests of rioters and looters this summer? I believe that many people were arrested any time the protests turned violent or in cases of significant vandalism. I know there were many highly reported arrests in my part of the country from the parts of the protests that went out of control.

Still, they weren't insurrectionists. They weren't trying to put someone in power who lost the election. That's an important distinction. Maybe we shouldn't compare them at all, but if we're going to, what MAGA did was worse.

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