There is a real difference between giving a democratic government the tools to kill people vs attempting to kill people yourself. If you don’t believe this then you don’t believe in democracy.
I also won't particularly care about the distinction when AI is inevitably used to enact violence on the US population.
A better example is the Civil War. The southern states refused to accept the free and fair election of Lincoln and decided to secede, which was not allowed by the Constitution.
Are you arguing that the Confederates were right to violate the law just because they believed they were right?
Have you not heard of the labor movement? Or abolitionists? Or the founding of this country? Or people fighting against Nazi control of their country?
All of those worked outside "legal" means. The law is quite often irrelevant to what's right or moral, and dying on the hill of breaking the law ensures no change can ever occur when a system or person in power inevitably wrongs people.
But throwing Molotov cocktails is terrorism. And I don't believe (please correct me) that a terrorist has ever gotten new laws passed by using terror.
Is this what we just saw with America attacking Iran?
It may have been a stupid order, but it was not unconstitutional.
... Isn't that rather against the spirit of the US' constitution? I can see it being a thought with other nations, but not this particular one.
> A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
Which kinda follows the spirit of English Common Law:
> The ... last auxiliary right of the subject ... is that of having arms for their defence, suitable to their condition and degree, and such as are allowed by law. Which is ... declared by ... statute, and is indeed a public allowance, under due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self-preservation, when the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression. - Sir William Blackstone
A "monopoly on violence" is exactly the thing our laws are supposed to protect us against. Because if a state has that, then they have a monopoly against all rights, because they alone can employ violence to curb those who do not subscribe to the state's ideology.
I'm pretty much a pacifist. I _like_ Australia's gun laws. But, a government's purpose is to protect their people. They are to be representative - or to be replaced. If they leave no other choice for that, then violence is the only answer left.
The key issue is that government (via courts) is the one that decides whether violence is justified or not.
You're right that a government that no longer represents its people must be replaced. But that's not the case in America. The conflict in America is between two different groups of people with different ideas about what the right thing to do is. So far, these two groups have used democracy to get their way. As long as that continues, there is no problem.
But when people use violence outside government law, just because they don't agree with the decisions of the government, then that's not justice--that's just terrorism.
It is the right of a person, rather than the government, under the way the US constitution is structured.
I should have been clearer that I don't mean only the government is allowed to use violence legitimately. Sometimes citizens can use violence legitimately.
But that doesn't mean an individual gets the final word on whether something is self-defense vs. murder. If I kill someone in an argument, I can't just say "it's my inalienable right to wield violence, so buzz off!". I will be put on trial and the justice system will decide whether I'm a murderer or not.
That's what I mean by "monopoly". The government+constitution+laws are the sole deciders on when it is appropriate to use violence, not individuals who think they are dispensing justice. The latter are either vigilantes or terrorists.
Oh is that what January 6th was?
But I will concede that some people on Jan 6th were attempting to change a result by violence. I support sending those people to jail.
You can't just decide on your own that violence is justified.