A Chart to Help Those on the Fence About Punching Nazis

That's my stance as well. I don't think we need to legalize punching Nazis. The law is a clumsy tool for such nuance. That's why we have juries. A jury should nullify any assault on marching Nazis.

Sometimes the poster and not the post gets a neg rep.

Actually if someone punches a Nazi, unless it is a clear case of the Nazi being a threat to the puncher, then the Nazi who was punched would be fully justified using violence to defend themselves.

The right to self defense does not go away just because you are a repulsive person promoting a repugnant ideology.

Thus confirming what we all already knew--you don't actually read anyone's posts.

No one is arguing against that.

Most of your posts consist of insults and sponge bob memes, why should I read those?

Except most here are.

A reasonable fear of imminent bodily harm.

A threat has to be specific, credible, present, and unambiguous for you PERSONALLY to take action to defend yourself. If you're concerned someone's rhetoric might, may, possibly could be a threat to someone else, then you report it to the authorities.

I'm saying you're making them seem like a bigger threat than they are--in order to justify violence against them--by equating them with a different set of people who lived in a different context in a different time.

Strawman.

Pretty sure the Korean War and the Vietnam War were against socialists. And we existed under existential threat by a socialist country for decades.

100 million died under communism, a great, great many of them by deliberate action of the state. And don't forget the USSR was allied with the Germans at the outset of WWII. They gladly divided up Poland with Hitler. Also, when the communists "liberated" Eastern Europe, they didn't leave afterwards. And they rolled in with tanks to crush opposition in Hungary and Czechoslovakia.

Let's not forget the gulags. And the show trials. And the use of famine as a weapon. And political repression.

That socialists were in favor of that doesn't earn any gratitude from me. LOTS of people were in favor of those things. If only the socialists were for them, they would never have happened.

Right. Nazis carrying weapons and stating "we'll fucking kill these people if we have to" sufficiently qualifies as an imminent threat, in my opinion. Obviously, that's up for a jury to decide, though.

You have to be freaking kidding me. So we shouldn't judge all Nazis by the actions of the Third Reich? These are the good Nazis then? The ones that only kill one person at their first rally?

Carrying guns and stating "we'll fucking kill these people if we have to" is a specific, credible, present, and unambiguous threat. And even if not directed a specific counter-protester or all protesters, defense of others is also a justifiable defense.

The remainder of your "what about...?"ism is a distraction. We're not talking about Communists murdering people on the streets of America in 2017, we're talking about Nazis doing so. You are twisting your wheels to justify the actions of Nazis. I suggest you take a good long look in the mirror, and try to understand how extreme your point of view is.

Your defense of the actions of literal Nazis in this and other threads speaks loads about the social circles you participate in.

Even your example taken at face value fails. What does "if I have to" mean?

A jury going by the rule of law would decide that such a sign did not constitute an imminent threat to anyone, and anyone attacking the bearer on that basis would be guilty of, at a minimum, assault.

No one has claimed that.

But law enforcement personnel are trained (ideally) and entrusted to carry weapons and use them in a responsible manner (hopefully). To put it succinctly, because of that like it or not we trust law enforcement officers judgement in such matters.

Fair enough, but I'll go on record as suggesting you avoid trying to punch people who are carrying firearms as much as possible.

So it's 2017, and you come face to face with a literal Nazi. Swastikas, shaved head, the works. He is visibly carrying a weapon and stating that he will kill you if he has to. And you wouldn't act to defend yourself, you would instead prefer to deliberate over the precise meaning of his words and motivations?

Very true. Hell, I avoid punching anyone to begin with.

No, "we" don't

So, how many people did the person who said that attack? Unless someone punched him out, can we assume he succeeded in his planned assault/murder?

Which others? If you (claim to) act in defense of others, you must answer the question: which specific person was under threat?

No, it isn't. Because if that reasoning works against these Nazis, it works against Black Lives Matter. Or against socialists. It can be argued that their rhetoric leads to violence, so wouldn't someone be justified attacking them be justified by "self-defense?"

You have exactly ONE example of that. There's no indication this is some great wave of peril.

But if you want to claim that, then how about the right's claim that the "fuck the police" rhetoric is leading to murder of officers? Isn't that the same thing by your own standard? I can point to examples of police officers killed by people who were whipped up by that rhetoric.

My extremist view is that people shouldn't initiate violence against others over political rhetoric, no matter how repugnant that rhetoric is. You seem to be the one arguing against the rule of law, and in favor of street violence.

This was not the first neo nazi and it was one man, not the entire group. Besides, this just pay back for what the Blues Brothers did.

Also, if you insist on pushing the parallels between today's Nazis and the German National Socialists, it might be instructive to remember that the latter used the murder of one of their members by a couple of communists for significant propaganda value. A song written by this member became the NSDAP anthem.

So, by giving into temptations for street violence, you may help engineer the outcome you wish to avoid by turning someone into a martyr for the cause.

Now you are acting like Tererun and getting diarrhea of the mouth. Paladin is no Neo-Nazi and you should reserve that for real ones not just people who disagree with you.

Are you listening to yourself? These are not people with a roughly similar ethnic background. This is a group of people who have chosen to march under the banner of the Third Reich. Not something similar or parallel. The swastika.

It's not a standard based on what actually happened, but what the would-be victim reasonably feared. The fact that someone doesn't carry out their threat to kill you because you acted in self-defense to prevent it does not magically make the self-defense doctrine disappear.

Again, you and @Federal Farmer are dancing around the main issue--why do you think we should treat Nazis differently in 2017 than in the 1940s?

Are comminists evil? I mean they did kill three to four times as many as the Fascists? Some of them for pretty piss poor reasons no better than simply because they wore eye glasses.

That is why everyone should condemn all assholes who promote violence for political purposes. I am happy to say Nazis are piece of shit just as I am happy to say self declared communists who proudly say they prefer to use violence as their favored political method, like Antifa does, are also pieces of shit. Condemning both makes the message stronger, not weaker, making it weaker is saying political violence from one side is ok but not from the other.

Comdemn all violence for political purposes or you are part of the problem.

Appropriating a symbol from X doesn't make you X.

And, anyway, I'm not saying there's no connection, or that the modern Nazis aren't every bit as repugnant as the original National Socialists.

What I'm saying is that equating them with Hitler's party/regime for the purpose of making violence against them more palatable is very dangerous. Initiating violence when there is no imminent threat is contrary to the rule of law.