“Now We See the Violence Inherent in the System!”

 

Everybody knows and loves this bit from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and conservatives will no doubt recognize exactly what we’re about to discuss as becoming a normal, if depressing, part of modern political life.

Last fall, I wrote about the defenestration of Jeremy Hambly (who has a popular YouTube channel) over some comments that he made about a semi-famous Magic: the Gathering cosplayer. In the ensuing months, the temperature has ramped up on Hambly from the predictable sources — mostly internet-based Social Justice Warrior gas-bags — but this past weekend saw the culmination of such language in the real world, when Hambly was physically assaulted at GenCon, which is the world’s largest gaming convention.

Yikes indeed. It seems that the mere presence of a problematic person such as Hambly is enough to send some lunatic leftists into a violent rage. From Campus Reform:

According to YouTuber Jeremy Hambly and multiple eyewitness statements, Professor Matthew Fantastic Loter repeatedly punched Hambly outside of an Indianapolis bar, then broke a window when Hambly fled inside.

Loter is a professor at Quinnipiac University who has threatened to fight “Nazis,” and now has apparently made good on that threat by choking and punching a person he perceives to be a fascist. As I said: conservatives should be no strangers to seeing and understanding that this is a growing trend on the left.

While wrapping themselves in the flag of defending civilization from evil-doers, the left continues to prove to us that “The violence inherent to the system” typically only comes from one source: Them.

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  1. C. U. Douglas Coolidge
    C. U. Douglas
    @CUDouglas

    Some I’ve noted have argued, “How can you be against antifa? Why they are against fascists! Punching Nazis is a good thing!” They gloss over that in most cases, those who are using violence against fascists and Nazis are using highly suspect and subjective views on who fits in those categories.

    • #1
  2. Shawn Buell (Majestyk) Member
    Shawn Buell (Majestyk)
    @Majestyk

    C. U. Douglas (View Comment):

    Some I’ve noted have argued, “How can you be against antifa? Why they are against fascists! Punching Nazis is a good thing!” They gloss over that in most cases, those who are using violence against fascists and Nazis are using highly suspect and subjective views on who fits in those categories.

    I believe the proper term for that is “projection.”

    • #2
  3. Jamie Lockett Member
    Jamie Lockett
    @JamieLockett

    Disgusting, all those pushing us towards violent conflict should be booted from polite society. 

    • #3
  4. Judge Mental Member
    Judge Mental
    @JudgeMental

    I favor the same solution as terrorists on a plane.  If you see Antifa, attack them immediately.

    • #4
  5. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Shawn, it’s becoming more and more alarming! I keep saying that and I can’t seem to find the words to say that we should be very worried. I fear that stupid fistfights are going to turn into killings. And I suspect those on the Left will praise the killer for saving the country. Sigh.

    • #5
  6. Shawn Buell (Majestyk) Member
    Shawn Buell (Majestyk)
    @Majestyk

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):
    Shawn, it’s becoming more and more alarming! I keep saying that and I can’t seem to find the words to say that we should be very worried. I fear that stupid fistfights are going to turn into killings. And I suspect those on the Left will praise the killer for saving the country. Sigh.

    I want to like this comment, but it feels wrong somehow.  The exact scenario I’m envisioning is one where  some of these keyboard warriors pick the wrong target to punch, and that target will be packing a concealed weapon and lethal violence ensues.

    What do we do at that point?  I don’t know.  But the temperature continues to go up rather than down, and it won’t be long before a major figure ends up getting assaulted somehow.  The pie incidents with Ann Coulter a few years ago should have been enough warning.

    • #6
  7. Miffed White Male Member
    Miffed White Male
    @MiffedWhiteMale

    Shawn Buell (Majestyk): According to YouTuber Jeremy Hambly and multiple eyewitness statements, Professor Matthew Fantastic Loter repeatedly punched Hambly outside of an Indianapolis bar, then broke a window when Hambly fled inside.

    Has he been arrested by the local authorities for assault?

    • #7
  8. Shawn Buell (Majestyk) Member
    Shawn Buell (Majestyk)
    @Majestyk

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):

    Shawn Buell (Majestyk): According to YouTuber Jeremy Hambly and multiple eyewitness statements, Professor Matthew Fantastic Loter repeatedly punched Hambly outside of an Indianapolis bar, then broke a window when Hambly fled inside.

    Has he been arrested by the local authorities for assault?

    From what I’ve read, a police report is active and the investigation is ongoing.

    • #8
  9. Miffed White Male Member
    Miffed White Male
    @MiffedWhiteMale

    Shawn Buell (Majestyk) (View Comment):

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):

    Shawn Buell (Majestyk): According to YouTuber Jeremy Hambly and multiple eyewitness statements, Professor Matthew Fantastic Loter repeatedly punched Hambly outside of an Indianapolis bar, then broke a window when Hambly fled inside.

    Has he been arrested by the local authorities for assault?

    From what I’ve read, a police report is active and the investigation is ongoing.

    So,  no?

     

    • #9
  10. AltarGirl Member
    AltarGirl
    @CM

    Shouldn’t that prof have been arrested?

    • #10
  11. Frank Soto Member
    Frank Soto
    @FrankSoto

    C. U. Douglas (View Comment):
    Some I’ve noted have argued, “How can you be against antifa? Why they are against fascists!

    Stalin was history’s greatest anti-fascist.

    • #11
  12. Ontheleftcoast Inactive
    Ontheleftcoast
    @Ontheleftcoast

    My neighbors are apparently convinced that antifa is against fascism. One objected to the BPD posting mug shots of arrestees from last weekend’s riots on its Twitter feed.

    • #12
  13. Kephalithos Member
    Kephalithos
    @Kephalithos

    Ontheleftcoast (View Comment): My neighbors are apparently convinced that antifa is against fascism. One objected to the BPD posting mug shots of arrestees from last weekend’s riots on its Twitter feed.

    Yeah. The article about that is rich in irony. Here’s a great line:

    “This is very disturbing,” Dubal told The Guardian. “It seems like a public-shaming exercise, which is not the role of the police department…They are making it really accessible for folks who might wish these people harm to locate them.”

    And another:

    But Jay Kim, the executive director of the National Lawyers Guild local chapter, said he felt police were targeting “anti-fascist protesters.”

    It really seemed to us like the Berkeley police department was there to…target the anti-fascist protesters,” Kim said.

    Gee. I wonder why.

    • #13
  14. Unsk Member
    Unsk
    @Unsk

    Now Miffed, how dare you demand Professor Loter be arrested? Don’t you know he is one of our SJW betters and thus deserving more emphatic treatment given the just cause he was fighting for?

    From Ace of Spades, we hear the story of another SJW hero who escaped jail time for brutally assaulting only seven people:

    “A former East Bay college philosophy professor who was charged with four counts of felony assault with a deadly weapon, causing great bodily injury, has taken a deal resulting in three years of probation for an attack at a Berkeley protest last year, court records reveal.”

    “According to Alameda County Superior Court records, Clanton entered a “no contest” plea Wednesday to one misdemeanor battery charge. The felony charges against him were dismissed, and an allegation that he had caused serious bodily injury was stricken. A misdemeanor charge that Clanton wore a mask during the commission of the crime also was dropped.”

    “Police said, previously, that Clanton attacked at least three people with a metal U-lock during the April 15 rally in and around Civic Center Park. Court papers later revealed that Clanton struck at least seven people in the head, according to authorities. One person received a head laceration that required five staples to fix. Another was uninjured but had a piece of a helmet broken off. A third was struck across the neck and back, police wrote.”

    Boys will be boys. Anita will be Antifa. 

    • #14
  15. Kephalithos Member
    Kephalithos
    @Kephalithos

    C. U. Douglas (View Comment): Some I’ve noted have argued, “How can you be against antifa? Why they are against fascists! Punching Nazis is a good thing!” They gloss over that in most cases, those who are using violence against fascists and Nazis are using highly suspect and subjective views on who fits in those categories.

    Social-justice theory is rife with a debate tactic I like to call “category-broadening.” It’s probably related to, though distinct from, the sloppy inductive reasoning often used to support trendy political movements. It involves at once expanding the definition of something most of us would agree is horrible, while also retaining the moral significance of that thing as narrowly defined.

    Okay, this isn’t the best of definitions, but here’re two examples:

    • The word “racism” once described any theory of racial determinism — i.e., the position that members of one racial group must be, by virtue of their membership in that group, either inferior or superior to members of other groups. Now, “racism” has come to mean “anything produced by Europeans.” Yet we’re supposed to treat racism as a great evil.
    • The word “violence” (used non-metaphorically) once described acts of physical harm. Now, “violence” has come to mean “any action or speech social-justice theory deems incorrect or immoral.” Yet we’re supposed to excuse assault and vandalism as merely forms of self-defense.

    “Anti-fascism” is yet another example. Punching members of the Weimar-era National Socialist German Workers’ Party might or might not have been a righteous thing. But when “fascism” is redefined to mean “anything right-leaning,” the revulsion and contempt most people attach to the word lose all importance.

    At the moment, the left is mired in a strange world of moral absolutes, albeit a world which lacks any sense of ethical proportion.

    • #15
  16. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Shawn Buell (Majestyk) (View Comment):
    I want to like this comment, but it feels wrong somehow. The exact scenario I’m envisioning is one where some of these keyboard warriors pick the wrong target to punch, and that target will be packing a concealed weapon and lethal violence ensues.

    I’m not sure it’s wrong, but may be incomplete. The violence can start in either direction. My hope is that those of us who could be targets would not use a gun unless it was absolutely necessary. I’m not so confident of the Left, since they seem to be willing to do just about anything.

    • #16
  17. BalticSnowTiger Member
    BalticSnowTiger
    @BalticSnowTiger

    Judge Mental (View Comment):

    I favor the same solution as terrorists on a plane. If you see Antifa, attack them immediately.

    Training. More Training. Concealed carry. Also, unfortunately, never dare to be alone so that your associate, friend, spouse, willing witness has a phone camera ready to document and support the eventual classification of what you do as defensive measures.

    • #17
  18. DrewInWisconsin Member
    DrewInWisconsin
    @DrewInWisconsin

    There’s such a thing as a “Professor of Gaming”?

    “I guess I just wasn’t made for these times.”

    • #18
  19. tigerlily Member
    tigerlily
    @tigerlily

    Frank Soto (View Comment):

    C. U. Douglas (View Comment):
    Some I’ve noted have argued, “How can you be against antifa? Why they are against fascists!

    Stalin was history’s greatest anti-fascist.

    He pretty much invented the genre.

    • #19
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