Charlottesville, Virginia [Ban The Klan?]

[AmateurEmale]

I would like to start a new thread about the deadly rioting in Charlottesville, Virginia within the last week.

The riot started over a demonstration about the old statue commemorating an American Civil War general, which anti-racists wanted to remove, and the pro-Confederate / alt-right / white supremacists protested.

Then the far-left group known as Anti-Fascist Action (aka. "Antifa") were on the streets, and there was a riot.

So far, at least three people have been pronounced dead.

Does anyone think that the alt-right or Klan should be banned in this day and age for the potential to incite a riot, or do you think they should have free speech?

And if the right wing cannot protest, what happens to the left-wing protestors?

I'd like to start a civil debate about the rights (or conversely, the limitations) of protesting about race or religion, which are two explosively unpopular subjects for debate.

[Mal Hombre]

The Klan have never been legal:
"While President, Ulysses S. Grant destroyed the terrorizing Ku Klux Klan to protect the lives of the freed former slaves. But with the intensely disputed presidential election of 1876 to succeed him in office came the “Compromise of 1877," which gave the White House to the Republican candidate in exchange for the removal of Grant’s federal soldiers from the South and the return of complete control of the region to the racist Southern Democrats. This end of the Reconstruction period enabled the Klan eventually to rise again and to terrorize and murder Blacks until President Lyndon Johnson used the FBI to destroy the Klan a second time, almost 100 years later."

https://www.rutherford.org/publicati...reciated_and_u

[cicciobuki]

I don't see how banning the klan would really change or solve anything.

[Silicone Carne]

Banning the Klan will still be a good start. It might not be a fundamental change but at least they'd stop saying and doing stupid and horrendous things with the so-called Free Speech protection. It's a paradoxal thing to think about but "free speech" should be controled.
Well done Donald! Into only 6 months you let racists morons walking in the streets and you raised the fear of a potential nuclear war.
That's just my opinion.

[Sir Honkers]

Originally Posted by plastic tiffani

Banning the Klan will still be a good start. It might not be a fundamental change but at least they'd stop saying and doing stupid and horrendous things with the so-called Free Speech protection. It's a paradoxal thing to think about but "free speech" should be controled.
Well done Donald! Into only 6 months you let racists morons walking in the streets and you raised the fear of a potential nuclear war.
That's just my opinion.

Actually it's not. A lot of us agree with you.

[scoundrel]

I find myself a little bit bemused by the Charlottesville story. On the one hand the display of tensions is pretty deplorable, and reminds me of the National Front marches which used to happen in the UK and the street fighting which frequently arose out of that.

On the other hand, I am not sure I see either the need or the useful purpose served in the proposal to remove the statue of General Robert E Lee. It strikes me as political correctness and historical revisionism and a denial of the past rather than an acceptance and coming to terms with the past. If it were General Nathan Bedford Forrest [founding father of the KKK] being removed, then I would understand. If it were a formal striking down of a Confederate flag, the emblem of the slave state rebellion, then I would understand. But General Lee? No I don't. I actually have sympathy with people who are offended by the removal of General Lee's statue. General Lee is an important figure in the history of the United States and was from Virginia, and all of his active service in the Civil War was leading the Army of Virginia and mostly spent defending, rightly or wrongly, the soil of Virginia. This is a real piece of American history and I feel no respect for the decision to try to rub it out. It stinks of lies, and I do not like it.

[bowlinggreen]

Personally, I am appalled by what has gone on in Charlottesville. People are losing their minds, it seems to me.

That said, I can't condone removing the right of free speech from any group, no matter how odious their beliefs. It's a treasured American institution, and one of the most important. We did enshrine that guarantee in our first constitutional amendment.

One you begin dictating what citizens may or may not express, you are on the road to tyranny. And that road leads to some very dark places, like Stalinist Russia or Nazi Germany.

[Silicone Carne]

That's Ouroboros because The problem is when you let people expressing their ideas in order to guarantee the 1st amendment, sometimes you let them saying things that should find their place between Stalinist Russia & Nazi Germany.
So maybe we should let the people speak but not at any cost. In some really free countries, you can do pretty much everything you want and almost say everything you want too. You can mock your president or everyone that govern you and nobody will sue you or kill you for that.
But still there are some existing laws that forbid you to tell statements that are considered racist, homophobic or else. And still, you live very very well in these countries.

[AmateurEmale]

@Everyone: Thank you for your above posts, expressing your opinions civilly.

I recall reading at OnTheIssues.org that Donald Trump once said of Confederate symbols such as the battle flag, statues of generals, etc., "[They] belong in museums, not in front of government buildings in the South." Undoubtedly, thinking people should ask Trump at his next press conference if he will hold the Southern states to this principle.

[Roubignol]

Originally Posted by plastic tiffani

That's Ouroboros because The problem is when you let people expressing their ideas in order to guarantee the 1st amendment, sometimes you let them saying things that should find their place between Stalinist Russia & Nazi Germany.
So maybe we should let the people speak but not at any cost. In some really free countries, you can do pretty much everything you want and almost say everything you want too. You can mock your president or everyone that govern you and nobody will sue you or kill you for that. b
But still there are some existing laws that fobid you tell statements that are considered racists, homophobic or else. And still, you live very very well in these countries.

Yep!

We don't have to forget that at the beginning of all the putches and revolutions, there only was a minority of Nazis in Germany, there only was a minority of Soviets in Russia, there only was a minority of Revolutionary people during the French Revolution, there only are a minority of fanatic Islamists in muslim countries.

But those fanatics often were (or are) brutal intolerant people. They are not pacific at all.

80 to 90% of the people don't want to cover their hands with blood or fight to death.

Originally Posted by bowlinggreen

One you begin dictating what citizens may or may not express, you are on the road to tyranny. And that road leads to some very dark places, like Stalinist Russia or Nazi Germany.

Speaking about a country that I know quite well: Switzerland. Nazis meetings and concerts are not allowed. And don't tell me that's this country is a dictature or a tyranny.
In a lot of Western European countries, we remember very well what happened in our continent about 80 years ago.
How can you be too permissive with the intolerants?

Apart that, rioters of all type must be condamned. Extreme left ones, like extreme right ones or .... in another way hooligans too.

If they really want to expose their views of life and convinced people, they have to pacifically do it with pens, ideas, speeches, but never with guns, fists or stones.