On the other hand it annoys some of the most insufferable humans on the planet. As a ham who’s not a boomer who would gladly die with the airwaves silent but compliant with rules and regulations established assuming usage of the spectrum would grown instead of dwindle I encourage it. Fuck ‘em.
They were the initial source, TF’s reporting added some questions around what exactly this could mean in practice for VPNs that span multiple countries, which most do. It sounds like the bill (unsurprisingly) isn’t well-considered and will have problems in practice.
Nobody reporting on this has mentioned Tor yet, which could be seen as a VPN serving many users (including many involved in intelligence work). That’s going to create some interesting fights.
Are you doubting the power of cloth bags and reusable drinking straws? Ethical consumption matters! I only buy products with green colors and “natural” looking fonts, that way I know that I’m not contributing to climate change. (Oh and although I drive a Tesla, I bought it before Elon went crazy, tee-hee.)
If only everyone would round up to the nearest dollar at checkout, we could end poverty!
Georgist-style LVT would also solve the problem, fairly quickly. Many owners would rush to sell to developers or build additional units where space allows.
I see what you’re saying, but true stateless people often have a different problem on their hands, because most countries won’t allow them entry at all unless they can get refugee status, and they will often be denied basic rights.
Some people actually voluntarily seek statelessness, but they’re either crazy or have enough resources to fly under the radar somewhere.
Snowden’s status is more of a political exile. Theoretically he could return legally and safely if there was a complete regime change where the new regime was aligned with his beliefs and actions, although the chances of this happening are approximately zero.
Yeah, Snowden was lucky he wasn't, by definition, stateless, otherwise Russia may not have offered him asylum. They got to piss off the US by doing so.
Epstein was primarily a money man, but you’ll notice that this gets zero coverage. I guarantee there’s a lot of serious dirt there that will never see the light of day.
It’s almost better for the people involved if the public keeps focusing on the most outrageous aspects of the story. (And it is quite outrageous, and terrible, to be fair.)
Not just Assange, basically everyone involved except maybe Poitras took a hit. Appelbaum was driven out of his work with Tor (and from public life) after a smear campaign, Greenwald had to shift to alt media, and Snowden had to flee the country. Other journalists and editors “moved on” from their work with the papers.
Snowden did ask them not to get into any direct military secrets that were in the leaks, so that could explain some of the restraint.
That's a pretty generous and kind way to say "became a far-right lunatic regurgitating the same talking points you see from AfD politicians". I don't know what the hell happened to that guy. But he clearly went off the deep end.
... but only after making $400K+/year for seven years, winning a Pulitzer Prize, and then CHOOSING to leave The Intercept because they wouldn't publish his extreme far-right lunatic stuff. If Greenwald isn't currently doing well, I don't think you can really say that it was because of the Snowden papers.
As I recall he became fixated on the contents of Hunter Biden's laptop, to the extent that he got himself fired from The Intercept over it. Maybe he saw the pictures of naked Biden and became absolutely obsessed with the photo gallery of coke and dong.
Hard to say whether he resigned, or "resigned". And I'm not sure there's a huge difference, practically speaking. By Greenwald's account, it was the former, I think. Either way, he took his marbles and went home. In fairness, I can imagine why, after having spent 7 years of his life mining through the Snowden archive, spending another few years mining the Biden hard disk might have been attractive.
It would probably be more accurate to say that for some time, his politics (opposing the Iraq war & the surveillance state) looked sympathetic to many people. His later embrace of Trump & Putin rather undermined the idea that his politics was based on deep libertarian principles.
But in reality he had already done some fairly vile things by then already, e.g.:
* Defending murderous Neo Nazis (not vile in itself, they need lawyers too) while calling their victims “odious and repugnant”.
* Running escort websites and producing cinematic masterpieces such as “Piss Boys in Love”, both with the involvement of his then-boyfriend and later husband David Miranda, under circumstances that seem rather exploitative of the Brazilians involved.
Defending your client is not vile, and making statements that contribute towards that defense is part of the game, even if they are harsh.
Funny to see someone who seems to be on the left engaging in “kink-shaming.” Glenn has the right to a personal sexual life, including whatever exotic sexual proclivities he may have. Frankly, the film you mentioned sounds pretty tame for gay porn.
I am not party to all the information, but he was never charged for the alleged misconduct and Die Zeit’s investigation didn’t find it convincing. Given how the Assange allegations fell apart, I think there’s a non-zero possibility that it was a defamation campaign.
He didn’t help himself with some public conduct/comments that painted him unfavorably. So there is that aspect to consider. But the scope of the campaign against him felt excessive at the time, to me.
One of the accusers refused to sign their written statement, then disappeared. The other kept making contradictory statements and changed her story, and recently said she was “happy” that he was free, although she did not recant her accusation. Prosecutors also allegedly changed one of the statements to make it sound more serious, per the later UN investigation.
They put out an Interpol notice and had him on the “most wanted” list for this, which is ridiculous. There is documented communication between the UK’s Crown Prosecution Service and Swedish authorities where the CPS is goading the Swedes into continuing the case, warning them not to get “cold feet.”
The prosecution eventually dropped the case because they believed that the evidence was too weak, blaming the long gap in time. I’m not clear on how they thought the passage of time had weakened their evidence, which was limited to victim statements from the very beginning, AFAIK.
A longish life has taught me to believe vulerable women who open themselves to ridicule, mistreatment and attack for outing more-powerful men who harmed them.
The women who outed Jason Applebaum knowingly opened themselves to some harsh treatment. I believe them.
>A longish life has taught me to believe vulerable women who open themselves to ridicule, mistreatment and attack for outing more-powerful men who harmed them.
A longish life has taught me to cast a very skeptical eye on anyone who comes out of the woodwork to cast evidence-free allegations on people who have raised the ire of the entire "national security" establishment.
Many believed the women who accused Assange of rape also that led to the bogus charges that had him imprisoned in an Embassy and then a British dungeon for years.
>who craft no end of reasons to not believe them.
The reason is that these allegations surfaced after he aroused the ire of the national security state. That's the end of the reason.
There's a huge component of the left which is quite directly 'anti-authority', which they see in 'the right' in classical form.
It's a form of personal identity less than ideology.
You can spot them often by their total silence on Russian (or Chinese) Imperialism (and racism), as they try to blame the CIA for all the world's problems.
His politics have been remarkably consistent over time. He’s always been a slightly left-leaning, anti-war civil libertarian who is deeply suspicious of government, particularly the US government. He’s been posting lately about how Trump has been starting or expanding unjust wars and cracking down on press freedom. That’s hardly a “right-wing fringe” slant.
Since 2016, he's appeared repeatedly in conservative outlets (including pushing conspiracy theories about Ukraine), gotten fired for uncritically pushing unsubstantiated claims from the Trump campaign as journalism, hosted a video podcast giving a voice to folks like RFK Jr.
Other than speaking up against the surveillance state, he's been solidly aligned with conservative viewpoints.
I'm not the biggest fan of him, but him showing up on conservative outlets because the other ones wouldn't platform him (due to going against US Dept of State propaganda) does not mean he is "conservative".
Please make an actual argument; tell us what "conservative" views he holds.
The source of that talking point was a young black protester who wanted real investment into black communities to stop the biggest killer of black Americans: criminals in their own communities. He wanted a structural solution rather than a media circus about an issue (police violence) that is minuscule in comparison to structural racism and would be rotated out of the conversation as soon as the media moved on.
Greenwald's main point seems to be that the conversation about race was used cynically to attack one of his coworkers for completely spurious reasons, and I don't see anything false about that.
If anything, ignoring the cycles of crime and poverty that black Americans are disproportionately victim to in favor of occasional media spectacles is completely on brand for America's dominant right wing neoliberal ideology.
Unfortunately to many, everything is a team sport, and that isn't an accident. It is a result of decades of carefully crafted propaganda by the powers-that-be. It's why otherwise intelligent people repeat idiotic tropes like "echoing propaganda", because a designated bad person says something, by definition that statement is false and making any similar statement puts you in league with that bad person and makes you bad. It's also an easy way to dismiss objectively factual statements and arguments without substantively engaging with them in any way. The same goes for appearing on outlets that are considered to be on the other team, working with someone on the other team on an issue (even if that issue isn't itself objectionable) and even talking cordially with members of the other team. It is an incredibly useful way to keep people on board with whatever team play is called by the team owners and also keep them from developing or expressing any independent thoughts whatsoever.
Glenn, along with many others in the left-libertarian camp, correctly identified that “wokeness” was being used to fracture the left between the old guard, focused on economic justice and ending imperialism, and the “groups” who focused solely on racial and cultural agendas and were actively hostile towards traditional left agendas. These groups were also often hostile towards traditional liberal concepts of rights, such as freedom of speech and equal treatment under the law.
I agree that his reporting on this was sub-par. It’s not his beat and he should probably leave it to others.
Yep, exactly. People who aren't super familiar with American propaganda often don't appreciate this enough, but every stupid network here will feature you if you pissed off the other team, and when Biden's necrotic ass is overseeing our waning genocidaire state, anyone who speaks out against his baby annihilation tendencies is going to end up having to slum it up on Fox because they're desperate enough to feature you.
He endorsed Bernie through 2023 when he (accurately) noted Sanders shifting away from anti-war/anti-imperialism positions, which seems to be Greenwald’s #1 focus. He was opposed to what he saw as the Biden admin’s role in perpetuating the Russia-Ukraine conflict and Biden-era “counter-disinformation” initiatives, which he is unsurprisingly opposed to. He maintains these positions under Trump while conservatives have moved against them; they are not “conservative” positions.
I’m not opposed to people hosting interviews with political opponents, and reasonable people shouldn’t be opposed to that either.
By 2023, it's not "hosting interviews with political opponents" - it's obvious that giving a voice and publicity to people like RFK Jr. is actively harmful to society. Freedom of speech means we don't throw RFK in jail, but no one has to publicize his views.
I disagree with you. It’s important to understand the perspectives of people actively involved in politics. Even (perhaps especially) those with fringe beliefs.
In the past, I would have agreed with you. But I've seen that argument used in bad faith so many times since 2000, I've come to see it as an excuse to introduce bad ideas and move the overton window. Every oligarch seems to be in favor of absolute freedom of speech until they control the media in question, then it's hard right for thee.
See that's the thing: bad faith requests for presence in the marketplace of ideas almost always more the discourse towards authoritarian views, reactionary and racist views. Smashing it metaphorically means that monarchists and authoritarians flood the marketplace with garbage.
We as a society still have the idea that we must protect ourselves from socialist and communist views, but we have no similar immune system for reactionary authoritarianism.
Socialist, communist, and reactionary views should all be equally allowed, along with bizarre views like Posadism and whatever Alex Jones believes.
I want to see a debate stage with Haz Al-Din, AOC, Ezra Klein, Thomas Massie, Curtis Yarvin, and Nick Fuentes. Let the best one win.
> We as a society still have the idea that we must protect ourselves from socialist and communist views
And this is why only reactionaries gain a foothold. Powerful people benefit from it, so reactionary views are let in while the rest of the “window” remains intact. Smash the window.
I think actually discussing and debating things is precisely how you get an informed society. We only need be concerned when people 'begin by denouncing all argument, or forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments with force.' That certainly doesn't seem to be the case with RFK, to say the least.
Your comment reminds me of a joke from the Soviet Union: "This is Armenian Radio; our listeners asked us: Was it possible to criticize Hitler? We’re answering: Sure. The same way as you criticized Stalin. You had to lock yourself in your bedroom, hide under two, or better three covers, place a pillow, or better two pillows on top of the blankets over your head, and then whisper whatever your soul wishes about the dictator, strictly adhering to a five-minute limit." [1]
The USSR had constitutionally enshrined freedom of speech: "Article 50. In accordance with the interests of the people and in order to strengthen and develop the socialist system, citizens of the USSR are guaranteed freedom of speech, of the press, and of assembly, meetings, street processions and demonstrations." [2] But there are rights, and then there is ability to exercise those rights.
I'm not entirely sure I'd agree with that definition of sealioning, but I'll respond to your definition. In general I see nothing wrong with pushing an agenda, so long as one is not simply ignoring other possibilities. For instance no less than Einstein rejected, to his death, a probabilistic interpretation of quantum mechanics.
All of those famous quotes like 'God does not play dice' or 'Spooky action at a distance' were mocking and sardonic swipes at alternative views, alternative views which were overwhelmingly supported by evidence, and ones that eventually we came to hold as most correct. He simply believed that the universe must be deterministic and rational.
And I don't think he did anything wrong there. The quotes were sardonic, but he genuinely engaged in good faith against different views - even if it would probably have been impossible to sway him from his own. And that's okay - people can see the world in different ways. And while evidence must be weighted, it need not dictate one's views.
That's what sealioning does. It makes it seem like you're ignoring a possibility unless you wholeheartedly engage with a disingenuous possibility. I'd get banned from HN if I tried to demonstrate because I'm not very good at it, but the original comic that coined the term is good.
The original comic didn't really resonate with me for a couple of reasons. The first is that the obvious metaphors it seems to have (which I assume you're alluding to here) are in quite poor taste. The second is because I think public debate is critical for a healthy society, and so am quite averse to anything that justifies making statements and then being unwilling to engage with challenges to them. Obviously outright harassment would be not only wrong but also illegal, so I think that's largely a nonexistent extreme.
In general I think if people were more regularly challenged on their claims, it might help reign in some of the self radicalization, intolerance, and so forth that's growing in society. When somebody only acknowledges 'friendly' voices, you end up in a scenario where they're effectively surrounding themselves with a baseline that's heavily biased, but that baseline will (from their perspective) be normal. That's just not healthy.
I think they're currently victims of a genocidal effort, but also like most conflicts it's one where both sides can be wrong. The narrative of good guys and bad guys is always shown to be nonsense in hindsight.
RFK was also a lifelong Democrat. Not that long ago anti-war, pro free speech, anti 'big brother', anti illegal-immigration, anti political violence, anti mega-corp (especially big pharma), and other such stuff was all part of a very typical liberal 'resume.' Now it's more or less the exact opposite on many of these points.
It's not people's views that are really changing, but those of the parties. A complete liberal from not that long ago would now be deemed a conservative by the DNC. I think that's a problem for the DNC that needs to be tackled, because it's self defeating.
2028, after this presidency, should be an overwhelmingly massive landslide the likes of Reagan-Mondale. But it's going to be a coin flip, and this sort of otherizing is precisely why.
RFK is a socialite born into centre left 'American Nobility', who, throughout his life was able to get by by being 'the face' of whatever organization, on the magazine cover of whatever.
Eventually, he touched a real nerve by speaking against vaccines, and had an instant following of very devoted crazy people.
He grifted that carefully for a while and partnered with DJT - a very similar kind of grifter of a different kind.
Neither of them are particularly principled, it's not reasonable to put them into some kind of camp.
RFK probably does have some very legit ideas about 'organic and environmentalism' I have no doubt, but they're behind layers of egoistic and geriatric incoherence. Just like DJT.
Greenwald might be just as close to RFK than he is to Snowden, who is relatively consistent. (Assange surely is).
Or, perhaps people can see the same evidence and come to different perspectives and conclusions. All without it being some malicious conspiracy, insanity, stupidity, or however you would like to frame it. If you look at society on a holistic level, it looks pretty bad. Mental illness rates are skyrocketing, testosterone is plummeting, IQ is declining, obesity is skyrocketing, and so on and so forth. The status quo isn't doing so hot.
Why? Well it's fairly obvious that some things like the internet are having some sort of a role, but in general nobody knows for certain. And so it's, at the minimum, quite reasonable to suggest that something, or more likely - some thingS, that we believe are completely safe, are not.
In living memory we believed that lobotomy was a great idea as a cure for various mental issues, that DDT was perfectly harmless - to the point that you'd have children playing in the large DDT fog clouds from neighborhood sprays, and so on. To imagine we now aren't doing the same thing, in ways that will seem equally absurd in the future, requires quite an unreasonable degree of arrogance and/or ignorance of the past and present.
"It's obvious that the internets is doing something so let's blame vaccines for autism ...
... because hey, look at the thing we used to do that was bad!"
Is exactly the kind of absolutely horrible logic that RFK Jr. spews to his acolytes that causes the problems.
It's fine to be be an antagonist, but you have to have a high bar, which RFK Jr does not have, therefore, he's a liar and a scammer, along with the rest of them.
He's chosen for his position for his 'Tabloid PR' and appeal to people who want 'slogan solutions' to problems of our era.
We have to understand things before we start throwing around sand.
Are you capable of having a debate without relying on straw men and ad hominem? You probably lack the ability to understand how you seem to people who don't already agree with you. This sort of behavior and attitude is why 2028 will be close, even though it shouldn't be.
You need to look up what 'ad hominem' and 'straw' men are because you've also misused those terms.
--> "Why? Well it's fairly obvious that some things like the internet are having some sort of a role," <--
This is nonsense. That's not sraw man or ad hominem.
Your attempt to defend RFK Jrs nonsense and misrepresentation of reality, but using your own 'stream of consciousness logic' is exactly the problem with RFK Jr himself. Done with bad faith, at scale, it's destructive tabloidism.
>A complete liberal from not that long ago would now be deemed a conservative by the DNC.
You say this like it isn't inherent to the nature of liberalism versus conservatism. A liberal of a prior generation is almost always conservative compared to liberals of the current generation. It just feels different this time because you're actually witnessing it change in real time rather than learning about it from history.
But in this case we're rather going in quite the opposite direction! For instance broad opposition to free speech has no place in any sort of formulation of liberalism, and so you find yourself in a scenario where a certain brand of liberal today would hold values deemed quite conservative, even by the standards of the past.
But this is also not particularly unprecedented. In the early 20th century the Republican and Democrat parties largely swapped roles. There was no formal agreement or acknowledgement of such. It happened quite organically, spurred along by decades of relatively significant events. I think we're seeing the outlines of such happening again, in much the same way.
When one debates aforementioned 'certain brand' types today, it often feels like a blast to the past. They share many of the characteristics of the die hard conservatives of times past - self assuredness bordering on divine authority, seemingly blissful ignorance of their numerous self-declared 'enemies', that trademark rabid intolerance, and more. The main thing that's changed is the dogma of choice.
First, the conversation was about the DNC, so what centrist Dems think is more important than "Progressives, radlibs, and the ultra-left". But beyond that, what specific policies are you talking about? Because without naming specific parts of the DNC platform, what you're saying sounds completely indistinguishable from "my niece corrected my pronoun usage and that made me angry".
Your point about the DNC is taken, although these groups do have sway there, as Yglesias often complains about.
Support for hate speech laws is common among leftists who primarily focus on social causes, as is support for “deplatforming” political opponents. Some also support German-style laws regarding politically extreme speech, which is funny, because those laws would almost certainly be used against them if they weren’t plainly unconstitutional.
I'm afraid I'm still not following you. In what previous generation did conservatives support hate speech laws? Because the topic being discussed was how a position can gradually over time change from liberal to conservative or vice versa. And from my perspective, it seems like you're just jumping at an opportunity you saw to complain about some fringe leftist position that you don't like.
> Who besides the conservatives right now is broadly opposed to free speech?
But to answer your question about conservative opposition to free speech, some conservatives are now showing support for hate speech laws, specifically laws against antisemitic speech, which is new. So this is actually a current “both sides” issue. Time will tell if the poles fully reverse on this; I think it depends on what form post-Trump politics takes.
Edit: wow, TIL. Apparently there were local laws against “race hatred” on the books in the early 1900s, and some conservative segregationists found that they could use those laws against “anti-white” speech (like supporting integration) in the 40s and 50s. So believe it or not, they became supportive of these laws until the Warren court overturned them, thanks to the work of the ACLU.
Mind you their version of "antisemitism" that they are banning is not hate speech, it is actually the opposite of hate speech and their ban makes hate speech mandatory.
Fair enough if you consider your comment a start of a new thread, but that is ignoring the context in which the comment you replied was made.
>specifically laws against antisemitic speech
As a Jewish person, I have a bridge that fights antisemitism to sell you if you genuinely believe this. Just the simple fact that they are only against antisemitism and not all hate speech should tell you there is no genuine conservative desire for hate speech laws. And your second example is just more evidence of that. Conservatives cynically abusing existing laws does not show a conservative value eventually becoming liberal or vice versa. You can argue it shows how these laws create problems, but it isn't evidence of any sort of switch in values.
This is similar to how many on the left don’t believe that “hate speech” restrictions should apply to speech against whites. This is the problem with laws that apply to the realm of speech and ideas; it is a very small step towards abuse that undermines equal treatment under the law, the free exchange of information, and the democratic process.
Both major US factions like to use selective enforcement and/or targeted taxation or regulation to attack their political rivals, while wrapping their actions in flowery language. This is a longstanding tradition here. If you don’t see it, I urge you to take a closer look and shed your bias.
Edit: I’ll add that this selective application is probably what creates the illusion of a change in values. In reality, it’s two tribes jockeying for power using whatever tools happen to be in front of them; naturally, the available tools shift over time. The ideological justification for a particular position or action is created after the fact.
>This is similar to how many on the left don’t believe that “hate speech” restrictions should apply to speech against whites.
These comparisons always seem to set up an equivalency between mainstream Republicans saying something extreme and what a random leftist said to their 50 followers on Bluesky. Like seriously, what mainstream Democrat is advocating for hate speech laws which only apply to non-white people?
Officially, there were only some small things like a house resolution that supported one-sided (minority only) hate crime protection, as well as some papers and op-eds that suggested that hate crime protection should only apply to minorities. These were about hate crimes, not hate speech, of course. It’s been a while, and I can’t find any records of statements from mainstream Dems.
What I saw in my personal experience was an army of trolls baiting this kind of response from left activists, with identity-focused activists readily complying, and with others then amplifying the message through retweets. Including many who should have known better, people I had formerly respected. There was zero condemnation or pushback on this from nearly anyone on the left, in fact there was often a sort of winking agreement with the message by the time it had trickled up to candidates and officials.
The worst offenders were the grifters in the “white fragility” consulting sphere, for obvious reasons.
Anyway, just because it’s more subtle doesn’t mean it’s not still an issue. Republicans are almost always less subtle about terrible things they believe or do; this does seem to be true in general. It’s only rarely that you can get Dem officials to say awful things like “turns out I’m really good at killing people” or “we came, we saw, he died.” This is made worse by the lack of a substantial platform or position statement in many campaigns nowadays, so it’s hard to identify what anyone really stands for at all.
Feel free to take your point on this, as I have no hard proof. But I and many others saw this happen first hand.
>Anyway, just because it’s more subtle doesn’t mean it’s not still an issue. Republicans are almost always less subtle about terrible things they believe or do; this does seem to be true in general. It’s only rarely that you can get Dem officials to say awful things like “turns out I’m really good at killing people” or “we came, we saw, he died.”
It seems like you are very close to getting it, so maybe spend some time brainstorming on possible reasons why Republican politicians say "terrible... awful things" much more frequently than Democratic politicians. There's probably some other explanation there outside one side simply enjoying subtlety more than the other for no particular reason.
If you look at actions rather than words, Dems have been equally complicit in the things that are destroying the country, namely the offshoring of US industry and weakening of domestic labor, privatization of public services (especially Clinton/Third Way), the financialization of the US economy, the expansion of the security state (especially Obama), the erosion of civil liberties, the continuation of “forever wars.” They also failed to correct course after the GFC, despite holding the trifecta, probably dooming the country in the long run by using endless QE to temporarily float the economy. We needed a hard landing and we didn’t get one.
The one good thing I have to say about the Republicans is at least they don’t fuck around. They are speedrunning the inevitable collapse, and we might actually be better off for it. With the rate they are going, there will be no time to finish constructing a fully integrated police state before the bottom falls out.
I think a practical issue you have to deal with on this sort of topic is what is done versus what is said. Illegal immigration is a great example. There's no part of any official DNC that overtly supports illegal immigration, yet policies and behaviors show an intent to enable and facilitate exactly that.
On the speech issue, here [1] is a rather great bit on DNC efforts to censor speech by the WSWS/World Socialist Web Site. The article mentions the ongoing obsession with censoring "disinformation" when disinformation itself is often little more than truths that counter the official lies of the day.
Be afraid, folks. Don’t read about the man behind the curtain, you’re better off knowing nothing. I’m sure everything is a-ok even without public supervision. Trust the authorities.
I read the GGP comment several times and I still have no idea what their point is.
Bait… Pegasus… honeypot? What? Decoding: is this indicating you’re ready with the honeypot to detect attempts to compromise you? Still makes little sense.
What democratically supervised institutions are being alluded to?
It's perfectly coherent to anyone who understands a) what a state is and b) not all states are equally bad. States are by their nature, necessarily violent. Their primary purpose is to prevent lethal intergroup violence and blood feuds. One doesn't do this merely by asking nicely. This is where the violence comes in. At some level this tradeoff is baked into every human, as with most pack animals. It's why so much of violence is posturing - ie creating off-ramps to bad trades.
The bait/honeypot part should be the least controversial element to someone with your apparent sentiments. This is a rather common tactic, likely around as old as states themselves.
None of this is to excuse or endorse any action. Just because states are observed to be certain way does not create some normative statement. I'm simply pointing out the coherence of the comment you alleged had none.
> Their primary purpose is to prevent lethal intergroup violence and blood feuds.
A state's primary purpose is to maintain a territorial monopoly on legitimate violence and to secure its continued existence. Generally this is at odds with its founding myth, but it's pretty obvious that states are also subject to a process that resembles evolution by natural selection. That said, I'm not even aware of any notable state or state-like entity that was created with the goal of "ending blood feuds". The vast majority of these territorial monopolies were created by means of conquest where the goal was to acquire resources owned by the people in some territory or with the goal of pooling resources to defend against such conquest.
> maintain a territorial monopoly on legitimate violence
For what purpose? Seems strange you start here and then need me to connect the dot to blood feuds.
We are saying the same thing. If adjoining families take it upon themselves to engage in blood feuds this is in direct conflict with the state's "monopoly on legitimate violence".
The point of the phrase is to convey that the only legitimate violence in the conception of the state is the state's own violence, or in some select cases (self-defense being one) violence the state explicitly grants or endorses. The monopoly on violence is thus sort of required when deriving the moral theory. The states violence is by definition legitimate in its own eyes. The monopoly is the operative part - there can be no competing violence. This is perfectly coherent, whereas a competing "legitimate" violence would not compute given the internal logic of the state itself. It would be existential.
This is the basic germ of politics. Prevent small conflicts within a group from escalating and prevent external domination. I mentioned both. Again, not sure where you see disagreement between our views. Preventing conquest by a roving band is compatible with my view. If the conquering entity is a state then my contention would be the process of stopping blood feuds would have already occured (among the conquering people) as that is what law and order is, which is sort of a prerequisite to effective armies. You don't get to just kill the person who killed your brother absent state intervention, because such acts have a way of spinning out of control. Justice is the province of the state alone. Of course, blood feuds still happen. Occasionally they are even legitimized (as is necessarily the case with this sort of intervention) by the state. But as state power increases, the space for this sort of violence shrinks. Once again, tacking on "legitimate" to "monopoly of violence" often confuses the point. The point is the state requires that all violence it does not sanction is necessarily illegitimate. There is a nice circular logic here, evocative of the phrase "the house always wins".
Put another way - when the state does it, it's not illegal. Those who control the state control the law.
> Their primary purpose is to prevent lethal intergroup violence and blood feuds.
[citation needed]
Historically, at least initially, their primary purpose was to allow tribes to organize themselves in a way that would support labor-intensive farming practices. Large-scale early grain farming was not possible without an organized state.
As technological complexity grew, states grew as well. I’d argue that the closest thing to a primary “purpose” for states (not that there is one, states evolved organically) is to maintain the organization of industrial supply chains that perpetuate modern life. Defense is secondary; still important, but this comes after ensuring that resources are available to sustain life.
States are currently the primary perpetuators of violence, and they are presently faltering at their job of maintaining global resource flows, thanks to all the violence. If they fail completely, we all lose.
Humorous rejoinder to complain of my own lack of citation and then responding with an ostensibly competing theory while offering no citation of your own.
Perhaps it is because you are aware that the two go hand in hand?
As to the rest of it, it sort of fails the historical test on its face. States have been around since well before Christ. Your disappointment with contemporary geopolitics ("all the violence"), economics ("industrial supply chains ") or whatever other ills you discover in your "modern life" are irrelevant to the question of state formation. Your contention of states creating more violence has also been debunked. Obviously there is more violence with more people. People are violent. On a per capita basis, states reduce violence. There is a rather well known book on this that was somewhat recently published that I strongly suspect you are aware of.
I sympathize with your disappointment. Do try to cheer up. The easiest way is to realize that despite everything, there are few eras where you would actually prefer to live instead. Certainly if you had no control over your social class, precise geographical location, or had up to give or take 100 years of variance baked into your somewhat errant time machine.
If you ran the same algorithm on the present age you would have a better shot at a pleasurable life than most humans could have ever dreamed for most of human history. If you require a citation for this we should probably just agree to disagree. Have a nice day.
868 worldwide cultures studied btw. For the majority, grain farming emerges with state formation—the two are inextricably linked. And for most of the others the fledgling state quickly adopts grain farming to feed itself, which forms the basis for the organization of the state.
It’s true that the seed of the state is a group of armed people threatening the rest into paying them a tribute. But without organized farming, groups like this quickly degenerate into roving bandit gangs. It’s not the core of the system, the organizing principle.
A canonical example is the Chinese Xia period, generally considered to be the initial period of state formation in China. Chinese state formation accompanied large scale projects to dam rivers, which controlled floods while providing irrigation for intensive agriculture. Complex organization and resource allocation was required to navigate this process. Before this period, there were warlords and armies, but no known organized states.
On the topic of violence—states can dish out violence on a scale far surpassing that of individuals or small groups. Industrial militaries and nuclear weapons multiply this potential. All of the largest slaughters in history were wrought by states. Ignoring this is willful blindness. States are not these wonderful things that prevent violence, they just redirect and reshape the violence. Humans are violent, with or without states.
> Bayesian phylogenetic analyses indicate that intensive agriculture was as likely the result of state formation as its cause. By contrast, grain cultivation most likely preceded state formation.
It seems you hold a much stronger position than the paper you cite. Anyway paper's interesting, thanks.
reply