• themelm@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    Would that actually work? How long should the north have kept armies raised and occupied the south to completely root out all bad guys? How long of doing that before you become the bad guys? How would you keep the trials from just becoming witch hunts?

    • Facebones@reddthat.com
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      1 year ago

      You can’t throw the book at every vague supporter, but you CAN throw it at participants and organizers as a show of what the next guys will get.

      People would think twice about insurrection if everyone who J6ed faced charges as enemy combatants instead of the slap on the wrist crap most of them are getting.

      • jj4211@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        There’s a fine line to walk between letting folks off too easy and making it even worse by going scorched earth on them.

        If they were treated as enemy combatants with their rights as citizens revoked, then you are likely to inspire more anger and righteousness than fear.

        The mindset of those that are receptive to the position of the insurrectionists is that government is undemocratic, corrupt, and authorian against them. It deflates their position when those folks get due process and frequently get off with light sentences. Incidentally, a lot of the key people got 4 to 18 years in prison, hardly a slap on the wrist.

        Lots of precedent where any initial offense is forgotten in the wake of an oppressive response. The best results have been where the “victor” exhibits a reasonable response rather than trying to go all in, especially when you are dealing with millions of folks roughly on the side of the guilty.

        • Facebones@reddthat.com
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          1 year ago

          Sure, but by your logic - the initial offense has happened. An attempt against the government was made. We’ll see how the soft buttpat response goes.

          When they do it again - enemy combatants. Full stop. The anger and righteousness is already there, rooted in false narrative nonsense. You can’t buttpat your way out of that. If they get a buttpat, it’s cause the govt knows they’re right, and they’re emboldened. If you throw the book at em it’s cause the govt is against the people and they’re emboldened. They played their hand, and that hand is violence.

          Fuck em, hang em all - it’s what they were trying to do, it’s only fitting. No tolerance for the intolerant.

          • jj4211@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            I am a bit concerned that all this ire aimed at the plebes trying to storm the capitol building detracts from the more significant threat. They were trying to influence election officials to ‘come up with votes’ and failing that, forging fake electors into the process and refusing to certify results. The “white collar” attempts to subvert the election are a more significant threat than a bunch of randos trying to break into the capitol building.

            But with respect to the people storming the capitol building, as stated, key folks in that got years of prison time. I would consider that more than a “soft buttpat”. Nearly half of participants received at least some prison time.

            • Facebones@reddthat.com
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              1 year ago

              Oh they should 100% face the same fate. I’d say hang them too but I don’t have the easy line from treason to hanging that I do for people who actively participated in violence.

              This whole Democrat shtick of “we can’t say anything bad about Republicans or stop them from fucking everything because it’s undemocratic to be mean to fascists” needs to stop.

              If they try to subvert the process, lock them up for life. If their followers get mad and take action a la J6, take them down and take prisoners. They are enemies of this country, it’s time to treat them as such. We’ve tried giving an inch for decades and every time they take a mile.

    • rambaroo@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Oh give me a break with this bullshit. We got almost 100 years of Jim crow because racists and cowards like you were more worried about the feelings of white supremacists than doing the right thing. Reconstruction was working.

      • jj4211@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        If the south hadn’t even seceded, I guarantee you you would still have had those laws happen. The biggest difference would have been the south kept their slaves longer if they never seceded.

        Being too weak on human rights was the problem for Jim Crow, not being too weak on rebellion. The hypothetical occupiying armies would have been there to squash rebellion, not try to further elevate rights of the black population.

        While more equal rights might have been a more prevailing sentiment in the free states, they didn’t have the will to stand up for those equal rights in states hundreds of miles away. They might have managed to abolish slavery in 12 or so years federally if left to their own devices, but they weren’t going to police the nuance of citizens’ rights in states they knew so little about.