People don't seem to understand that the existence of fair laws and open courts perceived as just, and the end of vigilante justice/violence as dispute resolution aren't independent and coincidental occurrences. - ThreadSky

akivamcohen.bsky.social • 71 days ago

People don't seem to understand that the existence of fair laws and open courts perceived as just, and the end of vigilante justice/violence as dispute resolution aren't independent and coincidental occurrences.

Reposted from Nicholas Grossman

Don’t torch Teslas, don’t yell at officials in unofficial places (restaurants, airports, homes, etc), be civil — any stance along those lines is an appeal to democracy and rule of law.

That social contract is broken. No one’s immune from the consequences.

Not an endorsement. A what-did-you-expect.

Comments

dankeevy.bsky.social•71 days ago

Literally the reason why Ancient Greek and Roman Senators began meeting in public. Hell, even Babylonians held court in public to make sure that all could see the King, and that all could bring a matter. Combating vigilanteism is literally proto-law in the proto-cities.

cogitatorx.bsky.social•71 days ago

Be sure and behave. If history has taught us anything it’s that hierarchy respects polite dissent.

sharkhand.bsky.social•71 days ago

Yup.

duckduckalpaca.bsky.social•71 days ago

Definitely feels very "HECTOR LIVES" from Longmire. The people turn to him when they feel like the justice system has failed.

sunfolk.bsky.social•71 days ago

The virtue signaling is very nice, Akiva. But we both know that you will not win this war without people like us.

emhouston.bsky.social•71 days ago

The social contract has been broken for years. A trip to Europe will remind you how civilized we used to be and how courtesy was almost a default.

mpbmke.com•71 days ago

The descendants of the people who put these systems into place, who are tearing them down now, have forgotten that it was ultimately for *their* protection.

nakhthor.bsky.social•71 days ago

And vice versa. This is v bad

phillip-rees.bsky.social•71 days ago

It's been eight years and they still haven't learned.

"Well, it's a no win scenario until basically the elites figure out that at the end of the day, as I like to say to my Americans hedge fund friends, the Hamptons is not a defensible position." - Mark Blyth

https://youtu.be/nwK0jeJ8wxg?si=Oyq7yTRl0OStDop7

pdxcharlie.bsky.social•71 days ago

Musk, after illegally firing entire government agencies:

"They are literally burning down Tesla dealerships. This lawlessness must end!"

Laws for thee, but not for me.

ryanhumphrey.bsky.social•71 days ago

They’ve got the power, now they want the privilege

70bpmhiccups.bsky.social•71 days ago

Yea. Courts aren't just there to punish criminals. They're there to stop endless eye-for-an-eye bullshit by enabling a different course.

agusnox.bsky.social•71 days ago

I think the social contract has been broken for a long time

And it wasn’t the regular person who broke it

louisamiller.bsky.social•71 days ago

Who doesn't understand that?

odoyle62.bsky.social•71 days ago

The fish rots from the head down. The freak flags are flying unfettered now, and pulling back the sheets to reveal their blackened fangs.

pwnallthethings.bsky.social•71 days ago

one of the counterintuitive things about authoritarianism is that it sucks for everyone, quite literally up to and including the authoritarians themselves. Every dictator is paranoid; the pervasive fear that they create makes everyone less safe and more afraid, including themselves and their lackeys

grumpyrootbeer.bsky.social•71 days ago

Yes, but how else do you get that visceral thrill of total domination and supremacy?

pwnallthethings.bsky.social•71 days ago

Part of the reason authoritarians often want to rule for life is not just that they are massive narcissist who want to always be in charge, but also just that in a democratic society, it is very easy and very safe for leaders to retire. In an authoritarian one, it is often very literally unsafe

notredale.bsky.social•71 days ago

That’s why you have to loot the banana republic’s treasury and high tail it to a resort country before the revolution army knocks down the gates.

adamcobb.bsky.social•71 days ago

To quote David Mitchell in Unruly: “Guys like that don’t retire, they’re either still running the show or they’re dead”.

apearlma.bsky.social•71 days ago

Just wild that Musk, to use a specific example, could easily have coasted into being a world dominating trillionaire, mostly loved due to his actions on climate change, having the power of the U.S. being a democracy to protect him.

mbbrownsf.bsky.social•71 days ago

Being for the greater good or being for the greatest harm should be a simple choice to make, but…here we are. ☹️

carmenology.bsky.social•71 days ago

Like an addict chasing greater highs, money is no longer enough and he’s decided to chase power instead

docbohn.bsky.social•71 days ago

There's a line from a movie that sticks with me, even if I don't remember the movie. The real power-behind-the-throne, speaking to a dictator: "Don't forget: you're only President *for life*."

rexor12.bsky.social•70 days ago

James Bond: License to Kill

skwashd.wtf•71 days ago

Are you suggesting Trump could become America’s Ceaușescu?

snoffle.bsky.social•71 days ago

Or Silvio Berlusconi, always running from a fraud charge.

mongrel.bsky.social•71 days ago

Please do threaten me with a good time!

7leaguebootdisk.bsky.social•71 days ago

Nikita Khrushchev felt that he had succeeded because when he lost power, he was allowed to retire.

timothystamm101.bsky.social•71 days ago

Arguably, the Communist nations, when they were still communist were more oligarchies, so he could still retain some influence because there was no one center of power in the Soviet Union post Stalin even if they were authoritarian.

7leaguebootdisk.bsky.social•71 days ago

His point was that they didn't shoot him.

timothystamm101.bsky.social•71 days ago

Yes, and that was because they weren't exactly a dictatorship or the type of oligarchy where the ruler can never allow another center of power. They were authoritarian, but they were a one party state, not a cult of personality or some kind of absolutist or nearly so monarchy by another name.

sotsogm.bsky.social•70 days ago

Absolutely not ruling out the possibility all of this ends with Trump trying to get approval from another country's leaders to travel there for medical treatment.

glassbeads.dev•71 days ago

Precisely. They can only retire feet first, and they know that. So instead they choose to live in hell, completely out of touch with reality, and ready to create hell for others too.

andref1989.bsky.social•71 days ago

If there are no rules, there's nothing to protect you from retribution if you no longer wield power... You're subject to the same capricious disregard/malice said authoritarian subjected everyone else to.

mamofcocktails.bsky.social•71 days ago

Exactly. Government—the ve ry thing Elon hates—is essentially there to protect his property rights.

pwnallthethings.bsky.social•71 days ago

worse: you're a rival power center to whomever comes next

comaraster.bsky.social•71 days ago

Diocletian was the only successful autocrat who retired & lived to tell about it

andref1989.bsky.social•71 days ago

You move from the maker of *that* "list" to being top of said list

mdhaichin.bsky.social•71 days ago

They get to be afraid of not just their citizens overthrowing them, but also the possibility of their lackeys and supporters deciding to (fatally) overthrow them (and they have to work to keep them happy, because you can’t just kill/imprison all of them).

mdhaichin.bsky.social•71 days ago

Oh, and let’s not forget how militaries in dictatorships tend to be badly run because authoritarians are so afraid of a coup that they’ll promote incompetent loyalists and maybe even hobble their own forces so they can’t be turned against them!

nicholasgrossman.bsky.social•71 days ago

Live possibility this crowd really did tell themselves that they’d dictate and crime, institutions would tut tut them but be hamstrung by their own rules, and everyone else would just take it.

Fits with their extremely shallow, blustery conception of strength and weakness.

pwnallthethings.bsky.social•71 days ago

people whose most difficult hardships in life was dealing without wifi on a plane thinking they are the types of hardmen who know how to subordinate a nation longterm

boondock.bsky.social•71 days ago

I think it's funny that we're actually living in the "good times create weak men" but not in the way those sharing retvrn memes think. Like, look in the mirror RomanNatlist1488. You're the weak men. Just a bunch of bored people sold WW2 era valor their whole lives, trying to find it.

johncastiglione.bsky.social•71 days ago

Longterm is the key here. I think they are very much right that the comfort level of the average american is something that will delay a backlash (not to mention the average Dem in Congress). But it won't hold long term.

pwnallthethings.bsky.social•71 days ago

if it does, it will be by actual strongmen taking over, and ironically the regime leopards will then eat all the soft people who helped made it

findingtangle.bsky.social•71 days ago

Ahhhh this is so true 😂 😭

stitchingtwitcher.bsky.social•71 days ago

In all fairness, they’ve trained us to be this way. We are socialized to be “civil” (read: subservient/compliant) in the face of all manner of injustice.

We have a lot to unlearn,
fast.

chrononaut.bsky.social•71 days ago

Maintain their legitimacy as democratically elected government, use it as a bunch of lawless warlords = have their cake and eat it too

aih.bsky.social•71 days ago

what a lack of education in Arthur Harris Thought does to a mf

snootacamund.bsky.social•71 days ago

They venerate Putin and that’s pretty much a description of his rule so pretty good chance. Differences in economy, demographics and political history make it unlikely his model would work here but nevertheless they will persist.

timothystamm101.bsky.social•71 days ago

Yep, they don't have a populace that is trained to take this, and they don't have an economy that was literally only or mostly based on corrupt favors and deals.

3fecta.bsky.social•71 days ago

Have a feeling that WSJ and FOX are going to be gone after more often. It's already started, especially on tariffs. There will never be a point when they run out of new targets.

kylerich035.bsky.social•71 days ago

Rupert Murdoch is probably the one person alive most responsible for all this and at this point probably the one with the most power to end it.

rockshrimp.bsky.social•71 days ago

the thing about lists is you're always somewhere on them.

outpacingzeno.bsky.social•71 days ago

this same dynamic goes generally for all oppressive systems (which can be counteracted by material gains for oppressors, but still). oppression produces distrust, which produces isolation and interpersonal instability. people aim to oppress for instinctual reasons more than rational ones

davidesdale.bsky.social•71 days ago

Recently saw the movie "Julia" with Jane Fonda and Vanessa Redgrave the fear was palpable. 30's Europe

kidyossarian.bsky.social•71 days ago

In a similar fashion, a slow moving government, while not good in a ton of respects, is still preferable to one that sees wild swings in terms of policy, institutions, etc. No one wants a system where a binary choice is punished on each side depending on who is in power.

stevennicholson.bsky.social•71 days ago

A well-functioning democracy respects past mandates while allowing for evolution, not endless rollbacks. Without stability, governance becomes a cycle of political revenge. Unlike parliamentary systems, the US often sees policy whiplash, especially via exec action, undermining long-term progress.

neuraldog321.bsky.social•71 days ago

These are good arguments why voting reform should be the number 1 thing on people's minds on the other side of this.

Currently we have plurality voting that rewards extremism and whiplash, and mandates a 2-party system.

It needs fixed if we are gonna keep being a democracy

yinkadoubledare.bsky.social•71 days ago

Yeah, companies trying to destroy the NLRB and other labor protections forget that in the times before the NLRB and orderly labor law the workers would opt for things like "destroy the factory" and "burn down the bosses' houses" and other violence against management and ownership. It's not good!

chambersaurusrx.bsky.social•71 days ago

Like do they not remember strikes?? Homestead may have ultimately lost but also they turned a factory into a fortress and tried to light a barge of Pinkertons on fire

themattp.bsky.social•70 days ago

This has been the thing that has been nagging at the back of my head since week 2 or 3. It feels like an increase in violence is inevitable unless something happens very soon. Like there is one event just waiting to kick it off. And maybe it will be a blatant undeniable disregard of the law. So soon

pullingaclaudia.bsky.social•71 days ago

It’s like with all the escalation of union busting and retaliatory firings - I really don’t think anyone, but especially the bosses, are particularly going to enjoy a world where labor disputes get resolved the old-fashioned way.

goldtrashcan.bsky.social•71 days ago

The rich need to understand that law and order protects them a hell of a lot more than the average Joe

davidstoptalking.bsky.social•71 days ago

It’s a shame they intentionally don’t teach the history of unions in the US. We went from a system where both sides have their armies to one where things were negotiated in a conference room. We can alway revert

sarwark.org•71 days ago

People aren't going to like what replaces the rule of law.

antiquequaalude.bsky.social•70 days ago

Yeah it breaks my brain when people don't understand this very simple concept. There's a contract and you're stupid if you keep trying to pretend it exists when it very clearly no longer does. You're going to get your clock cleaned if you keep living in that fantasy.

bkelsey91.bsky.social•71 days ago

If Trump is breaking the law, why does it matter?

grungehamster.bsky.social•71 days ago

Pretty sure his point is civil society needs a social contract and these chuckleheads think tamping down harder will bring the people they are anxious about in society in line rather than invite more chaos.

mtblah.bsky.social•71 days ago

And in the US, where gun ownership is so incredibly pervasive, reinstating vigilante justice is an even more scary proposition

neuraldog321.bsky.social•71 days ago

The more the current regime cracks down on the first amendment, the more people will look towards the second.

grungehamster.bsky.social•71 days ago

Part of why the "Purge" thing never clicked with me. The first film's "twist" that the vigilante justice works because it allows for the elimination of undesirable people misses that the powers that be have the most to lose to lawlessness and "I will install a panic room" doesn't fix it.

iamschrodinger.bsky.social•71 days ago

The same law that binds them protects them. If it doesn't bind them, it also doesn't protect them.

neuraldog321.bsky.social•71 days ago

Autocrats want to be protected by the law but not bound by it, and want to be served by those who are bound but not protected by it.

iamschrodinger.bsky.social•71 days ago

That is what they want, but that is not how it works. That is why Gaddafi met his end being torn apart, and Saddam was dragged out of a hole.

kenburnside.bsky.social•71 days ago

I recommend "The Dictator's Handbook."

It's a fantastic toolkit for writing plausible dystopias in fiction.

"Why Nations Fail" by Acemoglu is a great resource for writing revolutions and how they partially succeed and often fall to dictatorships.

I suspect you've read at least one of them.

jmsantiago.bsky.social•71 days ago

📌

scoutsaber.bsky.social•71 days ago

Picture very related:

thatac.bsky.social•71 days ago

"don’t yell at officials in unofficial places"

I'm sorry these assholes are using offical places to claim I molest kids so I really do not think they are entitled to any fscking respect or a moment of piece. It's open season on my people because of their lies & you want me to send a stern note? GYF

ethicking.com•71 days ago

I (a private citizen) got yelled at in unofficial places for stuff my (then-elected official) spouse did. And this was years ago when the social contract was mostly functioning.

Don’t scream at their young children or anything, but beyond that?

cripdyke.bsky.social•71 days ago

You misunderstand. The person was saying that this is a norm that is for normal times, but when the officials betray the people, they can't expect such norms to hold. The person is on your side.

thatac.bsky.social•71 days ago

Then I will say sorry about the GFY, but I stand by the rest.
I'm having a not good time lately & as we have no actual leadership doing anything its only getting worse.

cripdyke.bsky.social•71 days ago

totally hear you. I doubt Grossman saw what you wrote, and I certainly didn't take offence. I understand how offensive the take you thought you were reading is.

Be good to yourself, eh?

catharsis23.bsky.social•71 days ago

Wait since when was yelling at officials bad?

shivax.bsky.social•71 days ago

Yep.

It wasn't a great idea when the populace was mostly unarmed historically, but they're going for it with the most armed populace that's ever been for some reason.

zackattack17.bsky.social•71 days ago

If only the Capitol was a Tesla dealership on January 6th and only then would trump and his doj protect it.

notthatproud.bsky.social•71 days ago

I think a lot of us understand that. It’s the other side that doesn’t. And they’re not afraid of us.

stevezorowitz.bsky.social•71 days ago

Which is why, every day, more and more:

https://bsky.app/profile/stevezorowitz.bsky.social/post/3lkl5eqqa3s2n

lori55.bsky.social•71 days ago

As Elon Musk torches our country

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