Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin - Punching Nazis at the UC Berkeley Riots

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Feb. 2, 2017 - Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin

29:42

Punching Nazis at the UC Berkeley Riots

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	Well, well, well.
	What a surprise.
	Hundreds of hard-left agitators with various students who are ideologically aligned with them all desperately trying to prevent Milo Yiannopoulos from giving a talk on a campus.
	Hmm.
	I can't say that I'm surprised.
	I suppose we'll have to go through the usual slideshow of things that could have been prevented if there was any kind of police presence on the ground, where it really mattered, not standing somewhere far out, where they really can't intervene.
	Oh, this looks very civilized.
	A mob of people with banners such as This Is War and Become Ungovernable standing around some kind of garbage fire.
	That's exactly what I've come to expect.
	Graffiti saying kill fascists and fuck Milo just scrawled onto some poor business owner's shop.
	Hmm, that again does not surprise me.
	What does surprise me is liberals get the bullet too with a nice hammer and sickle?
	It's not that I'm surprised that communists hate liberals.
	It's normally that communists try to disguise themselves amongst liberals.
	Honestly, it's quite refreshing that they'd come out and be open and public, that they support the only ideology that's worse than Nazism.
	I wonder if there are any clips of property damage being done by the rioters.
	Yep, that's about what I expected.
	So what about a man being beaten unconscious in the street?
	That's pretty bad, but you might be a feminist and you might really hate men.
	So, here's some women being assaulted.
	But you know what, those women were probably wrong thinkers.
	You could tell by the fact that they were reasonably intelligent, attractive, and they were prepared to give as good as they got.
	And of course, those women were white.
	So what if we found a journalist from a good solid left-wing publication, a journalist of colour, and assaulted him instead?
	As a reporter, I was just assaulted by a group of people in black masks.
	They tried to take my phone, they were mad that I was filming what was going on.
	Well, I will try and contain my surprise.
	Now, there have been unsubstantiated rumours that the mayor of Berkeley had told the police to stand down, so that the rioters could do as they please.
	Now, I don't know if that's true, but most of the footage I've seen coming out of the Berkeley riots appears to involve virtually no police presence.
	That was until finally the looting, vandalism, and assault done by these rioters became too great and the police finally decided to intervene.
	So yes, the Berkeley PD did indeed shut down Milo's event, because, obviously, they didn't feel that this situation was safe enough for the event to go ahead.
	In fact, they had all campus buildings on lockdown, and then they issued a stay away in or near Bancroft and Telegraph due to major protest attacks warnings, and then they horned people that, look, the protesters are heading back to the campus via the centre street.
	If you're on the campus, stay indoors and away from windows, because these people are fucking psychotic.
	Eventually, the rioters had to be dispersed with rubber bullets and tear gas by the police.
	All because a gay Jew with a pension for black men had come to speak at their college and he was going to say things they didn't want to hear.
	Back in the 60s, Berkeley was the home of the free speech movement, which was a movement to prevent the university from censoring the students when they had an opinion about something.
	I think we can confirm that this movement is now dead.
	So we have returned to a time where political violence is back on the streets, and this is something we are going to see more of going forward.
	For example, multiple people stand at a Sacramento far-right rally and counter-protest.
	At least 10 people have been stabbed after clashes broke out during a rally outside the state capitol in Sacramento, California.
	The violence broke out between far-right activists from the traditional worker party and counter-protesters.
	I wonder who the counter-protesters were.
	And I'm sure you remember that a hard-left protester was shot at Milo's last event, and this protester incidentally wants dialogue, not charges.
	Unfortunately for him, he's going to get neither, because the police aren't charging him with anything, because the Milo fans shot him in self-defense, and he's been released without charge because self-defense is not a crime.
	But you really have to love the way the Guardian have framed this.
	The shooting victim.
	Do you mean the aggressor?
	And that really is the state of the mainstream media at the moment.
	The protesters will cry out in pain when they strike you, and the media will report that they are the victims.
	So why is this all happening?
	Well, of course, it's for a variety of reasons.
	One of those reasons is the mass celebrity endorsements of violence and rioting and sedition.
	Here's a tweet by Hollywood director Judd Appetal.
	I don't know who that is, but he says, this is just the beginning.
	When will all the fools who are still supporting Trump realise what is at stake?
	Well, I can see why he deleted this tweet, because this sounds like a threat.
	But you know what?
	That's only by implication.
	Sarah Silverman is way ahead of you.
	Wake up and join the resistance.
	Once the military is with us, fascists get overthrown.
	Mad King and his handlers go bye-bye heart-heart, heart-heart.
	sarah i think that might actually be treasonous like i i actually think publicly calling for your government to be overthrown might actually be considered a that might actually make you an enemy of the state sarah And I absolutely adore the idea of rich celebrities directing their middle-class useful idiots to try and overthrow the US government.
	I think that's rather hilarious.
	And I could spend my time finding clip after clip after clip of celebrities saying almost exactly the same thing.
	But it's actually easier to go to a celebrity award ceremony where one of these celebrities, and I'm sorry I don't know who these people are or what they do, I just literally don't care.
	But when one of these celebrities gets up in front of their peers and gives a rousing anti-Trump speech, and the entire room applauds, a standing ovation no less, you can get a feel for the zeitgeist in Hollywood.
	And I would just like to say that in light of all that's going on in the world today, it's difficult to celebrate the already celebrated Stranger Things.
	But this award from you, who take your craft seriously and earnestly believe, like me, that great acting can change the world is a call to arms from our fellow craftsmen and women to go deeper and through our art to battle against fear, self-centeredness,
	and exclusivity of our predominantly narcissistic culture and through our craft to cultivate a more empathetic and understanding society by revealing intimate truths that serve as a forceful reminder to folks that when they feel broken and afraid and tired, they are not alone.
	We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this horrible, painful, joyous, exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive.
	Now, as we act in the continuing narrative of Stranger Things, we 1983 Midwesterners will repel bullies.
	We will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no homes.
	We will get past the lies.
	We will hunt monsters.
	And when we are lost amidst the hypocrisy and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions, we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the disenfranchise and the marginalized.
	And we will do it all with soul, with heart, and with joy.
	We thank you for this responsibility.
	Thank you.
	There's a message from the Film Actors Guild for you, who literally think they're going to change the world through their acting.
	Jesus.
	Did he?
	People complaining that Trung ripped off a speech from Bane, but I mean, at least he didn't rip off a speech from a satire.
	Jesus Christ.
	And I love, I love the punching Nazis in the face, which is the next thing that we're going to talk about now.
	It seems that most of them have forgotten that they're getting older, they're a bit paunchy, and they spend their entire lives pretending to be other people.
	But the worrisome thing is that they are absolutely trying to normalize violence, specifically violence against people who are their political opponents.
	And these people are their political opponents purely on the basis of their ideas.
	Now, this means that if you hold said ideas, then whoever that guy was says that it's perfectly fine for you to just be assaulted on that basis.
	Do I even need to go through the manifest flaws with this line of reasoning?
	A, it's entirely subjective, so if you've set this as the standard, anyone else who happens to dislike your ideas and think that it's acceptable to punch you in the face will do so.
	And you will say, oh, I deserve that because you think differently to me and you think it's acceptable to punch me.
	And that's my standard for thinking it's acceptable to punch anyone else.
	So, I mean, that's just, it's ridiculous.
	But not only that, it totally undermines the democratic process.
	A democratic society that's resorting to physical violence is a society that is going off the rails, containing factions that have irreconcilable differences and are no longer willing to listen, or at least one of those factions is no longer willing to listen or tolerate the fact that their fellow citizens have different ideas to their own.
	Anyone, anyone calling for violence in a democratic society is the person who has lost the argument.
	You do not persuade people with violence.
	You only intimidate them.
	It also goes to show that you actually don't care about human rights, because even if you despise them, Nazis are people too, and they also have human rights.
	And one of those rights is not to simply be assaulted when you are doing nothing wrong.
	Which is why it was particularly horrendous when the left-wing internet exploded in a flurry of articles questioning, is it ethical to punch a Nazi?
	And the answer is just no, by the way.
	Unless you are in a direct Lockean state of war with that Nazi, then no.
	If he is not threatening you in any way, shape or form, the answer is no.
	Because you can't claim self-defense because people think differently to you.
	Now, you can type into Google, it is acceptable to punch a Nazi, or it is a good thing to punch a Nazi, and you will get hundreds of mainstream media outlets, blogs, websites, posts on forums of left-wing people saying, of course it is.
	It's literally never unjustified to punch a Nazi, and they mean it.
	It's an American tradition.
	Well, hang on, I thought you guys hated America.
	Well, yeah, we do, but it's, you know, it's convenient for us to not hate America right now, do you mind?
	I know that this is a country that's built on slavery and is a white supremacist capitalist patriarchy with an imperialist presence all around the world that's oppressing and killing brown people every day.
	But right now, I'm an American.
	If you happen to be a leftist listening to this now, and there is a remote chance that you might be, let me be the first to inform you that you are an abject hypocrite.
	But that's not a refutation of your argument.
	The refutation of your argument is that as soon as you consider some of your population ineligible for the same rights that you deserve, that will only last for as long as you are in the majority.
	This is the problem with collectivism.
	Basically what I'm saying is when you violate someone else's rights, you are inevitably violating your own.
	Instead of showing you an article that suggests that punching your political opponents is perfectly acceptable, I'm going to find one where it says that it isn't, specifically to show you the kind of language used in this, what is effectively an apology for this position, without going the whole hog and admitting this is a bad position.
	The punching a Nazi meme.
	What are the ethics of punching Nazis?
	The answer is there are none.
	You can't ethically assault your fellow citizens when they are doing nothing to you.
	That's the end of the story.
	This was written by Tariq Musa of Gamergate fame, who apparently has migrated to The Guardian along with other Gamergate stars like Lei Alexander.
	He says, it's good and healthy to criticize those on our side.
	Nothing is perfect.
	Is it right to punch Nazis?
	Well it depends.
	It's good to feel uncomfortable with this question.
	That discomfort itself already makes us better people, since we'd like violence to be never used.
	If someone thinks the end result of creating an uncomfortable culture for Nazis is worth the occasional punch, then they'll conclude that punching Nazis is good.
	That's a brilliant observation, Tariq.
	And if people are concluding that punching Nazis is good, do you really think it'll just be the occasional punch, even though one is too many?
	Good lord, I mean listen to the way he's describing this, as if this is a legitimate question that he's really not sure about.
	As previously noted, we're allowed to celebrate Nazis feeling uncomfortable, even if we're hesitant about the punch.
	Well either way that's sadism.
	Either way that's you enjoying the suffering of someone else.
	If you want to be sadists, then don't let me stop you.
	But I think that's totally vile.
	What's unhelpful is equating the punch of the Nazis' discomfort with Nazism itself.
	Who's doing that?
	It's also true that punching won't dislodge racist views from the minds of those who entertain them.
	In fact, to be honest with you, Tariq, it's probably going to cement them.
	Although it may make expressing them less comfortable.
	Don't worry, that's exactly what we're going to do with the social justice warriors.
	Just so you know, Tariq.
	We're going to laugh at you constantly until you just shut your fucking mouths.
	He finishes with, maybe we shouldn't punch Nazis, but we certainly should be working to create societies where their views never gain a foothold.
	That's very true.
	I totally agree with you, Tariq.
	And one of those ways is by creating societies where communists never gain a foothold.
	RawStory is a far-left outlet, and I found their attempt to speak to an ethicist about this quote-unquote issue fucking hilarious.
	Because they are so detached from reality that when they actually come into contact with someone who isn't, that person is baffled by their worldview.
	Is it okay to punch a Nazi leading ethicists way in?
	Question.
	Are you familiar with this video of Richard Spencer getting punched?
	Answer.
	Yeah.
	Do you really not know if it's ethical to punch someone even though they have odious politics?
	I mean, should we call your mother, or my mother, or anybody's mother?
	Isn't it hilarious that the left are so divorced from ethical standards that when they ask an ethicist a question, the ethicist can't even believe that they would ask that question.
	I mean, that should really stop you and provoke a lot of introspection, shouldn't it?
	But it doesn't.
	I don't think my mother would like very much to be involved in this discussion.
	I bet she wouldn't.
	Answer.
	My mother would.
	I mean, we do understand that just because someone's politics are vile and Richard Spencer's are, you don't get to punch them.
	Why is that a question?
	I think I can feel that one.
	These people are left-wing collectivist ideologues who have too much power.
	And this power has gone to their heads.
	It's made them feel as if they are not only ethically justified to do anything in service of their cause, but their enemies are, of course, subhuman, and therefore it's okay to do whatever you want.
	Well, many people on the internet seem to be quite conflicted about...
	I love how he interrupts them.
	I mean, holy shit.
	If there are many people on the internet who are conflicted about whether this is an ethical question or not, then there are many people on the internet with severe psychological problems.
	He says, well, I weep for our country in yet another way.
	No, you do not get to punch people even though they are ideologically despicable.
	You are not the first person who has asked me this, and it's deeply disheartening, I have to say.
	I gather that the rationale is that because Richard Spencer and his ilk would punch us, then therefore it's okay to punch them.
	But the journalist doesn't drop it there.
	Are there any circumstances in which you think it's okay to punch someone with Nazi sympathetic views?
	The professor answers, yes, in self-defense.
	But it has nothing to do with their Nazi views.
	You have an ethical right to defend yourself against a physical assault, but you do not have the right to respond to contemptible beliefs with physical violence.
	You organise politically, you struggle, you resist, you march, you vote, you run for office.
	We are not thugs and we do not respond with thuggery.
	Well, Professor, that's where you're wrong.
	They are thugs, as they are displaying, and I don't know whether you've noticed, but they have just failed in their political organization.
	And as Von Klauswitz will point out, war is simply politics by the means.
	That's what these people are doing.
	These people are still being political.
	They are just using violence because their political activism did not work.
	And ultimately, their violence must not work.
	Because I tell you what, if there is one thing that is the absolute death knell of any democratic system, it's the use of political violence to intimidate your fellow citizens that will kill it.
	Because as soon as you do it and you get away with it, someone else will see that and think, I can do it too.
	This is why, despite how wonderful Sulla's reforms were, he could never cover up the fact that he was the first to march an army on Rome.
	That's why the people who are committing political violence now have to fail.
	Everything that they're trying to achieve through violence has to be held back from them, regardless of the cost.
	The thing is, you would think at this point that the journalists would be quite embarrassed to carry on, but they labour on.
	Let me read to you one comment that I saw on Twitter.
	If you don't punch Nazis, holocausts happen.
	That's what we learned from letting Nazis speak in public from the last time.
	You have to punch them.
	The professor responds, that's ridiculous.
	That's nonsensical.
	One does not flow from the other.
	Because one of the most monstrous catastrophes in human history occurred, it is not because people failed to punch Nazis.
	It simply doesn't follow.
	Nor does it follow that if you fail to punch Richard Spencer that there will be dire consequences.
	It would seem to me that Gandhi's example or King's example are quite to the contrary.
	Even where allied against incredibly powerful armed opponents, genuine social change is possible without resorting to the gutter tactics of people like Spencer.
	Now, I don't agree with Spencer's views, and I don't really know anything about the man beyond them.
	But I have to say, I don't ever recall hearing about him assaulting someone.
	So to say that these are the gutter tactics of people like Spencer seems remarkably unfair to me, because he doesn't seem to be attacking anyone.
	These are the gutter tactics of the hard left.
	The hard left that is embraced by the radical social justice left, the regressive left who are completely in line with these views, even though they have no idea how awful things will be if these views take hold.
	These people are the useful idiots who will end up getting taken out back and shot by the actual communists.
	At least once the revolution is over.
	So now that we've heard from a professional ethicist who has told us that randomly punching Nazis when they're not doing anything wrong is not ethical, let's hear from the Guardian try to justify why this is ethical.
	In principle, it's never okay to hit anyone, Nazi or otherwise.
	But when Richard Spencer was punched while giving an interview in the street, it was a cathartic moment for many.
	That's a pretty horrific opinion, isn't it?
	To say that, look, I found this enjoyable, and I needed this.
	I needed to see someone else being abused before I could move on.
	And literally, that's what she says.
	A lot of us find ourselves at a loss for how to respond as frightening and dangerous views are suddenly not only being aired, but mainstreamed.
	Isn't that amazing?
	She is saying that she is the victim of someone else's opinions, and hearing it is having a negative effect, to the point where she needs to see someone being physically abused to get over it.
	Unable to adjust, we continued to engage with these views like they were just a new school of controversy.
	The world had changed, but we hadn't caught up.
	That punch?
	It caught us up.
	Can you imagine thinking that?
	Can you imagine thinking, you know what, I just, I'm sorry, I just can't get on board with this until I see someone being abused.
	Until someone is unjustly struck in the face, I don't think I can emotionally get up on board with this, so I'm just going to sit here in an emotional limbo until you abuse someone I don't like for my pleasure.
	She strikes me as someone with some kind of emotional deformity.
	Someone who isn't really a healthy human being and should probably not be allowed around children.
	When they go low, we go high, said Michelle Obama, amid the rising ugliness of Trump's campaign.
	Well, going high doesn't always work.
	Some positions simply cannot be entertained, let alone argued against.
	And now you can see why they lost the argument.
	All they're doing is making moral arguments.
	They're saying, well, I think this is wrong.
	Well, that only works if the other person thinks it's wrong also.
	If they don't think it's wrong, then you have to bring a factual argument.
	And clearly, these people are incapable of doing that.
	Otherwise, they would.
	There is this fallacy on the left around reasoned debate.
	Don't assault and boycott racists and misogynists.
	Debate with them.
	Don't go low.
	Go high.
	Be better.
	But why?
	Why should we be better?
	Because if you don't, you are literally as bad as a fucking Nazi.
	You idiot.
	Can you even imagine saying that the idea of reasoned debate is a fallacy?
	I mean, it's not a fallacy.
	A fallacy is a logical argument that is internally inconsistent and then contradicts and refutes itself.
	I mean, you could say it's a falsehood.
	It's simply an untrue statement.
	But even then, it's not.
	It is absolutely true that you should be reasoning and debating with your ideological opponents within a democracy.
	That's how things work.
	And the reason that the left does not do that is because they lose every time.
	They don't have reasoned arguments.
	They have arguments from emotion.
	If you don't care about their feelings, they have nothing at all.
	But honestly, this is absolutely baffling to me.
	Imagine saying that, look, I don't have reasoned arguments and I don't even think we should.
	And I simply don't care if I'm any better than the Nazis.
	I mean, it's just, it's a point so ridiculous to make.
	It's laughable.
	And yet, she wasn't the only person involved with this.
	There were many other people in The Guardian who would have helped her film this, write this, produce this, and then publish it on the website.
	And not one of them was like, is it a good idea for us to put up a video where we're arguing against reason and to be as ethically and morally just as the Nazis?
	Is that a good idea, or is that going to come back to bite us in the ass?
	Just for the sake of being better, or because being better produces results.
	This philosophical Achilles' heel is paralysing liberal democracy.
	Oh my god.
	Oh my god.
	I guess she's never read Aristotle.
	I'm sorry.
	I should come up with a reasoned answer.
	But sometimes you're so far off the reservation, all you can do is laugh at the person.
	What does she think she's saying?
	What scares me the most about this though, is she's literally saying that she should be as bad as the Nazis, and she's saying it in a way that is entitled to your respect.
	As if you should be listening to her and thinking, well, she's well presented, she's well spoken, then therefore what she's saying surely isn't complete batshit insanity, is it?
	Would I encourage people to go around punching Nazis?
	No.
	Aside from the fact that you just did by saying, look, you may as well be exactly like they are, which means punching them in the face, even though I don't see them punching anyone in the face.
	But why not?
	I mean, what possible justification could you have to not go around punching Nazis in the face?
	But I will also not condemn them for doing so.
	Okay, but that means I'm going to condemn you for failing to condemn your fellow activists who initiate violence against peaceful people who haven't committed any violence.
	For example, in the case of Richard Spencer, who wasn't punching anyone when he got punched.
	You are the bad people in that situation, even if he is a Nazi.
	The punch was a calling out after a time when too many things were not called out for what they really are.
	Going high might make us feel good about being the better party, but it is not a suitable response.
	And how is this not a call for violence?
	How is this not you saying it's acceptable for us to be violent towards our ideological enemies?
	Because if you can't give me a reason that it's not, then you are admitting that it is.
	Because that's exactly what this seems to be.
	I mean, this is an absolute shit show of a video.
	This is horrific.
	I could have done an entire video on this alone, but this was such a short one, I figured I'd include it in this.
	But I mean, now I'm going through it.
	I'm thinking, fuck, I should have just had this as its own separate video because this is insane.
	I mean, I thought that there were no depths to where the Guardian would go, but I honestly thought they wouldn't go as far as promoting violence.
	And doesn't work.
	Particularly now while we face a clear assault on hard-won freedoms and equalities.
	There is a narcissism of good behaviour that needs to be jettisoned.
	There is a complacency born out of a combination of shock, privilege, and inertia that make some think that keeping the dignity of liberalism intact will somehow shame bigots into behaving.
	I honestly find this amazing.
	I mean, I'm genuinely in awe of how self-centered a single human being can be.
	Her argument is that it's acceptable to punch a Nazi because a Nazi not only thinks vile things, they are going to act on those things surely, and so it's emotionally gratifying and totally acceptable to sink to the level of a Nazi and assault someone else.
	How she doesn't understand that that means that she is as bad as a Nazi, and therefore it's as acceptable to punch her as a Nazi, I don't know.
	But hilariously, she thinks she's got some sort of moral high ground here.
	She thinks that she's in the right.
	The narcissism of good behaviour would surely not inhibit her from doing something terrible if given the option.
	Jesus.
	I just.
	I'm honestly in awe.
	That's horrific.
	That's actually.
	I find that horrific.

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