Comment by evgen
6 years ago
That man was a United States Senator who suggested using the military to suppress political dissent. The suggestion that this is some minor newspeak squabble or a brief outbreak of political correctness grossly underplays how dangerous this suggestion was and the seeing you try to use Orwell to support your point is even more ridiculous.
Actually, the op-ed states:
> Some elites have excused this orgy of violence in the spirit of radical chic, calling it an understandable response to the wrongful death of George Floyd. Those excuses are built on a revolting moral equivalence of rioters and looters to peaceful, law-abiding protesters. A majority who seek to protest peacefully shouldn’t be confused with bands of miscreants. But the rioting has nothing to do with George Floyd, whose bereaved relatives have condemned violence.
Setting aside whether using the Insurrection Act to respond to rioting and looting is an appropriate response, it is quite clear that Tom Cotton is not advocating the use of the the military to "suppress political dissent", which would obviously violate the First Amendment.
This gets confusing, because many (including cotton elsewhere) intentionally blurred the lines between protestors and "rioters", and stood behind plans that served to suppress peaceful protest.
People on this forum are usually quick to remark that free speech is powerful and important and worth protecting even at great cost to individuals. Property damage caused by a small number of violent actors falls into this category, especially when the majority of the protests were peaceful and actively discouraged property damage.
So yes, Cotton's plan would have served to suppress political dissent and therefore probably violated the first amendment (and the third). Printing a sitting senator advocating for violating multiple constitutional rights without a disclaimer to that effect is a disservice to nyts readers.
Destroying things that do not belong to you is not free speech.
16 replies →
> it is quite clear that Tom Cotton is not advocating the use of the the military to "suppress political dissent"
That's wrong. Regardless of how you feel about the tactics used by the protesters, their dissent is clearly political in nature, and Cotton was advocating stopping their demonstrations with the military. It's a terrible mistake to misunderstand or sugar-coat his message and you shouldn't do it.
I thought it was fairly clear "suppress political dissent" was referring to the suppression of peaceful political dissent, and I was responding to that claim.
>...their dissent is clearly political in nature, and Cotton was advocating stopping their demonstrations with the military.
Calling the burning of buildings, the vandalism of public buildings and monuments, and the violence we've seen "political in nature" is really quite something. It's very revealing in terms of what the end goal is.
1 reply →
>> A majority who seek to protest peacefully shouldn’t be confused with bands of miscreants.
> ...it is quite clear that Tom Cotton is not advocating the use of the the military to "suppress political dissent"...
Eh, I'm not totally convinced. The devil is in the details, and there have been many cases recently where clearly peaceful protesters were treated like rioters when it was convenient to some of Cotton's allies.
The insidious part of suppressing dissenting opinions is that it gives carte blanche to lie about what those opinions were.
>...who suggested using the military to suppress political dissent.
This, of course, is not what he actually said - but it's what you heard that he said. Because that is the nature of the time that we're in, and why what Orwell said is relevant.
> This, of course, is not what he actually said
This is false, unless you're contesting he did not literally write "we should use the military to suppress political dissent" in that exact sequence of words.
I cannot figure out whether you don't think deploying troops in cities under the Insurrection Act counts as "using the military," whether stopping the protests is not "suppression," or whether you're suggesting the protests should not be defined as "political dissent." All these things are false.
The relevant Orwell quote would seem to be "To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle."
I'm pointing out the words he literally wrote on the page because there's a bunch of people in this thread who are doing what you're doing, which is making a blanket proclamation that Cotton wanted the military to essentially attack protestors, which isn't true. That actual quote is all over this thread.
The rest of your argument is a careless strawmanning, or projection, since the words on the page have actual meaning, words which you can put in front of your nose at your own pleasure.
3 replies →