The Dangerous Drift to Redefine Protest as Terrorism

[Mac1958]

Citizen: "Uh, that's not a riot".

MAGA: "Well, it COULD be LATER. So it's TERRORISM NOW".

 

[struth]

Yeah, you want the right to protest for your side, you just don't want anyone else the right to do so.

So can kidnapping someone off street and driving off with them in a white van, so can dragging someone out of their car for no reason, so can shooting someone in the back for no reason. These are all crimes, for anyone else, but the Trump gestapo. That's why people are reacting the way they are.

If I end up in jail for filming the masked gestapo and Maga calls it doxxing, i'm not the one who needs to look up the definition.

You got some weird thoughts

 

[scruffy]

So can kidnapping someone off street and driving off with them in a white van, so can dragging someone out of their car for no reason, so can shooting someone in the back for no reason. These are all crimes, for anyone else, but the Trump gestapo.

It's strict enforcement of existing law. Something you're not used to. Calling it criminal is way over the top.

That's why people are reacting the way they are.

No, libtards are just butthurt cause Orange Man Bad.

If it were really a problem you'd see 90% of America reacting. But it's only the 5% on the far left.

 

[Soupnazi630]

When college students sat down at segregated lunch counters in 1960, they were breaking the law. They trespassed on private property, refused police orders to disperse, and sometimes violated court injunctions specifically designed to stop their demonstrations. In an effort to maintain public order, local authorities arrested them by the hundreds and charged them with disturbing the peace.

But these students were also exercising their constitutional rights.

This paradox—that civil disobedience can be simultaneously illegal and constitutionally protected—has been a constant source of tension in the U.S. But how the law talks about it has changed. Increasingly, the language of national security is creeping into spaces once governed by public-order statutes and First Amendment doctrine. We are no longer debating whether protesters who break the law should face charges. The new question is whether they should be investigated as terrorists.

What happened in Minneapolis—and what threatens to happen more broadly—reveals how quickly that transformation can occur, and why it should alarm anyone who cares about democratic dissent.
We have been here before, repeatedly. In his comprehensive study “Perilous Times,” legal historian Geoffrey Stone traces a recurring American pattern: Perceived crisis triggers expanded executive power—which gets directed not just at genuine threats but at unpopular dissent—until the crisis passes and retrospective analysis reveals how badly we overreacted.

The Dangerous Drift to Redefine Protest as Terrorism

The line between civil disobedience and terrorism is collapsing. History warns us what comes next.

www.lawfaremedia.org

The alarm is especially pertinent given the regime's penchant for authoritarian governance. Something it has made no secret of in threatening to invoke the Sedition Act to stifle political dissent and criticism from American citizens.

The entire article is a worthy read.

The article is acuatlly ignorant and ignoring a great deal of the story.

I can agree that in general it is dangerous to start redefining protest as terrorism, But one cannot simply ignore the other side of the knife.

There have been exceptions in the past , such as the civil rights era after the death of king , but for the most part protests were in fact peaceful.

The test party demonstrations , the occupy movement environmental protests and so on. They really were peaceful. But not anymore. Now every protest is an excuse to right since covid and george floyd. The BLM riots were just riots they were not mostly peaceful. Jan 6 was a mindless riot. Real insurrections ( violent and deadly ) in multiple cities with CHAZ/CHOP. ICE protestss which are not opposing some injustice but are in fact violent calls for revolution.

The left is deliberately involving children conditioning grade schoolers to violently riot and using them as human shields. Abusing children who dare to be neutral or oppose the anti ice protests.

This is the new normal. Some would blame part of it on COVID for creating too much stress on people during lock downs but gthat passed a long time ago. It is deliberate and engineered by the left ( sometimes by the right as well but no where near as often ).

 

[Soupnazi630]

That is civil disobedience, and the whole purpose is to get arrested for doing something you think is wrong to be illegal.

They key is to not resist, and to peacefully submit to law enforcement.

That's the part you idiots forget about.

It is no longer civil disobediance.

It is attempted revolution

 

[berg80]

The left is deliberately involving children conditioning grade schoolers to violently riot and using them as human shields.

I was trying to take what you wrote seriously until I got to that part.

Question, wouldn't the violent J6 riot participants qualify as terrorists under the regime's new metric? trump pardoned them. Apparently, one man's terrorist is another's patriot.

 

[martybegan]

It is no longer civil disobediance.

It is attempted revolution

I don't think they have the will or organization for that yet, but they are working toward it.

Insurrection is a good word for what happened in Minneapolis against ICE and the federal government.

 

[the watcher]

The Dangerous Drift to Redefine Protest as Terrorism​

Also, to reflect upon our past and current use of regime change policies around the world

The Dangerous Drift to Redefine Terrorism as Protest​

That's not working out too well either

 

[the other mike]

When college students sat down at segregated lunch counters in 1960, they were breaking the law. They trespassed on private property, refused police orders to disperse, and sometimes violated court injunctions specifically designed to stop their demonstrations. In an effort to maintain public order, local authorities arrested them by the hundreds and charged them with disturbing the peace.

But these students were also exercising their constitutional rights.

This paradox—that civil disobedience can be simultaneously illegal and constitutionally protected—has been a constant source of tension in the U.S. But how the law talks about it has changed. Increasingly, the language of national security is creeping into spaces once governed by public-order statutes and First Amendment doctrine. We are no longer debating whether protesters who break the law should face charges. The new question is whether they should be investigated as terrorists.

What happened in Minneapolis—and what threatens to happen more broadly—reveals how quickly that transformation can occur, and why it should alarm anyone who cares about democratic dissent.
We have been here before, repeatedly. In his comprehensive study “Perilous Times,” legal historian Geoffrey Stone traces a recurring American pattern: Perceived crisis triggers expanded executive power—which gets directed not just at genuine threats but at unpopular dissent—until the crisis passes and retrospective analysis reveals how badly we overreacted.

The Dangerous Drift to Redefine Protest as Terrorism

The line between civil disobedience and terrorism is collapsing. History warns us what comes next.

www.lawfaremedia.org

The alarm is especially pertinent given the regime's penchant for authoritarian governance. Something it has made no secret of in threatening to invoke the Sedition Act to stifle political dissent and criticism from American citizens.

The entire article is a worthy read.

Protesters don't get pallets of bricks delivered to them by NGOs in black vans.

 

[Soupnazi630]

I was trying to take what you wrote seriously until I got to that part.

Question, wouldn't the violent J6 riot participants qualify as terrorists under the regime's new metric? trump pardoned them. Apparently, one man's terrorist is another's patriot.

um yes that is why I pointed out that the right does it sometimes also

This was never defense of trump

It is not about him

The part about kids was spot on accurate

 

[struth]

I was trying to take what you wrote seriously until I got to that part.

Question, wouldn't the violent J6 riot participants qualify as terrorists under the regime's new metric? trump pardoned them. Apparently, one man's terrorist is another's patriot.

There is no new "metric" for terrorist. It's been defined legally, and under webster the same for decades.

There is a difference between a peaceful protest, and even one that turns into a riot, then with organized, calcuated terrorist attacks.

and if I recall, the left didn't just call the rioters on Jan 6th terrorist, you referred to them as insurrectionist.....

 

[Soupnazi630]

I don't think they have the will or organization for that yet, but they are working toward it.

Insurrection is a good word for what happened in Minneapolis against ICE and the federal government.

True which is why I said attempted.

Give them another 8 to 12 years and they will have the numbers they need as they grow by indoctrinating kids starting in kindergarten

Yes it is also a perfectly accurate word for CHAZ/CHOP

 

[ThisIsMe]

There is no need to "dox" a judge or DA. Everyone already knows who they are. That's what it means to live in a free society. There isn't a single judge or DA who hides their identity!!

Exactly, because nobody is threatening them.

ICE agents weren't under attack in March when the face mask and no badge policy was instituted. They did it because they knew what they were doing was wrong. That's the whole point of masking and having a secret police.

No, it’s because the cartels want to kill them and liberals want to dox them

 

[dblack]

This has been on the agenda since the Patriot Act was passed.

 

[dblack]

Terrorist = Anyone the government would like to persecute without all those pesky Constitutional limits on their power.

 

[Stryder50]

The wording of the First Amendment is "peaceably to assemble".

That doesn't include blocking traffic or commerce, nor looting, nor riot, nor aggressive or violent "protest", assaults, infringing on other citizen's rights, etc. ...

When "protestors" show up with helmets, face shields, body armor/padding, gas masks, stout sticks/batons/"flag poles", body shields, projectile objects (rocks~bricks~concrete 'milkshakes', etc.), fireworks, etc., etc., etc. it is pretty obvious there is no plan to be "peaceable" in the protest assembly.

It shows clear intent to be violent and break laws, not just carry signs and banners.

You hear that antifa Black Bloc ?!

 

[krichton]

You got some weird thoughts

Only to those who don't believe in democracy and freedom.

 

[krichton]

Exactly, because nobody is threatening them

Who was threatening ICE in back March? They didn't don masks and hid their badges, they did so because they needed to remain hidden. That's what ppl do when they know they're about to commit illegal acts.

No, it’s because the cartels want to kill them and liberals want to dox them

New right wing talking point of the day. Tomorrow it'll be something else and the day after something else.

 

[krichton]

It's strict enforcement of existing law. Something you're not used to. Calling it criminal is way over the top.

Kidnapping is enforcement of existing law?. Show me the law that legalizes kidnapping and supersedes the 4th amendment. I'll wait.

No, libtards are just butthurt cause Orange Man Bad.

If it were really a problem you'd see 90% of America reacting. But it's only the 5% on the far left.

talk about living in a bubble. Read a poll some day.

 

[Mac1958]

The thinly veiled transparency of characterizing protesters as terrorists for the purposes of justifying law enforcement action against protests is crystal clear.

Someone has to do something of substance before this goes too far. There are legal actions that can be taken.

We're getting closer to the rubicon every day.