Mob Violence and the Left

Dave Griffey at Daffey Thoughts brings us the latest example of mob violence perpetrated by those on the Left, as usual occurring at an institution ostensibly dedicated to education:

The group identity politics of the Marxist/Leninist Left continues to bear fruit.  Not happy with the law, a group of students took it upon themselves to destroy a Confederate statue at the University of North Carolina.  It was not a statue dedicated to a particular racist slave owner.  It was dedicated to remembering the Nazi Confederate soldiers who fought and died in the Civil War.

This American Iconoclasm is one of the fruits of the post-modern Left.  The ‘identity politics’ that it promotes encourages such vigilantism.  It also discourages such outdated notions as forgiveness, mercy, reconciliation, humility or unity.  It assures an ever younger group of adherents that they are beyond reproach, the universe should cater to them, and that their judgement is infallible.  Therefore they judge, they destroy.

It’s odd, but I can remember studying American history in school.  It was the 70s and 80s.  Two big themes were in historical studies in those days.  One them was that all of those other cultures were not only bad, no matter what they did.  The Persians, Huns, Mongols, Hittites, Assyrians – you name it.  They may have had their rough spots, but they were better than bad, and we should understand and celebrate their good side.

Parallel to that was a growing emphasis on the sins of the West.  Both Europe, Christianity and America were put under the microscope.   The victories and exclusive blessings of the West and America weren’t ignored, but we were often reminded of the bad, the sins, the failings – how we were often no better than all of the other cultures and civilizations in the world.

One of the examples I remember?  In a lesson on the Revolution in high school, I remember a picture of Colonists pulling down a statue of King George.  The point of it?  That, alone with stories of tarring and feathering and other such acts, just showed that the Colonists could be bad, too.  They could engage in mob violence, property destruction and other forms of violence just like we see in other parts of the world.  We are no better because we were no better.  Funny that now that same type of violence is finding fruit in the same liberal movement that used such examples to show the sins of our past.

Of course we see that this mentality is hardly confined to old statues, since the same Left is engendering a whole new generation of vigilantes willing to take their ideals straight to people.  This is a fine example of an anti-radical-right progressive being assaulted and beat up because he dared to bring an American flag to the protest.  Antifa, like much of the emergent Left, hates America like the KKK hates blacks.

Destruction, violence, physical assault, bigotry, vigilantism, mob rule, witch hunts – such are the defining characteristics of millennial and Facebook generation leftism.  The press isn’t running with the statue story yet, likely because most Americans oppose removing the statues in general, much less by breaking the law and destroying property because their righteousness declares it the right thing to do.  Likewise the press, by ignoring the multiple stories of Antifa violence and destruction, allows many good-hearted liberals the ability to deny there is such a thing as a radical Left. 

The good news is that most Americans are still sane and good and virtuous enough to despise such movements – whether on the right or left; those who hate blacks or those who hate whites.  The bad news is that people in very influential positions in our nation are for the racism, destruction, anti-Americanism and promises of lynch mob justice and anarchic violence, as long as it serves the needs of the Political Left.  We’ll see who comes out ahead in the end.

Go here to comment.  Abraham Lincoln in his Lyceum speech on January 27, 1838 saw where such mob violence could lead:

But the example in either case, was fearful.–When men take it in their heads to day, to hang gamblers, or burn murderers, they should recollect, that, in the confusion usually attending such transactions, they will be as likely to hang or burn some one who is neither a gambler nor a murderer as one who is; and that, acting upon the example they set, the mob of to-morrow, may, and probably will, hang or burn some of them by the very same mistake. And not only so; the innocent, those who have ever set their faces against violations of law in every shape, alike with the guilty, fall victims to the ravages of mob law; and thus it goes on, step by step, till all the walls erected for the defense of the persons and property of individuals, are trodden down, and disregarded. But all this even, is not the full extent of the evil.–By such examples, by instances of the perpetrators of such acts going unpunished, the lawless in spirit, are encouraged to become lawless in practice; and having been used to no restraint, but dread of punishment, they thus become, absolutely unrestrained.–Having ever regarded Government as their deadliest bane, they make a jubilee of the suspension of its operations; and pray for nothing so much, as its total annihilation. While, on the other hand, good men, men who love tranquility, who desire to abide by the laws, and enjoy their benefits, who would gladly spill their blood in the defense of their country; seeing their property destroyed; their families insulted, and their lives endangered; their persons injured; and seeing nothing in prospect that forebodes a change for the better; become tired of, and disgusted with, a Government that offers them no protection; and are not much averse to a change in which they imagine they have nothing to lose. Thus, then, by the operation of this mobocractic spirit, which all must admit, is now abroad in the land, the strongest bulwark of any Government, and particularly of those constituted like ours, may effectually be broken down and destroyed–I mean the attachment of the People. Whenever this effect shall be produced among us; whenever the vicious portion of population shall be permitted to gather in bands of hundreds and thousands, and burn churches, ravage and rob provision-stores, throw printing presses into rivers, shoot editors, and hang and burn obnoxious persons at pleasure, and with impunity; depend on it, this Government cannot last. By such things, the feelings of the best citizens will become more or less alienated from it; and thus it will be left without friends, or with too few, and those few too weak, to make their friendship effectual. At such a time and under such circumstances, men of sufficient talent and ambition will not be wanting to seize the opportunity, strike the blow, and overturn that fair fabric, which for the last half century, has been the fondest hope, of the lovers of freedom, throughout the world.

Much of the contemporary Left has only contempt for freedom for others, as such freedom has been traditionally understood in this country.  Such violent criminals are red fascists and should be put down with as much severity as necessary, or freedom will eventually be a forgotten word in this nation.