The Fight for Democracy: False Equivalencies

I’ve seen a lot of people deflecting any real discussion of the seriousness of the incidents at the Capitol this week by comparing them to the Black Lives Matter protests over the summer, and I think it’s necessary to point out some truths to address it.

Many people start with: ‘all violence is wrong’. But that’s not true, at least not for Americans. We are a country literally established by a violent overthrow of an existing government. Some of our proudest moments as a nation come from violence, whether collaborative action of the state (winning WWII) or actions of individuals (churchgoer kills gunman). We lionize our military and the trope of the plucky underdog defeating the oppressive authorities through violence is core to our national identity. The most popular movie franchise in history (MCU) is built around the joy of seeing the good guy beat up the bad guy. Americans love violence - as long as they feel it’s justified.

The next step in the comparison is to decry ALL crime. Surely you liberals will agree breaking the law is definitely bad? No, not really. Look up that American Revolution and you’ll see it was illegal. Slavery was legal; Harriett Tubman was a criminal. Martin Luther King, Jr., the very model of proper protesting BLM is asked to follow, was arrested dozens of times. McCarthyism was legal. The shooting of Tamir Rice was deemed legal. Legal does not equal moral or just. Once again, we Americans know this, we just don’t like to admit it because it leads to the next point.

What makes right or wrong is subjective, which requires nuance and examination, and us Americans (especially on social media) don’t like nuance.  If the ‘reasonable middle’ crowd make it this far, they will simply say that since it’s subjective, both sides must be equally right (or equally wrong). But that’s not true either. There is such a thing as objective reality and we, as a society, constantly define what is considered right. The earth is not flat. We did land on the moon. Climate Change is driven by human actions and the Theory of Evolution has been proven true even if it has theory in its name. And just because someone believes they are right does not make their actions just. Timothy McVeigh and Dylan Roof thought they were right, but we know they were wrong.

These generalizations lead us back to the specifics of this week and this summer. The cries of hypocrisy when liberals won’t denounce BLM. The deflection from the Right to minimize the failed coup because a bunch of other people protested over something else. It’s all to avoid examining what has really happened and where blame really lies. So let’s examine.

The BLM protests were overwhelmingly peaceful. Thousands of protests with less than 5% leading to any violence. Millions of protestors with less than 1% being violent. And of that violence, the part directed at people came from the State - police shooting rubbing bullets and teargas at peaceful crowds; physically assaulting citizens for standing still and asking for justice. The violence from the protestors was directed at property. The rioting and looting people decry only harmed things; it only served to disrupt commerce.

And what is the BLM movement’s justification for their actions? What is their goal? They seek to end racial bias in our criminal justice system. A bias that is objectively true - you can argue its causes or importance, but the data overwhelmingly proves bias exists. Their protests seek to draw attention to a wrong that society admits is a wrong; they seek to drive us into action to rectify that wrong by encouraging political change through the ballot box and legislature - exactly how our society approves such change. It’s the only way America has been forced to improve since its founding.

The storming of our Capitol, on the other hand, was based on blatant lies. Its justification is the claim that Trump won the election which he demonstrably lost by a wide margin. It’s based on claims of mass voter fraud which have been investigated by all levels of law enforcement and scrutinized by all levels of our courts and found to be baseless. The political right is built on the lies of their leaders who do so for their own political machinations. Justification cannot be built off of deliberate misrepresentations of reality.

The violence of the right is also of a different nature. Whether it’s the storming of the Capitol or the plot to kidnap a governor, the violence is directed at people and institutions of democracy. The violent mobs killed a police officer on Wednesday and posed a very clear threat to the lives of our elected officials, going so far as to erect a gallows on the Capitol steps. Its goal is to interrupt the functioning of our government and the peaceful transfer of power to the legitimate winners of elections. By its very nature, right-wing violence seeks to impose the will of a minority government over the voice of the people. It’s as anti-American as you can get.

There is no equivalency between the protests for racial justice and the insurrection at our Capitol, and any argument otherwise is fundamentally dishonest, even if those who make it are lying to themselves. Either way, we do not need to entertain it and should dismiss it out of hand.