Resistance or regret: Which would you choose?

[steelheart]

"And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security Operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say goodbye to his family?

Or, if during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Lenningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling in terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of a half dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?

The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt!"

-Alexander Solzenitsyn,
The Gulag Archipelago

 

[Double Naught Spy]

Ah, but they did have something to lose. The perception that they did not is in error in this case.

What they failed to realize is the length of time for trouble that would result due to their lack of fighting back.

They did not have the benefit of foresight to know that a lack of action would result in generations of less than adequate Soviet rule that would be so detrimental. It is easy to see the mistake now, but we see it with the benefit of hindsight.

The question is, if they would choose not to fight at that time knowing what was to come, or if they would see the future as being so horrific to to fight and maybe die as a result and in doing so would be fighting without knowing that they would be successful.

Those who fight with the attitude and/or situtation of nothing left to loose are rarely adequate fighters in such regional oppressions.

 

[model 25]

Just a point of view here, seems there is a bill to help stop the illegals from comming here and there are huge demonstrations to tell us we better not mess with them.

""It is a crusade to force the right-wing government to give us legalization, and we are not going to take anything less," he said. One marcher carried a sign with the slogan "The Sleeping Giant Woke Up," referring to the role of undocumented workers in American life."

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsa...UKOC_0_US-RIGHTS-IMMIGRATION-MARCH.xml&rpc=22

So here we have an invasion and what are you going to do about it? You want people to stand up to the government but the government sends illegals to steal your job and tell you how to run your country.

25

 

[SIGSHR]

IIRC, I recall a scene in the movie "Fail Safe" in which the character played by Walter Matthau says "How far do you think Hitler would have gotten if every Jew he went after had a gun in his hand?"
I also recall a phrase popular with Emiliano Zapata and his followers-"It is better to die on your
feet than to live on your knees!"

 

[PATH]

I prefer the line from Gibson's 'Braveheart', "They can take our lives but they'll never take our freedom". I sure hope I got that right!

 

[Glenn E. Meyer]

I recently read an scholarly book on the casual factors in genocide. It is on my office shelf and I don't remember the title. Duh!

What I do remember is that the author (a scholar and not a gun looney like me) was clear that a society decides that a group is troublesome AND unable to defend itself. Then, an attempt is made to exile or encapsulate them. If that doesn't work, then a genocide occurs.

As of yet, in the USA, there is no issue or group that will unleash the armed force of the state against an entire group of citizens which would be supported by enough of the country or without political or physical means to defend itself.

It might happen but the situations are not there yet.

No gun law has engendered revolt in an organized fashion. We have some singelton nuts like at Oklahoma City or fantasy like Unintended Consequences or the 'shall we fight' threads so common on gun lists.

However, most gun folks seem to think that political action is more successful. The increase in shall issue states is telling. Yes, there are due to demographics some bastions of antigun sentiment like NY, MA or CA. They may toughen their laws and have but have you seen any revolt. No, you haven't.

There are other causes that easily might go to violence as they hold their beliefs strongly. Might proabortion folks take up the firebrand if abortions were banned. I had one of my students pose that a prochoice activist and it really stumped her.

Most folks see democracy as working and that a bad law could be overturned. Thus political action is pushed.

If we had an increase in Christian conservatism such that the separation of church and state was truly eroded, would you fight? Some folks seem to want that. No, we would probably turn to the courts.

The current faith in our democracy is strong enough that unless something truly castrophic occurs that calls for revolts are seen as from nuts.

9/11 seems to have produced significant threats to the BOR and we see society investigating and turning against the forces of tyranny. Not all conservatives are of the flavor that they want to get rid of our BOR and follow a notably flawed leadership because he is the leader. Bush's cheer leaders are falling away.

I think it is could to keep alive the examples of the Holocaust and the Golags. I just got done teaching the Milgram and Zimbardo prision experiments to show how easily we can became monsters like the Nazis.

Another problem is that the gun world folk who call for revolt aren't really at the forefront of supporting most of the BOR. They have problems with minorities, the separation of church and state, etc. No offense but a large portion of the country would see a social conservative revolution as a call for them to buy guns and we would have a true civil war.

I would like all those who want to own an AR for the revolution to volunteer to go on an antiguerrilla patrol in your nearest inner city that isn't friendly to a social conservative revolution.

Our democracy is flawed but it works. We put in the AWB and it went away. We have shall issue laws and now no retreat/ stand your ground laws are being passed.

Political action is most important.

 

[Leif]

steelheart, do you have a point, or are you simply sharing the joys of Soviet dissident literature with us?

I've read the "Gulag Archipelago" (in its immense entirety, in fact), along with several other of Solzenitsyn's other works, and I think that if you're attempting to draw a comparison between the modern American political landscape and the darkest days of Satlinist rule, you may find that the illustrious author whom you cite probably would stand in complete disagreement with your conclusion.

Your post contains no question, no item for discussion, unless of course we're meant to discuss extracts of Soviet dissident literature. What's your point?

 

[model 25]

Leif

For someone so educated and not missing a thing I am suprised you didn't see the question at the top or title to the thread.

Resistance or regret: Which would you choose?

Been a long day?

25

 

[Eghad]

I'm thinkin we are nowhere near that bridge yet. I can still go down to the ballot box and write letters to the editor, my represenatives and post on the internet. I think the only revolution we need is at the ballot box to clean a bunch of folks from both parties from Congress and put a lot of fresh blood inside the beltway.

Besides I just purchased a new fridge from the Hurricane Repair funds. First new one we had since we been married. I am to busy enjoying the crushed ice/cubed ice from the door instead of having to reach in.

If some of you have that much energy and are ferminting for a ruckus...come to my house and sort out the Insurrectionist Tupperware under my kitchen cabinet.

 

[mack59]

Violence is never the answer.

1 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
2 a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
3 a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
6 a time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
7 a time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8 a time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
Ecclesiastes: 3: 1-8

But our country is different, that could never happen here.

“Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”
George Santayana

Well, I believe in the my rights but I'm not so sure about yours.

“We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”
Benjamin Franklin

“First they came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up,
because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left
to speak up for me.”
Martin Niemöller

People are basically good and we live in a democracy.

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."
-- C.S. Lewis

"It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority..... from the absolute will of an entire people there is no appeal, no redemption, no refuge but treason."
-- Lord Acton - The History of Freedom in Antiquity (1877)

The signs of tyranny or oppression are always clear.

“As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there's a twilight where everything remains seemingly unchanged, and it is in such twilight that we must be aware of change in the air, however slight, lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness. “
William O. Douglas

Let's not get carried away.

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. “
Edmund Burke

"Each of us has a natural right to defend his person, his liberty, and his property."
-- Frederic Bastiat

Bunch of extremist nuts if you ask me.

"You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the great struggle for independence."
-- Attributed to Charles Austin Beard (1874-1948)

They’re from the government we can trust them.

"The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion"
-- Edmund Burke

“Governments will always misuse the machinery of the law as far as the state of public opinion permits.”
-- Emile Capouya

It’s reasonable gun control and they wouldn’t abuse eminent domain.

"The usual road to slavery is that first they take away your guns, then they take away your property, then last of all they tell you to shut up and say you are enjoying it."
-- James A. Donald

Besides people wouldn’t stand for it.

" Find out just what the People will submit to and you have found out the exact amount of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them; and these will continue until they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress."
-- Frederick Douglass, civil rights activist, 1857.

It’s for the good of everyone, don’t be selfish.

"The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire."
-- Robert Heinlein

But what can one person do about it.

"If you think of yourselves as helpless and ineffectual, it is certain that you will create a despotic government to be your master. The wise despot, therefore, maintains among his subjects a popular sense that they are helpless and ineffectual."
-- Frank Herbert, The Dosadi Experiment

It really isn’t that big of a deal.

"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once."
-- Hume

Well, if people were more responsible we wouldn’t have to impose limits.

"And all the time - such is the tragic comedy of our situation - we continue to clamor for those very qualities we are rendering impossible. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful."
-- C.S.Lewis

There is no need for the antiquated idea of a militia.

"Today, we need a nation of Minutemen, citizens who are not only prepared to take arms, but citizens who regard the preservation of freedom as the basic purpose of their daily life and who are willing to consciously work and sacrifice for that freedom."
-- John F. Kennedy

Let’s be reasonable, it ain’t worth dying over it.

"If a man hasn't discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live."
-- Martin Luther King, Jr.

If we allowed that, terrible things could happen.

"Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it."
-- George Bernard Shaw

Hate speech is not acceptable.

"When even one American - who has done nothing wrong - is forced by fear to shut his mind and close his mouth, then all Americans are in peril."
-- Harry Truman


CCW laws are passed - but people are acclimatized to law after law that regulates, restricts, or removes another then another freedom. Remember when you could buy a gun from the local hardware store for cash or order one from the Sears or JC Penny’s catalog? Remember when smokers could smoke anywhere? Remember when you could tell a joke and not be afraid of offending someone or getting fired? Remember when you could say what you thought without risking being demonized, marginalized, de-humanized, or labeled as less than a man or woman. Remember when it wasn't just assumed that government needed to be part of the solution for every problem, because that wasn't government role? Remember when a parent threatened a disobedient child with a spanking and they didn't worry about DCFS or the courts. Remember when boys could settle it with a fight on the playground without being kicked out of school and having to go to counseling? Remember when you weren’t expected to apologize for who you were, what you thought, and what you believed? Remember when eminent domain meant that private property was taken for public use and not for private development?

What am I talking about, things have never been better, we’ve never been more free. Why things are getting better all the time, my congressman tells me so.

What did someone say once - the foundation of this nation and our liberty rests on four boxes - the soap box, the ballot box, the jury box, and the cartridge box. Always use the soap, ballot, and jury box, but find your line in the sand. I have a feeling that the afternoon is waning and the twilight is not as far away as I would wish. And I won't be ashamed to talk about, or if necesary use, all four boxes, including the cartridge box.

Life is too short to regret one moment, let alone one day. A life filled with regret is a life unrealized and unlived.

 

[Leif]

model 25, sure there is a question in the title of the thread. But one has to have something to resist or regret not resisting for it to be a question that can be answered. Is steelheart suggesting we invent a time machine, travel back to the 1930s or 1940s, and resist the NKVD, or KGB, or various other Soviet organs?

Or maybe he's searching for those who would resist something else, which for whatever reason he chooses not to specify. The only conclusion that I can reach from the thread is that he is familiar with a passage from the Gulag Archipelago, nothing more.

steelheart, make a point, or we'll just consider you well versed in 20th century Russian literature. If you want people to choose between resistance and regret, then in fairness you need to be specific about what it is you feel that they should resist. Otherwise, it's an empty question.

BTW, thousands of people did resist Soviet rule in the Ukraine and the Baltic states during the Second World War. Unfortunately, many of them threw their lot in with the Germans. However, their resistance was, on the whole, futile and resulted only in their deaths and reprisals against their countrymen.

 

[steelheart]

My point was, I thought pretty transparent to any cogent person. If it was not to you, I will state it in a more overt manner, to wit:

My point was: To cause people to consider the results of being unarmed and unable to resist a government with a monopoly on arms and power, and to consider the urgent need to preserve the citizen's access to arms.

I thought the passage I quoted from The Gulag Archipelago was a fitting way to accomplish this.

Is steelheart suggesting we invent a time machine, travel back to the 1930s or 1940s, and resist the NKVD, or KGB, or various other Soviet organs?

Please, Leif - if you can't be rational, at least try to be realistic - or is this just pointless snideness and sarcasm?

I find it quite curious that what I say - anything that I say - causes you to PMS to the degree that it does. Why do you insist on following me from topic to topic on this board and attacking every post and every word that I write??

 

[Leif]

steelheart, your point consisted of a terse, open-ended question and a quotation from a published work. That's not really a point. You made a point in your subsequent post, so why didn't you just do that in your first post and save everybody the process of interpretation?

Nobody's following anybody, you're the one who keeps starting topics containing vague or overblown statements in L&P; a number of people have commented in several of the threads that you started, so are they following you as well? If you don't want people to ask for clarification, don't be vague. And try not to be condescending while you are at it ...

So, to answer a question with question so that you may better clarify your point, are you comparing the modern American political landscape to that of mid-20th century Soviet Russia, or are you making a general observation about history or society? Is this an academic question, a manifesto, or a rambling anecdote?

 

[Mk VII]

people did resist the OGPU/NKVD in the '30s. There were quite large rebellions, which were supressed with troops, artillery and aerial bombing if necessary. And it didn't make any difference.

 

[Eghad]

I think the vast majority of us here understand the consequences of the loss of the 2nd Amendment. Preaching to the choir here, suggest you make some converts outside TFL. Thats where the rubber meets the road.

 

[Al Norris]

I don't like to admonish anyone in a public manner. I think it's childish to have to do so. But sometimes its called for. This is one of those times....

Progunner ... er ... steelheart, tone down your responses and get rid of the ad hominems and the bad attitude.

Because you started this thread with a very vague and open to interpretation question, and because it took you 3 days to respond to everyones wonderment, and because of the ad hominem attack on Leif... Thread Closed.

Now I'm gonna look at the other threads you started...