Follow-ups to Vigilante Justice

The primary thing I personally want to say is that there is almost no such thing as malicious evil. All evil is done by people who think they are doing good. Even the Nazi thinks that he is safe-guarding his society from exploitative forces that wish to drain it and abandon the hollowed-out ruin. The fact that doing evil ALWAYS FEELS LIKE DOING GOOD is exactly why we can't count on arguments of "it's for the good in this case" special-exceptions. We spent a lot of time and social capital on arriving at "Extra-judicial violence is never acceptable." The fact that it feels so right and good to break an established rule against violence should give us pause. Twice.

Here's some other things said on Facebook, which means it'll disappear in just a few days, and that I wish to preserve for posterity.

L: One of the reasons we support liberal civilization is because it keeps us safer than an authoritarian regime would, even one that we thought was "on our side".

The prohibition against private political violence is the absolute cornerstone of civilization. It is prior to free speech. It is prior to democracy. It is prior to egalitarianism. It is the very first step towards freedom and liberalism. It is the Schelling fence that must be defended above all others.

What's terrifying isn't that an idiot nazi blogger got punched. An occupational hazard of being an asshole is that people are more likely to punch you. What's terrifying is that I'm arguing with people who think they are liberals on Facebook about whether or not to condone it.

I'm upset that so many people claiming to be liberals endorse punching people for the explicit purpose of political intimidation. That's a big deal. That scares the shit out of me.