A 2nd Revolution?

[Ridge]

Violence is the easy way out - but it's also a sure path to discrediting everything you stand for.

[GunTroll]

Violence is the easy way out - but it's also a sure path to discrediting everything you stand for.

So wise you are.

[Ridge]

So wise you are.

Meh, copied it word for word from Glenn Beck's Common Sense

[GunTroll]

You Fatty fat fat so Beck listener! Hold your head in shame!

[Pancho Villa]

The thing about a (mostly) democratic society (yes, we are a Republic, I know) is that if you have the numbers to do a successful violent revolution, you have the numbers to be such a huge voting bloc in elections that you'll be pandered to politically anyway. When that pandering consists of "Ya'all leave us the eff alone, y'hear?" it makes it even easier, because you're not demanding handouts, you're demanding the cesessation of handouts.

If any violence did happen in the US, civil war style, it would probably come from the critical mass of people wanting to be left alone being reached in a single state which would subsequently vote itself out of the Union. Now, I don't know how much history y'all know, but the last time that happened it didn't work out so hot for the seceding side, but who knows. Times a-change.

There are a lot of preconditions for a successful effort to change the culture. Violence - if it must occur - will be the very last thing, and will be in self defense.

Also, to the fine folks talking about militias - the difference is, during the revolutionary war, 2-5% of the population was available to be out in the field as militia at any one time. To besiege a fairly sizeable army for the time - almost 10,000 men strong - that occupied Boston, the militia answered the call, with no central, guiding authority except their love of liberty, to the tune of 20,000 men. Today, you'd be lucky if 200 crazies who never drill showed up. As a general rule, my thought on militias that almost no one who wants to be in one should be allowed in one. But perhaps my intellectual snobbery is showing.

[GunTroll]

We just got schooled. Again!

[Pancho Villa]

Sorry to double post, but I wanted to add:

Studying the culture (especially the differences from then and today) from that of the revolutionary war to that of today is a hobby of mine. In general, I believe that a man from there would consider modern man to be quite an unprincipled coward, and probably stupid to boot (surprisingly, from what little data I have been able to gather, I think that most grown men of the time were far better educated and a higher percent of the population were "thinkers" than are now.)

Of particular relevance to the interests of this board, though, are the law enforcement and militia systems of the time. Everyone knows the US didn't have much of a standing army for the longest time; fewer people know that police officers as we know them today were also unheard of in the colonies. What is also not common knowledge is the fact that the difference, technically, between your powers and a policeman's powers is that a policeman can issue traffic citations. This is a legal legacy from those times - though, de facto, a policeman has a lot more leeway because courts often give them much more benefit of the doubt than they do to us regular folk.

Essentially, if someone robbed you, you were expected to run the guy down, beat him to submission, and take him to the nearest court house. Your neighbors were expected to help in this and come by as witnesses. A European who came to America shortly after the revolution was amazed (to paraphrase) at two peculiar things - the complete lack of government agents and the complete lack of people who got away with crimes. There were numerous (private) investigative agencies who made it their mission to track down, capture and take to the authorities people who got away with crimes. They created, of their own accord, methods of communicating across their respective jurisdictions, so that fugitives could not get away simply by getting out of the county. And it was such a successful system that the US didn't really see widespread use of police officers until after the civil war.

This alone tells you how different the people back then were compared to now. I think I could count on a lot of folks here, even ones I have disagreements with, to stop what they were doing and help me tackle and subdue some jerk who tries to take my stuff; but I don't think its something you could expect in general, let alone people volunteering their time to track down criminals, to make their own neighborhoods safer.

Now, some of this is undoubtably due to problems put in by the government. The effective tax rate back then was pretty close to 0%, as opposed to the 60-75% of our income thats confiscated in various ways by the government today. People could work a lot less (even when their work was less productive) and still make a decent living. But I also think al ot of it is a short-sighted (NOT selfish - unless you take 'self interest' to mean 'my immediate self interest while ignoring how my actions harm me in the long run,' which I think is silly) view of life. Today the pull of the "now" is strong in your average person's mind - back then I believe many more people thought about the long term, about consequences and principles. So they could see how it was in their advantage to put 4 hours a week into helping the local investigative agency out, or helping run down a pickpocket. The obvious selfish (ie self-benefitting) nature of those actions are clear to anyone who thinks beyond the immediate moment - but many people today do not think beyond the immediate moment.

To a colonist of the time, helping to hunt down criminals and serving in the militia were not things done out of blind duty, selflessly, for the good of "the community." The colonist knew that his own interests lay in living in a safe, well protected society; and that nothing is free ("God said: take what you want, and pay for it.") He knew that safety, order and peace were not something you counted on appearing from thin air, but something you did your part to create, because it is obviously in your own self-interest to live in a safe, sane society. The penalty for not coming out during a militia callout was pathetic - something like a traffic ticket today - but the militia came out, voluntarily, in droves.

[MichiganMilitia]

I think that most grown men of the time were far better educated and a higher percent of the population were "thinkers" than are now.)

I agree... Progression of culture in America has created an environment that encourages the people to become sheeple. Being a thinker is what will set you apart and place you far above the rest of the sheeple.

And thank you for the history lesson. These things are important to know and are all too often left out of history lessons at our (tax dollar funded) public schools.