Trotskylvania wrote:Kubra wrote: "It fails to distinguish between ends and means. In conventional thinking, there's no real distinction made between someone who uses violence for liberatory ends, and someone for whom violent repression is an end in itself."
tl;dr the problem isn't political violence in general, but the normative definition of such currently taken.
Er, is that the correct interpretation, trot?
Yes.
Take, for example, the emancipation of slaves during the American Civil War. This was an immensely violent enterprise; in itself it meant the complete destruction of the existing socio-economic system. Slave-owners were mortgaged to the hilt on their slaves. Both they and their creditors were bankrupted. The freeing of slaves amounted to the massive dispossession of billions of dollars (1860 dollars, no less) of wealth.
The actual practice of emancipation required more than just legal pronouncements, but the waging of total war, the ruination of the entire Southern economy, and the deaths of hundreds of thousands on both sides.
But the end result was the abolition of slavery in America, giving millions the basic rights of citizenship.
Considering that we've been to war for far worst reason with far worse results I'd say it was definitely worth it.
My only regret is Lincoln's assassination and his spineless replacement ending Reconstruction early.
