Continuing the discussion from Are you worried about violence if Harris wins?:
This is the reverse question from the thread linked above.
If Trump wins and it seems it was done via electoral shenanigans do you worry there will be violence from the liberal side? (which is not an idle threat…republicans have been working hard to get officials in place that might be able to tilt the results).
Ironically, it would be liberals yelling, “Stop the steal!”
No, not much. Long term I have worries, but short term, very litttle.
I guess it’s a question of what kind of window we’re talking about. Most of the political terrorism in my life has been committed by the conservative movement: Charlottesville, the Olympics bombing, Oklahoma City, the Club Q shooting, Dylan Root, numerous attacks on abortion clinics and providers, January 6, the Buffalo supermarket shooting and on and on. Violence and hate is built into the framework of the Republican Party and I don’t expect that to ever change.
We’ve seen what republicans have planned with Project 2025. We have seen republicans steal Supreme Court seats. We have seen republicans try to overturn a whole US election (with violence and other means). We have seen them purge voter rolls and demand IDs and close polling places and limit mail-in votes and so on. We see them stacking election officials (see OP).
I am NOT (read that again) advocating violence. Far from it. But is there no limit to this?
No there is no limit. I just don’t think you can have a democracy when half the people in your country are hostile to democracy.
ETA: and the GOP has been actively denigrating government and democracy since Reagan, this is the result.
That sounds like a recipe for violence (maybe goes to @What_Exit’s long term worries).
I mean yeah, America is drenched in blood, children get slaughtered going to class and we just shrug.
We’ll just keep shrugging.
I live in a liberal city (well, all cities are liberal) and I do expect significant unrest, rallies, demonstrations, protests with at least some disruption and violence if Trump wins. After all, Trump 2.0 is going to be worse than Trump 1.0, and the first term was already pretty bad.
However, I am not worried because I live far away enough from downtown that there would likely be no personal effect to me.
I am considerably more worried about violence from celebrating Trumpists; and from any Trump administration itself.
If enough such violence occurs, yes, people may start fighting back. But while I’d expect a whole shitload of demonstrations even if it doesn’t, I wouldn’t expect violence from the Left unless the Trumpists do indeed start doing the more violent of the shit they say they’re going to do.
And unfortunately, this is what Republicans have figured out, and some Democrats haven’t - that there is almost no limit to what one can get away with as long as one does it “peacefully.”
From the liberal/left side? Little if any, after decades of learned helplessness they are passive and prone to self-blame and infighting. Most won’t fight even if it gets to the point of right wing death squads roaming around killing people, they’ll just argue over whose fault it is and how to “compromise” with the fascists.
I wouldn’t expect violence from the Democratic side. If the steal was really obvious, I think the most likely large-scale response would be a general strike. A significant portion of the population just decides, “This society isn’t functioning properly anymore”, and just refuses to play along.
And I suspect a few Blue States will do the same. Just straight up refuse to recognize the new government. Nothing violent, just, “Nope, not going to do that.”