# Can there ever be a stop in the retribution cycle? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 27, 2018, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830 "2018-06-27T12:17:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Bruce\_Wayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bruce\_Wayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bruce_Wayne)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2018, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/61 "2018-06-30T17:06:36Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Did Clinton ever dish it out by calling anyone a cunt? > > You should think again about the post you just read. Your question is a non sequitur. Your first post in this thread was a non sequitor. If your gonna equate crazy white person going on racist rant with republican you gotta own the Democrats who love to murder one another in Chicago. Something more analogous to Sanders getting kicked out of a restaraunt based on moral grounds would be a Pro choice democrat being kicked out of a restaraunt based on moral grounds. I bet that’s gonna start happening a lot more often now. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2018, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/62 "2018-06-30T17:36:06Z")
OP complains about “democrats … refusing to serve [people who work for Trump] at restaurants.” Let me try to hone in on this ideation by posing a hypothetical analogous scenario. Suppose a Democratic President pursued a policy where children were deliberately abused; bragged and cackled about it; and blamed the Republicans saying if they kissed his ass he’d undue the damage with an executive order. His policies were explained to the press by an unusually nasty Press Secretary, we’ll call him Hucky. A Republican restaurant owner refuses to let Hucky eat at his restaurant. I ask **Urbanredneck** and others how would they react to this? Let’s stipulate for the sake of discussion that refusing to serve Hucky is a more heinous sin than torturing or abusing children. If I were a Democrat I might say something like _“Even though my President’s separating children from their parents, possibly for months, is a minor transgression compared with the horror of making Hucky visit a different restaurant, the fact remains that this heinous restaurant owner is just a private citizen, while the President is an important role model. POTUS needs to bend over backwards even for the little things: dotting I’s, crossing T’s, and not torturing children. For this reason, I think the President’s minor faux pas is more newsworthy than the restaurant massacre.”_ But what about those of you focused on blaming the restaurateur? With parties reversed, would you stand on principle and still assert that the restaurant owner’s sin was more grievous? Help us out here; we want to understand your thinking. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2018, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/63 "2018-06-30T18:16:20Z")
> [@CelticKnot](#): > > I wasn’t talking about myself. :smack: Yeah, I get that you didn’t think that what you said applied to you, but you looked at what others said, and decided that you had no responsibility, and that it is all someone else’s fault. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2018, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/64 "2018-06-30T18:19:16Z")
> [@Bruce\_Wayne](#): > > Your first post in this thread was a non sequitor. If your gonna equate crazy white person going on racist rant with republican you gotta own the Democrats who love to murder one another in Chicago. > > Something more analogous to Sanders getting kicked out of a restaraunt based on moral grounds would be a Pro choice democrat being kicked out of a restaraunt based on moral grounds. I bet that’s gonna start happening a lot more often now. Are you talking about a prominent pro choice democrat, who is the spokesperson for planned parenthood or something? I could see that. You could justify that that is an equivalence in power and influence that they have over their respective organizations. If you are talking about some random democrat who happens to be pro-choice, then no, it’s not the same at all. The analogy to that would be kicking out all anti-choice republicans. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/65 "2018-07-01T06:12:42Z")
That both sides do it doesn’t make it right. As they say, two wrongs don’t make a right. The BBC has an article on the subject [here](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-44620412). I couldn’t even begin to summarise it. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/66 "2018-07-01T06:53:06Z")
> [@pool](#): > > Why are you lumping the Westboro Baptist Church in with Republicans, or at least right wingers, they are registered Democrats, and have also opposed Donald Trump? Not that I consider them true Democrats but your smearing them as Republicans doesn’t really hold water. Evangelical Christians are decidedly conservative. Westboro is the most fringy of those. Not sure what reality you live in but in ours they are markedly not liberal and about as diametrically opposed to liberalism as you get. They “registered” as democrats and opposed Trump??? Well that settles it then…they must be liberal! :rolleyes: You know East Germany called themselves the German Democratic Republic. North Korea calls itself the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Clearly they were/are democracies right? By the same token Westboro must be liberal democrats because signing up makes it so. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/67 "2018-07-01T16:02:51Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > That both sides do it doesn’t make it right. As they say, two wrongs don’t make a right. > > The BBC has an article on the subject [here](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-44620412). I couldn’t even begin to summarise it. Ah, bothsidesism. “He punched me in the face, so I asked him to stop.” Both sides, eh? Now, there is the fact that parties are made of people, millions of people. And to equate what some random person who happens to be on one side to what someone who is an actively supported leader of the other side does is absolutely disingenuous. So, when you complain that some college student on a blog said something mean is the same as when the president calls the press the enemy of the state, I see that there is an inability to understand how a president that is supported by his party is different from a college student. Whether that is through willful desire to not understand that, or an actual inability is the only question I am left with. ---
**Author:** ![pool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pool/32/4152_2.png) [@pool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pool)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/68 "2018-07-01T17:28:12Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Evangelical Christians are decidedly conservative. Westboro is the most fringy of those. > > Not sure what reality you live in but in ours they are markedly not liberal and about as diametrically opposed to liberalism as you get. > > They “registered” as democrats and opposed Trump??? Well that settles it then…they must be liberal! :rolleyes: > > You know East Germany called themselves the German Democratic Republic. North Korea calls itself the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Clearly they were/are democracies right? By the same token Westboro must be liberal democrats because signing up makes it so. :rolleyes: Their patriarch also fought for desegregation at a time when that was not very popular in the U.S. I’m not saying they are liberal or conservative, I think they are just fucking crazy you were the one trying to put them in a box they don’t fit in, they are sort of all over the place. They don’t really belong in the discussion because they are a cult, that was my point. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/69 "2018-07-01T18:34:17Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > Both sides, eh? Yes. Many Democrats are not paragons of virtue. You might try reading the article to which I linked. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/70 "2018-07-01T19:06:34Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Yes. Many Democrats are not paragons of virtue. You might try reading the article to which I linked. I did read the article, the one that you couldn’t even begin to summarize. Well, here’s a summary: Republicans are doing actions that are harmful to minorities, to foreigners and their countries, to the world, and ultimately to this very country. Democrats are protesting those actions, and sometimes are a bit rude about it and hurt the republican’s feelings. Both sides, sure. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/71 "2018-07-01T20:17:30Z")
A liberal asshole tried to assassinate Steve Scalise and his colleagues. [Here is an article](https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/29/ajit-pai-family-death-threat-man-charged-688040) about a piece of shit that emailed Ajit Pai “I will find your children and I will kill them”. Yes, both sides have assholes amongst them. You trying to downplay your sides’ pieces of shit as merely “a bit rude” is disingenuous / inaccurate. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/72 "2018-07-01T20:25:02Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > A liberal asshole tried to assassinate Steve Scalise and his colleagues. [Here is an article](https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/29/ajit-pai-family-death-threat-man-charged-688040) about a piece of shit that emailed Ajit Pai “I will find your children and I will kill them”. Yes, both sides have assholes amongst them. You trying to downplay your sides’ pieces of shit as merely “a bit rude” is disingenuous / inaccurate. There are assholes of all types, including violent assholes, on both sides. There are also folks who rationalize support for sexual assaulters and violators of consent on both sides. The Democrats are actually beginning to try to purge themselves of that latter category. The Republicans are not, and those in office (for the most part) generally continue to rationalize supporting sexual assaulters and violators of consent. So do lots of Republican voters/Trump supporters. This tells us a lot about the morality and decency of those folks, IMO. ---
**Author:** ![Silver\_lining](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aca169/32.png) [@Silver\_lining](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silver_lining)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/73 "2018-07-01T20:42:59Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Right now we have [democrats saying its ok to harass people who work for the Trump administration](https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/25/politics/maxine-waters-trump-officials/index.html) such as going to their homes, refusing to serve them at restaurants, etc… > > In a few years a democrat will most likely take over and republicans and their supporters will do the same. All part of “they did it first” campaign. > > Can this ever be stopped? Yes. It can be stopped. Top Democrats such as Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, heck even Jimmy Carter need to come out and shame this type of behavior. Have they? Another possibility is to censure or expel politicians who open ask to cost people in the public. Protest all you wish, just don’t try to intimidate or scare people in public. This can not become the new normal. Expanding the right to refuse service based on politics can quickly blur lines to the right to refuse for other areas such as racism. The right to refuse service should only be limited to asking a very religious person to make or do something they object to based on their previous lifestyle choices. The court ruled 7-2 in favor of the baker. The hidden news is most of the press did not mention that several minority groups such as Jewish and Muslim Americans supported the baker. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/74 "2018-07-01T20:46:07Z")
> [@Silver\_lining](#): > > Yes. It can be stopped. Top Democrats such as Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, heck even Jimmy Carter need to come out and shame this type of behavior. Have they? This is laughable when Trump has rhetorically encouraged violence multiple times. Whatever you think of refusing service because of political actions, it’s entirely non-violent, unlike many of the things Trump has said. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/75 "2018-07-01T21:06:18Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > A liberal asshole tried to assassinate Steve Scalise and his colleagues. And his actions have been condemned by liberals. He was a mentally ill person who did happen to be a liberal. If we want to trade violent people associated with one side or another, we will be here all day, but I think that the list of violent acts by right wingers will be much longer than that of the left. I also see more justification of actions by the right when a right wing person commits or threatens acts of violence. Did you really want to play this game? > [@](#): > > [Here is an article](https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/29/ajit-pai-family-death-threat-man-charged-688040) about a piece of shit that emailed Ajit Pai “I will find your children and I will kill them”. There have been lots of death threats to lots of people. The owner of the red hen has received death threats due to SHS publicize her account of being denied service. Maxine Waters has received death threats due to trump’s deliberatly inflammatory mischaracterization of her comments. As far as the Ajit Pai threat, that wasn’t because he was a republican, that was because of his decision that affected net neutrality and the threatener was against that specific policy. Frustration over the FCC completely going against the public’s wishes caused him to do something rather stupid, which, once again, was condemned by the left, unlike when the NRA calls for curb stomping reporters, and that is defended right here by the right. He has apologized for his comments, and will probably pay a rather severe criminal penalty for them, is Dana Loesch apologizing for or being held accountable for her comments? > [@](#): > > Yes, both sides have assholes amongst them. You trying to downplay your sides’ pieces of shit as merely “a bit rude” is disingenuous / inaccurate. Yes, both sides have assholes, but the left tries to police the assholes, and calls them out and makes them face consequences. The right gives them a promotion. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/76 "2018-07-01T21:10:35Z")
> [@Silver\_lining](#): > > Yes. It can be stopped. Top Democrats such as Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, heck even Jimmy Carter need to come out and shame this type of behavior. Have they? > > Another possibility is to censure or expel politicians who open ask to cost people in the public. Protest all you wish, just don’t try to intimidate or scare people in public. Would you apply your standard to trump? > [@](#): > > This can not become the new normal. Expanding the right to refuse service based on politics can quickly blur lines to the right to refuse for other areas such as racism. > > The right to refuse service should only be limited to asking a very religious person to make or do something they object to based on their previous lifestyle choices. So, you are saying that the only reason that someone should ever be refused service is if the service provider claims that god told them not to serve them? What if they come in cursing and causing a scene and disturbing my employees and customers? Do I have to make up a god to justify my not tolerating such shenanigans? > [@](#): > > The court ruled 7-2 in favor of the baker. The hidden news is most of the press did not mention that several minority groups such as Jewish and Muslim Americans supported the baker. The court rules that the colorado commision was too harsh on religion, and didn’t give proper due processes. They did not rule i favor of the baker’s ability to discriminate based on his religion. That is still an open question. Can you give a cite for your “hidden news”? ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/77 "2018-07-01T21:11:55Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > … when the NRA calls for curb stomping reporters, and that is defended right here by the right. … WTF are you talking about? Cite? ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/78 "2018-07-01T21:15:57Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > WTF are you talking about? Cite? Really, you didn’t hear about it? Okay. Seems you could google it yourself, but here you go. [https://www.dailydot.com/layer8/dana-loeschs-anti-media-rhetoric-resurfaces-after-capital-gazette-shooting/](https://www.dailydot.com/layer8/dana-loeschs-anti-media-rhetoric-resurfaces-after-capital-gazette-shooting/) ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2018, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/79 "2018-07-01T21:17:24Z")
> [@Napier](#): > > Republicans attack people for being what they are. Democrats attack people for doing what they do to others. It is one of my deepest frustrations that people refuse to acknowledge this fact. > [@](#): > > I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. We’re called to judge only by the content of one’s character, and the Republicans have none. But even then, they’re too deeply embedded in the “Us vs Them” mentality that they can’t acknowledge we’re talking about their unique _behavior._ ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2018, 11:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830/80 "2018-07-02T11:32:55Z")
Basically, the right is saying that the Democrats need to continue to be the adults in the room and when a small restaurant refuses service to an administration official, it’s as bad as when their president encourages his supporters to “knock the crap out of” a protester because America holds Democrats to a higher standard than the GOP. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-there-ever-be-a-stop-in-the-retribution-cycle/816830.md?page=5)