Anti-government violence is growing. The response needs to be more than just increased policing
Anti-government extremism is not one coherent ideology or organisation. It can encompass sovereign citizens, conspiracy theorists and others who come to see government institutions as fundamentally corrupt, illegitimate or actively working against ordinary citizens.
(emphasis mine) shit cuz they're onto me :p
Our research points towards an approach known as procedural justice. “Procedurally just” governance is about how governments exercise their authority. It means treating citizens with respect, making decisions fairly and without bias to prevent benefiting one special-interest group over another, being transparent about motives for legislation or new government processes. It also means giving people meaningful opportunities to have their voices heard.
Importantly, our study found that when people perceived government as more procedurally just they reported lower levels of anger and were less likely to perceive the government as illegitimate.
This relationship was evident among both conspiracy believers and non-believers. It means procedural justice shouldn’t be dismissed as merely good public relations. It potentially forms part of Australia’s strategy for preventing violent extremism.
[...]
Rather, governments need a two-track response. They need to identify and disrupt people moving towards violence. But they also need to reduce the conditions that can make that violence attractive in the first place. These include alienation, anger and a belief that public institutions exercise power without listening to people or treating them fairly and equally.
I thought this was a good and thoughtful piece to have been put out so soon after what appears to be an attempted political assassination of a politician who, near as I can tell, wanted more government transparency and accountability.
Not really a great sign of the times. With government building out some of the largest surveillance machines in the world I suspect we can conclude what the response will be. As the author highlights though, restoring trust and a sense of justice is more important to get back to a society where we feel our concerns can be dealt with non violently.
https://theconversation.com/anti-government-violence-is-growing-the-response-needs-to-be-more-than-just-increased-policing-294782Open linkView original on lemmy.dbzer0.com
37 replies
30 years ago, the US created "section 230", which was used to indemnify platforms from what was written on those platforms. Attach that to an algorithm which promotes certain things while suppressing others, and now American companies can publish by proxy. They don't need to write vile stuff, just promote it to create danger for people who don't agree with them.
Australia does not have this rule but instead of using that fact to fight against rampant misinformation on platforms like Facebook, Labor have created a framework to ostensibly "protect children", but actually to create a real name policy on web platforms. The reason is because fighting a Google is much harder than fighting some guy who posted something in support of Palestine.
This creates fertile ground to construct the case violent action against politicians, almost always on the left*. Labor need to understand that this is not a "bipartisan" thing, or "simply good regulation" or whatever. ONP goons will happily kill people (or allow people to be killed) in the ALP (among others). You can see this in the horrifying rhetoric making light of Jacqui Lambie's injuries. While the Libs might not, the Nats absolutely will stand by and watch someone murder left wing politicians at the behest of far right US platforms.
It's time to hold these platforms to account through truth in advertising laws which are extremely popular, not to mention as publishers of illegal material (which Facebook for example is absolutely doing).
*Note: This isn't about who commits the action, but about who the action is against.
Restoring trust and building the largest surveillance machines in the world really do clash as possible options. I am not criticising what you say, just pointing that it reflects the polarisation of our society. We need more collective action to promote trust-making and more public discussion in schools, universities, community organisations, in communications media and political institutions.
One of our biggest obstacles is that capitalist interests will take advantage of such events to divide and surveil us even more. We must see this and not be dragged down by it.
Politicians themselves have to model decent behaviour and not act like fools (e.g. the one who made the 'shame and stone in the public square' comment, and the PHONey cartoon about Lambie's health challenge) in the current social environment. There is a lot of sick ideology and behaviour about.
EDIT: Having said that, being a politician is no picnic: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/oct/20/helen-haines-alleged-attack-response-tightened-security-ntwnfb. Also, I don't know if you've seen this short of Pliberserk commenting on the sort of comments she and others have received: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/ri5pZcwAGhQ
Oh I fully expect Australia to descend into violent state suppression as climate change worsens. The government already runs blacksites for refugees the UN condems as crimes against humanity and are in direct violation of its treaty obligations. As climate refugees surge and capitalism continues to collapse I don't imagine things getting better.
Australia is already a police state, and I think the reason the government is enthusiastic about "ai" (along with other govs) is because it makes possible the sort of surveillance and profiling that makes the panopticon look like a private getaway.
It's just that this path likely only begets more violence and anger.
I would like Australia to be a real democracy, i.e. a country where decisions in all spheres of life are Democratic (most people work under dictatorship dynamics, and that's what a lot of us spend our time doing) and political life is accountable and transparent. The only way to get there is through collective action, and political consciousness-raising.
In the meantime it would be good if we didn't walk down a path of distrust and cycles of violence.
Agreed.
fuck the government, we don't need masters
In Australia we generally view government as our servants not masters. We don't elect a tyrant to rule us. We elect a local member who we can meet and talk to and ask for help with problems.
I disagree with my local member's politics but I don't regard him as a bad person or someone out to get me.
I really don't understand this. Any group of people living together inevitably creates rules and governance to serve their common interests. How are the roads going to be maintained and garbage collected without people contributing money into a pool and electing someone to administer it.
There is a cultural belief that we elect people and it's good and fine and works, but that's observably false. It's a fantasy idea of what government is supposed to be, not what it is in practice.
The reaction to people wanting their "representatives" to actually represent them has been an increase in oppressive violence, things like ramping up police violence and introducing anti-protest laws.
The people in my community have been hospitalised, deported, raped and even killed because they wanted things to be better. We've gone through all the officially sanctioned channels, we've used protest to make ourselves heard, but we're only being beaten.
As you said, any group of people are going to create rules, but they don't need to create hierarchical government to effectively enforce those rules, or organise the day to day activities of society. We've organised without government plenty of times before.
We're not just saying things purely out of anger, there's a massive amount of theory behind it. If you really do want to understand, then if recommend you read some of the anarchist faq or any leftist theory tbh. At the very least, you'll likely find the ideas interesting even if you don't agree with everything. I tend to find most people who seriously engage with these ideas agree with a good deal of them. All we're asking for is society to organise in a more just and equitable way, while disabling or limiting the avenues for corruption to take hold.
I once thought the same as you, we're literally drowned in propaganda from birth so it's extremely hard to break out from the dominant ideology, but there are better ways if you decide to evaluate the alternatives on their own merits and not pre-concieved notions of what they are.
I want to live in a society where we are least likely to suffer at the hands of despots. There is no realistic path away from democratic society that doesn't return us ultimately into the hands of kings and warlords. Democracy is imperfect but it's the best chance we have to live the lives we want.
Not opposed to Marxist critiques of capitalism but left and right, authoritarians and anarchists both form a horseshoe. The end game for either tends to be a single party state controlled through force by a corrupt elite.
Social democracy or democratic socialism can both be made to work. Libertarianism and syndicalism deny human nature and experience.
I'm really not sure how anarchy leads to any kind of state when it's specifically stateless. I'd say it's far more resistant to corruption and centres around a more robust and empowering form of democracy than any representational system, which is inherently corruptible.
Horshoe theory is silly
Source: I made it the fuck up
The disappointing community response to Covid-19 in 2020 demonstrated why we do need rules and enforcement of them.
Faced with an outbreak of a contagious disease, too many Australians refused to wear a mask, quarantine or distance until it was legally mandated.
we don't need a government to do those things and be organised as a community
But we kinda do. Because you can't expect people to act reasonably or rationally.
I know a guy, let's call him Bob, who got a warning from the police for aggressively looming over a man at the supermarket who was wearing a mask and trying to maintain healthy social distance.
Because Bob didn't believe in masks or social distancing he percieved that behaviour as the other person being judgemental of him. When the other guy, rather reasonably, pointed out that he has cancer and didn't want Bob, who was wearing his mask over his chin at the time, to be so close to him, the confrontation was on.
Bob still maintains to this day that he was just standing up for his rights as an Australian...
He is also firmly of the belief that Anthony Albanese is a traitor to the country and that John Howard is the best Prime Minister we have ever had...
I don't quite understand what your example is meant to demonstrate, but I think you're confusing me with a libertarian (the weird fascist kind) or something which I am absolutely not.
We don't need a government to keep everyone in line, that's a fact. We can organise, decide rules, enforce them and have actual justice without a violent system of domination built on hierarchical power.
I understood it quite clearly.
Bob and people like Bob need institutional structures around them to stop them reacting badly.
This has been proven time and again; the issue isn’t those systems, it’s the people that are responsible for managing those. Including electors who are responsible for putting people in the positions that make the decisions.
Anarchy’s a great dream but it’s unachievable without societal breakdown.
My example? That there are people who refuse to act rationally or reasonably? This was someone who needed an intervention from an authority to motivate him to act in a way that cost him nothing but that he was ideologically opposed to.
Governments are always going to have a strong advantage against other frameworks that seek to decentralise power, trying to overthrow a centralised power structure is likely to be extremely violent and bloody. We aren't there yet.
I have read Alastair Reynolds and I would love to be a Demarchist, but I don't see that being feasible in the forseeable future.
Right, that's what I thought you might have meant, simple misunderstanding then. I'm not saying we don't enforce things, just that we don't need hierarchical systems of authority to do so. Someone putting the community at risk like this can be stopped without the use of violent state thugs, probably with much better outcomes too.
Sure, revolution isn't on our doorstep, but I still want things to be different. I don't think there's anything wrong or objectionable about aspiring to a better society. Why would we talk ourselves out of the idea just because change isn't right around the corner?
Demarchist? I afraid I'm not familiar with the term, so I won't make assumptions. Regardless I still don't think we should give up so easily.
Democratic Anarchy, it is a system that would rely on a couple of generational leaps in computers and mind machine interfaces before we could even aspire to it. Nowhere near as appealing as the Culture would be, but also only dependent on moderately Clarke tech computers not massively Clarke tech.
Anyway I'm not defeatist, more just realistic. This guy would fall pretty squarely into the capitalist bootlicking Libertarian camp. He only really responds to violence (or the threat thereof) as motivation, in other words your typical boomer small business owner. He is never going to comply without some form of threat to back things up.
Its great to be idealistic, but I sincerely doubt we will see change in my life time, or that of my kids. We as a species are wired to listen to the ape that shrieks the loudest too much.
Uh covid very clearly showed that yes we fucking do.
When left to their own devices to do the right thing, way too many aussies went "Fuck yas" and put us all in danger
Can you explain why a government is the only way to keep people in line?
People will continue to be problematic, but we don't need this one specific structure to deal with it. Imo it's actually a particular ineffective and often cruel way to go about it.
Having a formal behaviour enforcement structure with codified rules and a supportive scaffolding prevents things like lynch mobs.
We don't need a government for that
In these above examples, without a government, how would you suggest you gained a consensus on state wide health response ? Who balances all competing needs for hopefully the greater good?
Hammurabi settled this shit a couple thousand years ago ngl. Hobbes followed up with a big ol' stake afterwards
bit of a non-sequitur
Let me rephrase then: I think the government is fundamentally corrupt, so we should abolish it regardless of whatever half-assed attempts they make to placate the majority. They'll undoubtedly continue to assault and disempower the same oppressed people that they currently do, for the profit of a select number of corporate elites.
Because that's what I mean. It can't be fixed, they can just put in measures to retain power.
I'm a goddless commie but random killings of politicians doesn't seem useful and has established itself as having a deathtoll potentially in the millions^[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Archduke_Franz_Ferdinand].
Incoherant rage only furthers fascist ends and I don't think it's a bad thing if the government tries to be less shit. Accelerationism hasn't got a shiny track record, and at any rate Australia isn't on the cusp of revolution waiting for our moment.
You're putting words into my mouth that I didn't even remotely say.
I never said we should go around murdering people, I never said I wanted to accelerate fascism. I kind of want to avoid both of those things actually, they're among my main complaints with the government.
Things have needed to change for a very long time, these people have been inflicting violence on a frankly absurd scale against first nations people, immigrants, sex workers etc etc.
One politician being attacked being the trigger for "change" is insulting given the context of what they're inflicting on the populace. They don't care about being less shit, they just want a licence to continue brutalising the innocent without consequences.
Call it incoherent rage if you like, but I'm allowed to express frustration and anger by commenting relatively meaningless things. You can read into it more if you like but can't someone just be upset and express a desire for real radical change without it turning into a huge debate?
I'm not having a go, chill out a little. Just discussing the article.
If you say so, but I don't think there's a read of your reply that comes across that way.
In that spirit, I don't much care for the article given the way it frames all dissent as violent extremism from the far right. There's no meaningful discussion of legitimate criticism from those of us on the left who want the government gone. We're just lumped in with conspiracy theorists and sov-cits as "others".
Not to mention the whole idea that they just need to do things a little different is laughable, for the reasons I've stated previously.
Nah; get rid of lobbying. Make it illegal and make truth in advertising law.
Anyone who says government isn't needed is either a giant piece of shit or completely ignorant of what that would actually mean...
It rarely matters which is right, neither should ever be listened to under any circumstances
Yeah, 'cause we're doing so well right now with governments everywhere, right?
Good to see DJ Khaled still getting work
Let's goooooo