It appears that a large-scale international conflict may soon occur. What can we do?

Unless The Dude can provide sources as evidence of the 'many videos' he has seen in regards to his statement, "With other threats of riots and revolution (as I have seen many videos where both Democrats and Republicans have threatened riots and revolution) these issues are in my opinion becoming less unlikely." then he is, despite saying otherwise, fear mongering.

Alan wrote: Unless The Dude can provide sources as evidence of the 'many videos' he has seen in regards to his statement, "With other threats of riots and revolution (as I have seen many videos where both Democrats and Republicans have threatened riots and revolution) these issues are in my opinion becoming less unlikely." then he is, despite saying otherwise, fear mongering.

Of course.

http://www.nbcnews.com/card/pence-revolution-rally-goer-dont-say-n664776

""I will tell you just for me — and I don't want this to happen — but I will tell you for me, personally, if Hillary Clinton gets in ... I'm ready for a revolution because we can't have her in," she said in an emotional moment."

http://www.allenbwest.com/analytical-economist/black-lives-matter-issues-major-threat-to-white-people-over-presidential-election

"Dear white people if Trump wins young n**** such as myself are fully hell bent on inciting riots everywhere we go."

http://dailycaller.com/2016/09/23/65-percent-of-voters-think-there-will-be-race-riots-if-trump-wins/

"65 Percent Of Voters Think There Will Be Race Riots If Trump Wins"

http://www.politicususa.com/2016/04/22/oath-keepers-predict-civil-war-clinton-wins.html

"Oath Keepers Predict Civil War if Hillary Clinton Wins"
""The level of hatred among conservatives for that woman is so stratospheric I cannot see any other outcome," claims Oath Keepers website"

There's plenty more stuff out there. Please note that I'm not fear mongering, I'm recognizing these things as real possibilities -- which they are -- and asking only what may be done by us as individuals to prevent such things from occurring. There is a difference between fear mongering and encouraging peacebuilding before an issue gets out of hand.

EDIT:
The possibility of violent revolution is not unimaginable. The same thing has occurred in many great nations, such as Egypt which at one point was a major world power and France -- as well as the US itself. Our founding fathers, as I'm sure you know, took a lot of inspiration from John Locke who in his second treatise of government (I'm pretty sure it was that one, correct me if I'm wrong) argued in favor for the right to revolution. The presence of the second amendment in our constitution is in part meant to defend that right to revolution. So given that the foundational philosophy of our nation and the laws put in place by our most fundamental legal documents recognize the possibility of revolution in the United States, I find it strange that any time someone brings up the possibility of such a thing it's dismissed as fear mongering, improbable, or even impossible. Locke sure didn't think so. Jefferson sure didn't think so. I sure don't think so.

TheDude wrote:

Alan wrote: Unless The Dude can provide sources as evidence of the 'many videos' he has seen in regards to his statement, "With other threats of riots and revolution (as I have seen many videos where both Democrats and Republicans have threatened riots and revolution) these issues are in my opinion becoming less unlikely." then he is, despite saying otherwise, fear mongering.

Of course.

http://www.nbcnews.com/card/pence-revolution-rally-goer-dont-say-n664776

""I will tell you just for me — and I don't want this to happen — but I will tell you for me, personally, if Hillary Clinton gets in ... I'm ready for a revolution because we can't have her in," she said in an emotional moment."

http://www.allenbwest.com/analytical-economist/black-lives-matter-issues-major-threat-to-white-people-over-presidential-election

"Dear white people if Trump wins young n**** such as myself are fully hell bent on inciting riots everywhere we go."

http://dailycaller.com/2016/09/23/65-percent-of-voters-think-there-will-be-race-riots-if-trump-wins/

"65 Percent Of Voters Think There Will Be Race Riots If Trump Wins"

http://www.politicususa.com/2016/04/22/oath-keepers-predict-civil-war-clinton-wins.html

"Oath Keepers Predict Civil War if Hillary Clinton Wins"
""The level of hatred among conservatives for that woman is so stratospheric I cannot see any other outcome," claims Oath Keepers website"

There's plenty more stuff out there. Please note that I'm not fear mongering, I'm recognizing these things as real possibilities -- which they are -- and asking only what may be done by us as individuals to prevent such things from occurring. There is a difference between fear mongering and encouraging peacebuilding before an issue gets out of hand.

Trying to use these sources as evidence of an impending conflict is perpetuating more fear mongering. Tef Poe and "Rhonda" are fear mongers themselves, and these articles are meant to point out that they are wrong, not correct. They are a minority, not the norm.

In the case of the NBC News article, the point of it was that even Mike Pence, Trump's running mate, says revolution is a bad idea and shouldn't happen even if they lose.

Allen B. West's article is an indictment of the BLM movement for encouraging violence and reversing the gains made by the Civil Rights Movement.

The Daily Caller article quotes a survey conducted on SurveyMonkey of 1,051 registered voters done almost a month ago that asked people to speculate on what might happen if Trump wins. It is hardly evidence of a large scale conflict coming.

The Politicus USA article is a look at the lunatic fringe; the extremists. It is about the "Oath Keepers" who are some of the most notorious fear mongers themselves. The article also points out why their argument for revolution against imaginary enemies is flawed.

If anything, these sources are arguments against an inevitable conflict. They show that reasonable people who recognize fear mongers are willing to call them out for being ridiculous.

And on the topic of John Locke, Thomas Jefferson and the other founding philosophers of the U.S brand of democracy...

Justifying revolution in the Declaration of Independence and allowing for the possibility of necessary revolution in many other cases does not make these men proponents of it. In fact, the Constitution and Bill of Rights were written the way they were in order to prevent tyranny and create a government that would allow its citizenry to correct problems without violent revolution.

Locke and Jefferson specifically make appeals to reason, not emotion. Accepting that revolution is always a possible outcome is reasonable. Warning people of impending revolution or violence without reasonable evidence of it is fear mongering.

Senan wrote: Trying to use these sources as evidence of an impending conflict is perpetuating more fear mongering. Tef Poe and "Rhonda" are fear mongers themselves, and these articles are meant to point out that they are wrong, not correct. They are a minority, not the norm.

But there are also direct quotes from individuals who very clearly take the position that riots or revolution is necessary or going to happen. In a couple of the links, there were people claiming that they would WILLINGLY be a part of such a thing. This at the very least shows that the attitude exists in this nation and that people are comfortable with expressing that attitude. When people think things that aren't socially acceptable, I'd say that most of them aren't willing to broadcast that information to the rest of the world through the media. If the attitude is there, the possibility is as well. Unless you don't think so? In which case I'd like to know how you think ISIS came about.

In the case of the NBC News article, the point of it was that even Mike Pence, Trump's running mate, says revolution is a bad idea and shouldn't happen even if they lose.

Of course he did. He's a politician. Do you think a revolution would be led by politicians, or do you think it would be led by common citizens? Do you think news sources and politicians are going to say "Oh yes! That would be grand! I'm in full support of revolution!"?

Allen B. West's article is an indictment of the BLM movement for encouraging violence and reversing the gains made by the Civil Rights Movement.

Yes. What's your point? The BLM movement has encouraged violence. And race riots have been happening. I live in Milwaukee, maybe you heard about this. Not 20 minutes from my house there was a race riot just a little while ago. Businesses were burned down. People were targeted and attacked for their race. That's just the facts.

The Daily Caller article quotes a survey conducted on SurveyMonkey of 1,051 registered voters done almost a month ago that asked people to speculate on what might happen if Trump wins. It is hardly evidence of a large scale conflict coming.

Perhaps not the best sample size, but still it gives details on what some people in our country are thinking right now. ISIS didn't start in 30 countries with thousands of supporters. It started as a smaller organization and it grew. I think it's important to have forethought in order to prevent a similar growth in violence from occurring. The presence of the BLM movement itself shows that there is a divide between the citizens of this nation and the legal system/government of this nation. That is the foundation of revolution, of riots which are still occurring around the nation.

The Politicus USA article is a look at the lunatic fringe; the extremists. It is about the "Oath Keepers" who are some of the most notorious fear mongers themselves. The article also points out why their argument for revolution against imaginary enemies is flawed.

If anything, these sources are arguments against an inevitable conflict. They show that reasonable people who recognize fear mongers are willing to call them out for being ridiculous.

Show me one politician or journalist interested in continuing their career who will advocate for revolution directly who isn't part of the "lunatic fringe". It wasn't so many years ago that the facts we know about the NSA were just speculation by the "lunatic fringe". It wasn't so long ago that theories of corruption in our political parties were just topics for the "tinfoil hat" crowd. I refuse to reject information just because I find it uncomfortable or because it's from the "lunatic fringe". Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

TheDude wrote: But there are also direct quotes from individuals who very clearly take the position that riots or revolution is necessary or going to happen.

I'd just like to add that a small group of individual claiming they'll do 'XYZ' if 'ABC' happens, is a dangerous way to evaluate almost any situation. Humans, by our very core nature, love to exaggerate and make wild claims.

With a simple Google search I can easily find a unlimited amount of groups swearing to do 'XYZ' if 'ABC' doesn't happen, for many varied situations. It doesn't make these claims a valid threat, though.

Each election year people act if the end is coming, and swear to do crazy things like leave the country, riot, etc.

They did it both times with Obama, and to my knowledge, there is no proven research showing that there was any followup on those threats.

In addition, I submit that political discussions and other topics of grand nature need to be discussed using verified, legitimate sources, such as http://www.politifact.com/ , and http://www.snopes.com/ for instance.

I do not reject information that makes me uncomfortable. I also do not accept quotes from people who are known and self-identified advocates of violence and extremism as reliable information on which to base my decisions or behavior.

The fact that there are individuals hell bent on violence or disruption is not new. These people are always there and they are always capable of inciting riots. This is not new or different. I lived in the Los Angeles area during the riots in 1992. I work 2 miles from the site of the terrorist attack in San Bernardino less than a year ago. I am not naive enough to believe we are immune to violence. There has always been corruption in politics and government and law enforcement. This isn't new either.

This doesn't mean we are escalating toward some new era of public awareness. The "tin foil hat" crowd does not have exclusive access to secret information. Sometimes their best guesses are right, and sometimes they fulfill their own prophecies by creating the very conspiracies they warn us about. I can promise you that when the BLM movement takes violence to the streets again, they will also be shouting the loudest about corrupt police when law enforcement arrives to stop them.

In my mind, none of this justifies giving extremists attention in the press so that they can spread their ill-informed ideas and scare people. We are giving a voice to those who wish to stir up unwarranted fear in order to push an agenda. Politicians, activists, protesters and terrorists alike will say whatever they need to in an attempt to gain a following. It is up to the discerning individual to make an educated decision about whether or not to go along, and fear mongering inhibits this.

Our Doctrine has a few things to say about this.

For what it's worth, I'd rather be a clock that's a few minutes slow than be a broken one that is right twice a day. If revolution is really coming, as Jedi we will act appropriately according to our Doctrine when it happens. In the meantime, I will not worry myself over the ramblings of those looking to upset the peace and harmony I see all around me right now.

Russia don't have military power to go against NATO Russia could maybe support a war against the US but with all NATO, Britain, Germany, France, they would obliterate Russia in a matter of weeks, I don't belive China would join Russia, yes they have same political views but China is begining to grow economic and making their markets in Europe and the US, entering a war with NATO what advantages would that bring to China? my anwser: 0, it would send China to a internal market only. So if Russia want to start a war they will loose badly and it wil result in milions of deaths and i am not talking about a nuclear war just a convencional war becuase if nucs are allowed then much more people would die and Russia would disappear of the map along with other important cities in the US and Europe, maybe the end of the world as we know it. We live in the 21 sentury i think people even in Russia know what a world war would mean, they too have families and lifes...

Not much to do really , take care and dont step on any landmines... :blink:

@Cayce

My point is that a small group of individuals can still affect great change. Take, for example, terrorist organizations. On 9/11/2001 there wasn't a mass effort by millions of people to crash some planes. There were a few people on board who hijacked it, and the results have been clearly seen not only in our government but also in American culture in general. Just because possible revolutionaries are small in number doesn't mean that they aren't a threat or shouldn't be taken seriously.
In addition, here is a quote from the Wikileaks:

"Here is what we have: Huffington post is doing a story tomorrow "fact checking" the idea that there was a push for a constitutional amendment in 1996, as HRC claimed was true. The piece will essentially say there was not, and will quote Rosen's tweet and Eval Wolfson saying this was not true and was hardly a basis for DOMA to be signed by WJC."

This demonstrates that the Clinton campaign has had exchanges with fact checking sites such as PolitiFact and Snopes. Given that this is the case, how am I supposed to trust in the legitimacy of those websites? How am I supposed to trust that they act in a completely fact-based, nonpartisan manner? I sure don't trust those websites after having read the Wikileaks information, so now what source am I to turn to? Our mainstream media is compromised as well. A review of the Wikileaks information reveals that to be a fact.

What I mean to say clearly is that the legitimacy of those sources are not written in stone, and that the verification of them depends wholly on who is doing the verifying. At this point, Wikileaks may be the most reliable source of information out there.


@Senan

Given that my point was that people are advocating violence and extremism, then, you should be completely willing to accept quotes from individuals who advocate violence and extremism.

I disagree with your sentiment that we're not escalating toward a new era of public awareness. The media's job is now being done by hackers and leakers who present the information with complete clarity and no partisan lens, which is more than the media in this country ever did. If things continue in this fashion and people actually care about it, we will certainly be in a better position of public awareness and understanding than at any other point in our history, perhaps in the history of any nation on this planet.

You also use the term "conspiracy" as if it were something automatically untrue, or at least I inferred that from you. We know for a fact that certain conspiracies are true. The DNC corruption, the NSA scandal, etc. are all conspiracies which have been demonstrated to be absolutely true. Recently a scientist named Michio Kaku admitted to some extent that government-based weather control programs exist -- previously a position only taken seriously by that "tinfoil hat" crowd. The legitimacy of any claim can only be demonstrated through facts and we can only learn the facts by listening to the media which has proved thus far to be unreliable or by piecing together the information through logical deduction on our own. Just because someone is talking about something you would consider to be a conspiracy theory doesn't mean they haven't done the latter.

When you say that there has always been corruption, that probably is true. But that doesn't mean that we have to sit idly by while corrupt politicians create policies which subjugate us or murder innocent civilians (such as the US drone strike program). It doesn't mean we have to sit idly by while corrupt law enforcement officials enforce those unjust policies. It doesn't mean that standing up for ourselves and standing against something terrible is unworthy of a Jedi or an intelligent human being. We may actually have a duty to do so. None of the corruption or the problems will change if WE the people aren't the ones to change it.

And in order for us to change it, we need to take seriously the complaints and threats of individuals, no matter who they might be and no matter what their history is. The boy who cried wolf was right in the end; there was a wolf.