Storming The Capitol Has Been Glamorized Online
The fact that Trump supporters have stormed the Capital is shocking. But the idea of physically storming the halls of Congress and taking it over by force has cropped up in many far-right communities online for a long time. Q — the anonymous poster who inspired the QAnon movement — , and “taking back” the country. On Twitter, TikTok, Parler and TheDonald (a forum that took the place of the now banned, pro-Trump subreddit with the same name) leading up to today’s protest, with discussions of plans for the day. In many ways, this is the culmination of similar acts we’ve seen over the last few months, including the FBI-thwarted , and anti-lockdown protests that led to armed trespassers storming into statehouses and . Online, comments alongside livestreams of the protests have been encouraging those who have raided the Capitol and even calling for violence. This is an act many online communities continue to glamorize and support.
It is difficult for me, as a reporter who was on the street during the protests in Minneapolis last summer, to not be comparing and contrasting police response to each set of protests. I am obviously not seeing everything going on there, but I haven’t seen police shooting less-lethal munitions, like beanbags or rubber bullets, at any of these people on the Capitol steps. Which is hard to square, emotionally, with things I saw in Minneapolis, like my reporting partner being shot in the face by a police projectile or a protester I was interviewing in an otherwise empty lot being shot in the leg with similar rounds by officers pushing back a far smaller group of protesters who were making much less contact with the officers. .
This is gas lighting bullshit, Lotus.
Listen to the people and stop with this "far right" shit. This is deeper than right/left.
I mean or not. The more this situation is dismissed or rationalized and the truth of it is ignored it's just gonna keep getting worse.
These are regular ass working Americans fed up with the government fucking with their lives and liberty. Dont buy into these pro establishment narratives that paint the people as the villains.
I'm not rationalizing anything. I have seen zero evidence of what you people are claiming.