If you find this horrifying (and I hope you do, because there can be no moral justification for celebrating murder), then I encourage you to really think about whether we would not be better off without such extremist language poisoning people's minds. We have to try to stop escalating, or the cycle is going to destroy our society.
There is no inherent threat of violence in saying "this person is a threat to democracy". This is why the US has strong protections for speech, so that we don't get arbitrary determinations of what's acceptable and what's not.
The First Amendment is about stopping the government from stopping you from saying the things you want to say. The First Amendment says nothing about social norms. People in this thread are asking for people to tone down the rhetoric, something that seems eminently reasonable. Think of it this way: if you want to insist that so and so are "a threat to democracy", what's to stop them from similarly inciting violence towards you? Generalized violence would not be good for anyone, including those who might currently feel safe from it.
The golden rule is always in effect.
So, yes, your speech saying so and so is a "threat to democracy" is protected speech, but it is in fact inciting violence.
> Where as so and so "is going to destroy our society" is not?
The quote was:
| We have to try to stop escalating, or the cycle is going to destroy our society.
Indeed that is very much not incitement to violence but actually incitement to de-escalation. The "or the cycle is going to..." part is not specifically a threat against any one person, unlike the "so and so is a threat to democracy".
How can you not see this?
Incitement to violence is what I see when the president explicitly tells his supporters to beat up his opponents, which he does. Unfortunately, that is one of the smallest incitements to violence we've seen from the right over the years.