zlacker

>>david9+(OP)
I was just at a conference today where one of the presenters referenced the "Trust barometer": https://www.edelman.com/trust/2025/trust-barometer

According to that study, 23% approved of the statement "I approve hostile activism to drive change by threatening or committing violence". It's even higher if you only focus on 18-34 year olds.

Full report here: https://www.edelman.com/sites/g/files/aatuss191/files/2025-0...

>>ipytho+BD
Is it possible that violence is just more rational for today's 18-34 y/o than it was at some other points in recent history?

>>mothba+DE
The argument against using violence to achieve you ends is that if everyone does it, it is bad for everyone. If those who do it do not face repercussions then they will gain undue advantage, motivating everyone to match their actions, which again, is bad for everyone. The solution is the social contract and the rule of law. If enough people agree that anyone taking that path should face repercussions sufficient to not grant a net advantage, then enforcement of the law prevents others from taking the path of violence to reach parity with the violent

When the rule of law is eroded, which it has been, in the US and worldwide. Then it does indeed become more rational to use violence to restore the rule of law. Unfortunately it also increases the motivation towards violence for personal gain, that makes the task of restoring the rule of law all that more difficult. Countries have spent years trying to recover that stability once it is lost.

>>Lerc+kI
Rule of law in itself is not a worthwhile institution - and is not enough to keep violence at distance.

You need protection, non corruption and a level of equality to be protected by that rule of law.

I think that is what mostly has been eroded - also the poorest 10% need a reason to believe in rule of law.

>>tossan+zK
You make a good point. For example, the rule of law in North Korea or Equatorial Guinea is whatever the HMFIC says it is. And that's written in law, the police and courts enforce it, all proper and aboveboard in a legalistic sense. Just not in common sense.

As far as the poorest 10%, though: There is always a poorest 10%. And a poorest 50%. If you're in the middle class or higher, you have every reason to prevent the poor from revolting and taking what you have. This can be accomplished by a vast array of carrots and sticks. Some countries lean more toward the carrot - we call them liberal democracies. Autocratic states use the stick.

But although greater wealth inequality may be a good indicator of the tendency of the lowest 10% to become lawless, it is not a good indicator of which method is used to keep them in check. Cuba has pretty amazingly low levels of wealth inequality - essentially everyone's poor. Keeping them from rebelling, however, is all stick, precisely because any kind of economic carrot would undermine the philosophy that it's better for everyone to be poor than to have wealth inequality.

>>noduer+c61
Very good points.

For the most part, the bottom 10% in most liberal democracies are much better off than most people in most autocratic states.

Wealth inequality isn't great but the existence of wealthy people in successful countries helps fund service for the entire population. Yet I saw a poster the other day titled "class warfare" with a picture of graveyard saying that's where the "rich" will be buried. People don't understand at all how counties and economies work and how this system we live in works vs. the alternatives (I'm in Canada btw).

>>YZF+wa1
Interesting how this is always about how liberal democracy (namely European supremacist nations like yours) who control the world as the global north and are the primary reasons for the “autocracy”

I don’t know where you can even think the bottom 10% of the west/liberal democracies are better than “most” in those other countries. That’s a wild thing to think. Seems like typical western centrism and chauvinism.

>>skinny+ro1
Let's look at one example.

The average income in Egypt is ~$1900 USD a year (it's probably worse now but this is a number I've seen). Low income threshold in Canada is about $20k (EDIT: CAD) a year and that's about the bottom 10%.

So not sure what your point is re: wild thing to think. Do you think the average Egyptian is better off than the low 10% Canadian?

How is it that because liberal democracies "control the world" that Egypt is forced to be an autocracy? Do they have no agency? If Liberal democracies so control the world how come some countries have been able to do better (China e.g.)

>>YZF+pC1
>> How is it that because liberal democracies "control the world" that Egypt is forced to be an autocracy? Do they have no agency?

This is exactly how I would have responded to the above comment. I'd just add that there is tons of evidence for liberal democracies attempting to help or entice those countries to become less corrupt, more transparent and more democratic. Saying that countries that have been independent of colonial rule for a hundred years, which incidentally were mostly handed democratic systems, have become autocracies because of liberal democracies want them that way is sheer insanity.

Your point about agency should be the standard rebuttal to all forms of third-worldism that attempt to blame homegrown problems on external actors. But having someone external to blame for homegrown repression isn't just post-hoc rationalization. It actually serves to reinforce the oppression in those states, both as a pressure-release valve for autocrats, and the failure to evaluate internal problems serves as an underlying reason why they have not successfully overthrown those regimes and transitioned to democracy.

Mostly, though, that type of talk comes out of the mouths of Westerners who know nothing about the situation in, e.g. Egypt.