My core objection is the claim that saying so and so is "a threat to democracy" is inciting violence. Where as so and so "is going to destroy our society" is not? One doesn't seem any more extreme than the other to me.

▲

cryptonector 5 days ago | parent [-]

To be fair, you can incite violence and that speech is protected under the First Amendment as long as there is no risk of imminent violence.

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?

	▲	ImPostingOnHN 4 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Likewise, raising awareness of threats to our democracy implicitly and explicitly appeals to the threats to stop threatening democracy. It is not incitement to violence. 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.
	▲	yibg 4 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		"What you're doing is threatening our democracy, you have to stop" vs "What you're doing is going to destroy our society, you have to stop". What's the difference between those in terms of inciting violence?