Is there any way to avoid a second American Civil War? - What would it take to calm things down?

[Spunt]

America's political polarisation is worsening every year. In the last three years we have already seen right-wingers storming Congress, and left-wingers declaring independence from the US (CHAZ/CHOP). All media seems to be propaganda for one side or the other, and the rhetoric from both sides is apocalyptically violent (TND, Punch a Nazi, Trans Genocide etc.). As an (admitted) outsider and student of history, right now America most closely resembles the Weimar Republic or late Tsarist Russia, both of which fell to civil war. Civil wars which both resulted in the rise of two of the three most evil and oppressive regimes in human history (the third, Maoist China, also came from a civil war, but one with different causes). Civil wars, coups and revolutions seldom result in improvements to the lot of their citizens. Were the Germans better off under Hitler? The Russians under Lenin/Stalin? The Chinese under Mao? The only wars that seem to improve the lots of citizens at all tend to be wars of independence, such as the American Revolution or those of Slovenia and Croatia. Otherwise they lead to dictatorship and genocide on a scale that even most of their proponents wouldn't have wanted.

The way I see things playing out is as follows. I don't know when this will happen, frankly it could happen tomorrow or in 50 years. But the way things are going this will happen eventually:

1 - A Blue state (most likely California or Oregon, maybe New York) passes legislation that the right fundamentally object to. Maybe reparations, something tranny-related, gun bans, in-home state surveillance to detect racism, something like that.
2 - SCOTUS rules it unconstitutional.
3 - Blue state decides to ignore SCOTUS and do it anyway.
4 - Republican President/Congress calls it sedition and mobilises the National Guard.
5 - Blue state declares independence
6 - Boogaloo

It could go the other way, with a Red state doing something a Democrat Congress/President won't stand for, but at the moment it's the left who are being more provocative.

In terms of the outcome of the war, barring external intervention, the right would not only win, but crush the left. The left hate guns, they hate discipline, courage, strength, hierarchy and opsec - in other words all the things you need to win a war. The vast majority of the military would side with the right. And the right would control the food supply, the transport infrastructure, munitions plants and most importantly the power infrastructure. All the fancy AI Silicon Valley techno-drones won't do much good with no power and no fuel. So when the dust settles, a victorious right would claim "emergency powers" and turn the USA into a real Fascist dictatorship - not the one the left insist we already have, but real, swastikas-and-genocide fascism. The cost of rebuilding will be beyond the ability of the massively indebted federal government to repay, and it would go bankrupt, maybe dissolve entirely. Not only would there not be enough funds to rebuild the country's infrastructure, there wouldn't be enough money for welfare, the health system or very much at all. It will be absolutely brutal and miserable, and famine is likely. In the phenomenally unlikely event that the Left wins (such as the Chinese intervening), then replace the Fascist dictatorship with a Communist one, which will be much the same but with a different flag. And dictatorships with problems at home start wars abroad to serve as a distraction, someone to blame and something to occupy otherwise idle and rebellious young men. A Fascist US government might invade Mexico to "help" their government deal with drug cartels and the immigrant problem, or invade Canada if they supported the left in the civil war (if it broke out tomorrow, you know Trudeau would). Decades of bloodshed and carnage, any of which could lead to a nuclear holocaust.

So the question is this: What would it take to calm things down? Are there any examples from history of countries that pulled themselves back from the brink? Part of the problem is that I suspect the answer to the question for many Americans would be "when those assholes in California/Florida realise they're the bad guys and stop what they're doing". I don't see how that's going to happen, personally.

And if you think an second American Civil War would be good and glorious and make life better, you've not been paying attention. Read a history book.

 

[Troonos]

I'm taking an accelerationist stance.

 

[JULAY]

Were the Germans better off under Hitler?

Yes, they were, until June 22, 1941.

 

[Meat Target]

I'm taking an accelerationist stance.

Actively wanting collapse is foolhardy, and accelerationists seldom know what they're asking for.

A civil war is like a tornado. It sounds like an exciting Happening, until you see what it does.

Yes, you should prepare for worst-case scenarios, and things need to get worse before they get better. But you also shouldn't get a boner over them.

Now, I'm not saying we should appease the lunatics waving their wangs at kids or the congressvermin plundering our country. I'm saying that you need to be ready to gamble everything, and that looking for an off-ramp () should come first.

The Founding Fathers didn't just wake up one day and decide taxes on tea were worth clipping Redcoats over. The War of Independence happened after years of trying to appeal to and stand up for Colonists' rights as Englishmen, and being answered only with the heavy-handed Intolerable Acts.

Election years always suck, but I'm no-shit dreading 2024. The shitstorm currently gathering will make Covid, the Summer of Love, and Most Fortified Election Ever look idyllic. As awful as Clown World is, you are living in the "good old days" right now. And you'll miss them when they're gone.

 

[Lord of the Large Pants]

The problem is that it's not an issue of red states VS blue states anymore. It's an issue of major cities VS everyone else. And it's pretty hard to just secede individual cities.

 

[Fartificial Insmelligence]

Actively wanting collapse is foolhardy, and accelerationists seldom know what they're asking for.

A civil war is like a tornado. It sounds like an exciting Happening, until you see what it does.

Yes, you should prepare for worst-case scenarios, and things need to get worse before they get better. But you also shouldn't get a boner over them.

Now, I'm not saying we should appease the lunatics waving their wangs at kids or the congressvermin plundering our country. I'm saying that you need to be ready to gamble everything, and that looking for an off-ramp () should come first.

I don't disagree with you necessarily, but there's no way in hell the ship can be steered back on course at this point. I think we'd have to tear the whole thing down and rebuild from scratch, too much corruption and red tape would hold up change while the people up top who can commit mass-plundering and human rights abuses get away with in since they aren't bound by law.

 

[Gog & Magog]

THE YEAR IS 2053
...THE LOLCOW UPRISING HAS CRUSHED ALL GOVERNMENT FORCES
...THE END FOR LOLCOW LLC HQ NEARS
...THE LAST KIWIS HAVE DUG IN
...WHEN ALL HOPE SEEMS LOST A CALL COMES IN!!
: "Until the, uh, Kiwi International Brigades arrive, you guys are gonna need to hold out! General CrunkLord420 and his TempleOS Gendarmerie will be joining you soon. See you all on the front lines!!!"

 

[Breadbassket]

From how I see it eventually politically one side will triumph over the other eventually or polarization could be defused by a number of compromise politicians who in the process would end up blowing up their own careers because their own sides would hate them for being too moderate and it may possibly just kick the can down the road for the wider problems. The former seems far more realistic then the latter sadly.

The polarization is on track to amplify more and get more chaotic gradually every year until we reach some kind of climax. You have to depend upon the existing political establishment and its elites to be able to defuse it and in my opinion they don't seem willing or able to fix things. Even if someone knows the way to address something they have to be in a position of power to implement anything and that assumes they'll be able to actually do so because some individuals or groups may have vested interests in things not being changed even if it benefits the nation at large because they benefit from the old system.

There appears to be a slow inevitable march toward calamity. I can't predict when it will boil over but it has to do so at some point at the current rate of things. To stop that from happening would take a miracle.

 

[Meat Target]

I don't disagree with you necessarily, but there's no way in hell the ship can be steered back on course at this point. I think we'd have to tear the whole thing down and rebuild from scratch, too much corruption and red tape would hold up change while the people up top who can commit mass-plundering and human rights abuses get away with in since they aren't bound by law.

Like I said, things need to get worse before they get better. Most people don't have the time, energy, or attention span to sperg about politics, and have too much to lose.

But those who do are the ones who change the world. "Who dares, wins."

I think a peaceful, orderly National Divorce is the best anyone can hope for. It'll hurt like a motherfucker, but not nearly as much as creating a continent-sized Kosovo.

Most liberals and many conservatives would decry that as "New Jim Crow! New Apartheid!" Well, it's better to be separate and alive than united in a mass grave. You cannot force incompatible peoples to live together and expect them to just magically get along. It has not worked once.

 

[General Emílio Médici]

What would it take to calm things down? Are there any examples from history of countries that pulled themselves back from the brink?

On the first one, I think ironically a small bogaloo would stop a much bigger bogaloo from happening. It's a lot harder to focus on tranny and nigger worship when you are having trouble putting food on the table. So a big economic implosion might just starve the ideological fires of these people out of oxygen and instead direct people to more logical concerns like basic economic issues and food.

As for pulling themselves from the brink, the only nation I can think of was Russia in the early 1990's when the USSR collapsed and they almost had a backlash by die hards but didn't. In part it is hard to tell when nations came to a brink of civil war because we don't know if it would have happened.

 

[Sexy Senior Citizen]

As an (admitted) outsider and student of history, right now America most closely resembles the Weimar Republic or late Tsarist Russia, both of which fell to civil war.

Weimar Germany is probably the closest parallel, though there are obvious differences. History doesn't repeat, but it echoes.

2 - SCOTUS rules it unconstitutional.
3 - Blue state decides to ignore SCOTUS and do it anyway.
4 - Republican President/Congress calls it sedition and mobilises the National Guard.

That won't happen. This may sound odd to you as an outsider, but courts do not make the law, and their rulings don't carry the force of law. Courts interpret the law only. This is called "separation of powers" and is what keeps judges from becoming black-robed kings. People panic over the Supreme Court being "packed" when in reality it is, by design, the weakest branch of the government. Yes, the other branches of the government can tell the courts to go pound sand, and yes, there is precedent (President Andrew Jackson).

And this is before you get into the fact that Republicans are limp-dicked wimps who couldn't fight their way out of a wet paper bag. They'd make a big hullabaloo about it, but they wouldn't do anything involving force, or consequences.

It could go the other way, with a Red state doing something a Democrat Congress/President won't stand for, but at the moment it's the left who are being more provocative.

More likely, but not by much. What'll likely happen is they'll go the Trump route: arrest governors, mayors, town councilmen, and the dog catcher. Modern American politics are evolving into cults of personality. Remove the object of veneration, and the cult either finds someone new to worship (and arrest) or it dissolves.

So the question is this: What would it take to calm things down? Are there any examples from history of countries that pulled themselves back from the brink? Part of the problem is that I suspect the answer to the question for many Americans would be "when those assholes in California/Florida realise they're the bad guys and stop what they're doing". I don't see how that's going to happen, personally.

Here's the point I've been building towards: there won't be a civil war. The moment the US government declares war on its own citizens is the moment it's finished. Logistical problems aside, do you really think foreign governments won't interfere? A second American civil war would quickly escalate into World War 3.

You'll see opposition leaders arrested. You'll see Wacos and Ruby Ridges. You'll see protests and riots. You'll see an ever-tightening grip by the Feds. But you won't see all-out war unless it's initiated by some militia group, and even then, you'll see a crackdown like you wouldn't believe. The insurgents in Vietnam and Afghanistan were simply military enemies. A local uprising would be an existential threat to the Powers That Be, and it would be crushed with a speed and force that would make you realize how much was held back in Vietnam and Afghanistan.

Then again, I could be wrong. All I'm hoping is I can get my bugout cabin ready before the storm arrives...

 

[MavisBeaconTeachesSnipin]

imo if TPTB can keep the wheels on the cart until the zoomers are the adults in charge then the overton window will have moved enough for them to stay in power.

there is only going to be escalating police action against citizens under counter-terror legislation. the gov has been investing in and legalizing the tools of repression for a half century (militarized police, surveillance, AI, drones, etc.) a "civil war" is going to be nothing more than the excuse for them to really drop the hammer.

 

[Beige]

To be blunt, I don't think for a second that modern Americans have the balls to start a full-scale civil war, especially over idealogical reasons. They're simply too soft and comfortable. The people who talk the most shit on the left have never been in a real fight, or fired a gun in their lives. It's all fantasy and hyperbolic propaganda.

The only way I could see any type of violent civil conflict would be some type of major economic collapse, and even then, it would be small pockets of fighting between hardcore political factions, not full North vs. South, Red vs. Blue type shit.

I agree with Null: People in New York and California aren't going to fight a war to keep states like Texas and Florida as part of the country, or vice versa.

 

[Barry McKockner]

We are where we are because of centralization of powers to the fed. The more people who you have to represent, the harder it is to keep everyone happy. For all people bitch and moan about new york, florida, cali, texas, etc..., the people who stay there are largely happy with it barring one or two hot button issues (like homeless for Cali). They wouldn't be happy with florida style government and laws, and we shouldn't be trying to ram it down their throats either. The only problem is when they want to make everyone else live like they do. This is only possible when the federal government becomes to big for it's britches.

 

[Meat Target]

People in New York and California aren't going to fight a war to keep states like Texas and Florida as part of the country

They don't need to. They can conquer them without firing a shot.

The former are colonizing the latter, and then voting for the same policies that doomed the states they came from, like cancer cells from a tumor.

 

[Spunt]

That won't happen. This may sound odd to you as an outsider, but courts do not make the law, and their rulings don't carry the force of law. Courts interpret the law only. This is called "separation of powers" and is what keeps judges from becoming black-robed kings. People panic over the Supreme Court being "packed" when in reality it is, by design, the weakest branch of the government. Yes, the other branches of the government can tell the courts to go pound sand, and yes, there is precedent (President Andrew Jackson).

I'm aware of the position of the Supreme Court, but the scenario I proposed isn't one branch of the Federal government against another, it's a State (or a collection of them) against the Fed. I mentioned SCOTUS because they seem to be ruling high-profile state legislation as unconstitutional on a more frequent basis (or maybe it's just hitting the news more?), which could provide the flashpoint. A dispute between States and the Fed is what kicked off the first Civil War, after all. One of the weak points of the American system is that there's not many provisions if a State says "nuh-uh" to the Fed, other than things getting violent, and that problem hasn't been fixed since the last time. Nor, arguably, should it be. Are there theoretical mechanisms for states to secede under the Constitution? Even if there are and they are followed, I don't think in practice it would be peaceful, there's too much at stake.

Here's the point I've been building towards: there won't be a civil war. The moment the US government declares war on its own citizens is the moment it's finished. Logistical problems aside, do you really think foreign governments won't interfere? A second American civil war would quickly escalate into World War 3.

Again, the question is, if a State secedes, do you think the people who pulled off Ruby Ridge and Waco would just let them leave? It probably will finish the Federal government, but that doesn't mean it won't happen. The Yugoslav, Sudanese, Ethiopian, Iraqi, Burmese and Mexican governments have all made war on their own people, and that was just in my lifetime. They just call them "rebels" or "terrorists" to justify it. Foreign governments interfered in the majority of those, as well as those of Vietnam, Afghanistan and Korea in previous years, changing them from civil conflicts to superpower proxy wars that dragged on for years and killed millions. Most of the governments that started those wars didn't survive to the end of them.

And yes, an American civil war would very likely cause WWIII. Doesn't mean it won't happen.

To be blunt, I don't think for a second that modern Americans have the balls to start a full-scale civil war, especially over idealogical reasons. They're simply too soft and comfortable. The people who talk the most shit on the left have never been in a real fight, or fired a gun in their lives. It's all fantasy and hyperbolic propaganda.

People thought the same thing in Weimar Germany. Just like in the USA, you had Communist and Fascist militias duking it out in the streets, false flag atrocities, the right attempting coups, the left setting up independent communes, all tolerated by the government because there were enough people in the government who were sympathetic to them to let it slide in the hope their "side" won. And in both cases (and in Italy), it was the left who talked the most smack only to make a surprised Pikachu face when they lost and ended up in camps.

 

[Matt Damon]

1 - A Blue state (most likely California or Oregon, maybe New York) passes legislation that the right fundamentally object to. Maybe reparations, something tranny-related, gun bans, in-home state surveillance to detect racism, something like that.
2 - SCOTUS rules it unconstitutional.
3 - Blue state decides to ignore SCOTUS and do it anyway.

This is already happening frequently (mostly by the left, but red states are starting to learn the game now) and nobody has the balls to do anything about it.

I suspect that will only get more brazen with time and won't be the sudden tipping point you imagine.

 

[TheDarknessGrows]

Yeah just chill and remember that only two groups want a civil war:

• The leadership of all other nation states especially our jealous European "allies" that have been waiting 400 years to carve up the most valuable geopolitical real estate on Earth and prevent a unified power from ever controlling North America again.
• The United States government which has been trying to create an excuse to repeal habeus corpus since the last civil war and who have been trying to neuter the populace and take dictatorial control over the nation.

 

[Johnny Salami]

TTD and TND. Add TKD for good measure

 

[Sexy Senior Citizen]

Are there theoretical mechanisms for states to secede under the Constitution?

There aren't. Secession is as a no-no under the Constitution, and most people (barring retards and trolls) believe secession/civil war is an absolute last resort. Secession isn't in the cards for the foreseeable future, shitstirring notwithstanding.

Again, the question is, if a State secedes, do you think the people who pulled off Ruby Ridge and Waco would just let them leave?

A State will not secede. Depressing as it sounds, the Federal Government will quash such a movement before it can reach that point. A spontaneous, decentralized, populist movement geared towards secession has the best chance at succeeding. Unless the FBI/CIA/NSA/Department of Homeland Security/ATF/whatever is gutted to the point of ineffectiveness, secessionist movements will be infiltrated, observed, and crushed before they reach a point where it becomes a threat.

It probably will finish the Federal government, but that doesn't mean it won't happen. The Yugoslav, Sudanese, Ethiopian, Iraqi, Burmese and Mexican governments have all made war on their own people, and that was just in my lifetime. They just call them "rebels" or "terrorists" to justify it. Foreign governments interfered in the majority of those, as well as those of Vietnam, Afghanistan and Korea in previous years, changing them from civil conflicts to superpower proxy wars that dragged on for years and killed millions. Most of the governments that started those wars didn't survive to the end of them.

While there are similarities, there are several notable, extreme differences between the USA and everyone else.

1. The majority of the rebels will be former soldiers who enjoy hunting, hiking, and camping. If you think Vietnamese rice farmers could inflict serious damage, imagine what trained soldiers with an axe to grind against Uncle Sam could do. Foreigners may mock America's "Cult of the Soldier," yet it stands as a potent defense against overt government crackdowns.
2. In a war, the rebels will undoubtedly launch counterattacks to cripple Federal infrastructure, including power lines. Remember 2020's Summer of Love? Imagine that on a larger scale: EBT doesn't work, food and drinkable water are running low, there's no electricity, there's no air conditioning. On top of secessionists, you're dealing with rioting niggers who aren't getting their gibs, a starving and demoralized population, and an inability to quickly respond to either.
3. Nukes, tanks, and planes can flatten secessionist cities, but then what? You have a wasteland. You need to rebuild, and put boots on the ground to make sure the rebels don't get uppity. Now you're dealing with a popular uprising, trained by the soldiers in point 1.

And this is before Russia and China decide to interfere. Now, all of a sudden, you're dealing with Johnny Reb the former soldier and his new best friends Ivan and Chang.

The Feds know all of this, and it scares the shit out of them. They take secessionist movements very, very seriously, and work to nip them in the bud.