What should the reaction of conservatives (and, indeed, of all Americans) be when luminaries such as Jane Fonda calls for "murder" on The View or Bruce Springsteens' guitarist demands that Republican "cockroaches" be "exterminate[d]"?
Do not be outraged.
Do not get offended.
Do not demand apologies.
Thank them.
Sincerely.
And… thank them profusely.
Indeed, they are giving you the best ammunition possible (so to speak) for the Second Amendment and for retaining gun rights.
After one of the E Street Band's musicians tweeted “Exterminate the [Republican] cockroaches”, Robert Spencer wrote: Steven Van Zandt Is Bruce Springsteen’s Guitarist. He Hates You. He Wants You Dead. Part of the reason for the musician's rant is that among all the alleged sins — duly listed — of the "MAGOTT cockroaches", the latter are intent on heading out of their homes for the sole purpose to go "shoot some kids,"
But Steven Van Zandt ought to be thanked. Because he has, consciously or otherwise, given the best reason possible for Americans (not to mention other nationalities) to keep their guns in addition to retaining their Second Amendment rights.
This is how you might respond:
I am touched by your words, Ms Fonda/Mr Van Zandt/whomever, and I wish to thank you very much for calling me a MAGGAT or a cockroach who needs to be exterminated in addition to shouting for me to be murdered (if not gagged for my opinions or imprisoned for dubious reasons), since it proves beyond a shadow of a doubt, Ma'am/Sir, that generally, my positions (not yours) are correct, and certainly the argument in which I say that the Second Amendment is necessary for the protection of myself, my family, and my neighbors.
Related: How to Respond If Someone Calls You a Racist or Says "You Are Full of Shit"
Guess what! When people rail against “Republican White Supremicist scumbag cowards and pussies that need guns to feel like real men” and when they call you "Foxsucking scumbag Russian bots and MAGOTT cockroaches", guess what: when and if people of a like mind gets into a high political office, the Hollywood actors and the rock'n'roll musicians and other, more common people of their ilk are hardly likely to come to your defense — in any shape or form.
They may not be actively participating in hunting you down, but they will not go out of their way either to help you or to offer you any form of protection.
Don't count on it, when they take "Springsteen’s fanatical and unreflective Leftism and mob thuggishness deeply to heart" and when their voices are "full to a sickening degree of angry, expletive-filled invective against patriots."
No point in looking anywhere — anywhere — for Voltaire's "I may not agree with what you say,
but I will fight (to the death) for your right to say it."
In fact, continues Robert Spencer, Van Zandt’s hair-raising tweets, "his double standard and [his] eye-popping hate"
are an intriguing glimpse into the mind of an unthinking Leftist who is utterly lacking in any ability to evaluate his own words and deeds with any degree of honesty, and who is quick to accuse others of what he himself is guilty of doing.In any case, the message is clear. You are on your own.
Which, indeed, come to think of it, is… the entire message of the gun rights crowd. Isn't it?
At Powerline, adds that
liberals’ tolerance of this kind of talk has had real consequences. Most notable, of course, is James Hodgkinson’s devastating attack on the Republican Congressional baseball team. And when Nicholas Roske set out to murder Justice Brett Kavanaugh, it is likely that he had extremist pro-abortion rhetoric in mind.
Back to Robert Spencer:
Steven Van Zandt, who is secure in the conviction that he is on the other side of the National Socialists (although he is wrong about that), would be horrified and no doubt driven to new heights of rage and invective to see himself compared to Heinrich Himmler. But it’s not an idle comparison. Himmler’s reduction of those he hated to the status of vermin — or “cockroaches,” as Van Zandt put it — was the indispensable prerequisite for his genocide. Steven Van Zandt, without realizing it, is helping pave the way for Leftists who are more ruthless and consistent than he is, but who share his core assumptions about the world.
As for James Carville, back in 2010, he referred to Republicans as "reptiles". And that is nothing new. Far from it. Back in the 1850s and 1860s, when an Illinois Republican felt the necessity to address himself to Southerners and Democrats (during his Cooper Union speech in 1860), guess which term Abe Lincoln reached for:
…when you speak of us Republicans, you do so only to denounce us as reptiles [!], or, at the best, as no better than outlaws. You will grant a hearing to pirates or murderers, but nothing like it to [Republicans]. In all your contentions with one another, each of you deems an unconditional condemnation of [Republicanism] as the first thing to be attended to. Indeed, such condemnation of us seems to be an indispensable prerequisite — license, so to speak — among you to be admitted or permitted to speak at all. Now, can you, or not, be prevailed upon to pause and to consider whether this is quite just to us, or even to yourselves? Bring forward your charges and specifications, and then be patient long enough to hear us deny or justify."Reptiles, outlaws, pirates, murderers, cockroaches, MAGATS"… How often have Republicans been called terrorists in the past decade? (And in the years, in the decades, before that?)
As for Honest Abe himself, this member of the GOP (which the Republican Party of course wasn't called back then) was so hated by members of the Democrat party that when this "barbarian" won the 1860 election, they would rather tear the nation apart over the next four years than accept him in the Oval Office. See: What Caused Secession and Ergo the Civil War? Was It Slavery and/or States' Rights? Or Wasn't It Rather Something Else — the Election of a Ghastly Republican to the White House?
Take a moment. Take a moment and think of the Democrats' revulsion over, as well as the mainstream media's depiction of, such leaders as Donald Trump, Sarah Palin, George W Bush, Ronald Reagan, etc, etc, etc…
Think about how every four years — and every month in-between, really — all Republicans (Republican voters, Republican "haters", Republican candidates — successful or otherwise — etc) are depicted as Hitler (in other words, as someone akin to Lucifer), fascists, Nazis, monstrous, racist (or, more generally, satanic), reptiles, [cockroaches, MAGAts,] engaging in hate speech, etc, etc, etc…
(Is it any wonder that I conclude that we are living in the era of the drama queens? But the era of the drama queens seems in fact to be the norm in the history of humanity…)
More related: Americans AnonymousHow do you respond to someone who tells you "You are full of s--t" or to someone who calls you a racist, a sexist, a bigot, a hater, a fascist, a Nazi, a troll, a reactionary, a crank, or a clown?
Simple.
You thank them.
Profusely.
Very profusely.
Tell them:
I am touched by your words and I wish to thank you very much for calling me a racist/a hater/a sexist (and/or for saying that I am full of shit), in view of the fact that that shows that you have run out of arguments and that you now have no choice but to resort to ad hominems and insults.If you wish to elaborate:
Of course, being liberals, people like you have no rational arguments to begin with, that is, none beyond your self-serving (and never-ceasing) statements of self-praise, such as that you are the most intelligent people that ever lived, that you are the most compassionate people who ever lived, that you are the most loving people who ever lived, that you are the most generous, most humanitarian, most peaceful, most tolerant people who ever lived, and that nobody before you has been as open as you are to debate and to discussion.
