• @NJSpradlin
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    3110 hours ago

    Taking these ridiculous comments of Trump’s without the context behind them, singling them out and reading them strictly in the ‘neutral’ voice you’re advocating for… entirely strips it of the dog whistling that it is.

    With a mindset like that you’d also say that ‘Trump didn’t literally tell his supporters to storm Congress on J6’ or ‘Trump isn’t actively exciting violence against democrats and immigrants’, and sure on the face value of most of what he says he isn’t exactly doing that. But, he knows what he’s saying, he has seen plenty of examples of this dog whistling of his getting the violent results he wants.

    Each statement like this points his violent supporters in the direction of his preferred targets.

    • @FlexibleToast
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      87 hours ago

      But there are plenty of things Trump has literally said that you don’t need to reach. He has literally said he wants to be a dictator. He has literally said he wants to use the military against US citizens…

    • @GrymEdm
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      7 hours ago

      Downvote if you want, they aren’t the same. There are big differences between this brief statement and the lead-up to J6, and takes like this only fuel the conservative assertion that “woke Liberals” will blow anything out of proportion. You can believe what you want, but I’m not going to resort to unfounded “but he could be” claims given how many valid criticisms are available. I’ll stick to the things he’s actually said about women’s rights, the environment, locking up opponents, wanting to be a dictator…

      The long J6 speech was held right in front of the Capitol where he said some version of “we need to fight” so many times that legal experts say it’s obvious, in an evidence-applicable-to-court way, that he was inciting. It was preceded by many day’s worth of rhetoric, and he was telling others to do his dirty work. It’s the basis for an incredibly serious lawsuit.

      The “hit back” conversation was like two lines in one anecdote about verbal sparring, and in context clearly wasn’t him asking if it was his turn to punch Michelle Obama. He also never spent days calling for anything along the lines of “You folks need to hit Michelle Obama” the way he called for them to fight at the Capitol. No one is going to make a lawsuit about those quotes.