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DBentonSmith ago

It has taken millennia to establish even a weak semblance of the Rule of Law. To abandon Law in favor of vigilantism has lots of bad consequences, many of which are too grisly to imagine. Even though self defense is not vigilantism (under the law) a corrupted system never sees it that way. It will always choose to protect its own power and authority.

Regardless of that, when serious crimes are enabled and protected by a corrupted system, people will, simply, defend themselves, whether the system declares that self defense legal or not. That's just the reality of it.

The consequences of the conflict between those two realities really is too grisly to imagine.

notdivided ago

I think the key here is its the abandoning of the rule of law that causes people to seek vigilantism. The vigilante is not who abandons the law when there was no rule of law that is even working to abandon. I don't support vigilantism but I think it's an important distinction. If your highest value is justice unfortunately there may be a case for vigilantism in the world as we know it.