this post was submitted on 08 Jun 2025
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I was jist following orders (lemmy.blahaj.zone)
submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

The National Guard of this country has murdered American citizens on numerous occasions in our country's history without a peep about prosecution later on from anybody. Don't expect it to change this time. And really don't expect them not to fire. These Weekend Warriors love the idea of killing Americans. It's what they dream of.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 days ago

Nazis are Nazis. They knew what they were doing from the get go. They were just too cowardly to say it out loud.

Punch Nazis. Or they will punch you.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 days ago (1 children)

The only reason such a rationalization was ever brought forward is because they were brought to face judgement by a group of powers seeking to enact some form of justice for the atrocities committed.

IOW, “just following orders” will never be a defense offered if there’s nobody to put them on trial.

It’s a huge assumption that there will be anyone to put those kind of people on trial in the US and dispense any meaningful justice at this point. Current dems won’t do anything. Current judges can’t seem to pass sentences that stick.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Won’t or can’t. The dems are minorities in all branches. A bit late to be beating the blame game on the dems after they were voted out of literally all power.

And the only judges who are doing anything right now is a trump and bush appointed judges in which are just facing appeals. So that’s not on the dems either.

You really need to stop blaming dems for all the reps doing bad things.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

I didn’t blame the dems for doing bad things. I blame the dems for doing nothing, or doing ineffective things. Especially when they did have the opportunity to do so.

Yeah, they can’t do anything now because they didn’t take advantage when they could.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 days ago (1 children)

So then by your own admission you do know they can’t do anything now. So why are you blaming the dems now? It can’t just be always the dems at fault even when the reps are clearly in the wrong here. It’s just a waste of energy and distraction at most from dealing with what is going on right now.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I don’t need to re-explain what I said.

And I disagree with your forcing a binary choice to remove attention from the dems. I can be pissed at the dems/DNC for helping, or at least not more forcefully opposing, the events that lead us to this point AND deal with “what is going on right now.”

[–] [email protected] 0 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

You’re not looking for solutions. You’re looking to blame and be helpless and a perpetual victim. That’s your choice and I won’t waste more of my own time on such a person who chooses to spend their time in such a way.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Keep going please. Make more shit up about me to satisfy yourself.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 5 days ago (1 children)

You also jump up your own asshole cuz you enjoy the smell of it

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 days ago

Huh. I’ve never been the subject of someone’s public kink before. You do you.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 days ago

I will NOT thank you for your service, I will resist you and shame you to my final breath for letting the allure of guns and patriotism lead you into at best complacency towards fascism.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Wait until he finds out his holy document was concocted by genocidal enslavers... Functioning as intended.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_religion

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago

Presidential Executive Orders

[–] [email protected] 112 points 1 week ago (2 children)

While true, most of them are likely one paycheck away from having their family living in the streets. That's a powerful deterrent against refusing orders that the US has somehow mastered. That too.

[–] [email protected] 47 points 1 week ago

The same applies to most gang members.

[–] [email protected] 44 points 1 week ago (2 children)

“I was just living paycheck to paycheck” won’t be a valid defense either :P

[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Of course, but most people will prioritize their own family members over others. It's an explanation, not an argument against being moral.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

My go-to in nuance situations that require clarification is "explanation is not justification"

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Except it will. As will "I was just following orders". It works for cops. It worked in Vietnam. Hell, it even worked for the majority of Nazi's; only a small percentage actually faced reprocussions for their actions.

Welcome to real history, where the good guys don't always win and the bad guys don't always lose.

[–] [email protected] 71 points 1 week ago

However it was deemed a valid defence in the trials of US war criminals in the Vietnam War.

[–] [email protected] 64 points 1 week ago (10 children)

The US literally sanctioned the ICC judges. There's not gonna be a Nuremberg trial for them lol.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

I have no idea if the gaurdian is a good source but I had no idea about this so I figured I'd grab an article link for anyone who also had no ideas this happened recently

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/05/marco-rubio-sanctions-icc-judges-israel-gaza

(Feel free to reply with links to better sources if you'd like :)

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 week ago

The guardian in general is a pretty trustworthy source afaik.

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[–] [email protected] 34 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's only partially true.

For starters, nearly everything German soldiers did was legal under German law.

Side tangent: GDR soldiers who killed civilians trying to flee the country could easily be prosecuted after reunification because this was explicitly illegal under GDR law.

It's harder to prosecute "legal" crimes. It requires establishing there are "natural laws" which stand above any law humans put in place. For instance, slaughtering civilians is one such violation of "natural law". It's more complex but that's the rough summary.

Besides, most German soldiers simply became prisoners of war and faced little to no legal consequences. The Nuremberg trials were mostly for those who gave the illegal order - no one has time for millions of legal cases.

I have little to no clue about US law but as far as I can tell, executive orders are legal until deemed illegal by a court. The order would therefore have to violate "natural law" - not the constitution - or be so obviously illegal beyond any reasonable doubt to allow for prosecution of those who follow it. Both of those are a very high bar to clear.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

This is a reason why I kinda like the psudo religious concepts that back US founding documents.

Now before everyone gets to typing about annoying evangelicals or whatever (trust me I understand) you don't have to believe in christianity or any other religious institution for the "natural law" concept to work. All it takes is an understanding that human rights are a default and don't magically disappear because your area's govt says so.

It's summed up nicely by this quote from John Locke.

"And where the Body of the People, or any single Man, is deprived of their Right, or is under the Exercise of a power without right, and have no Appeal on Earth, there they have a liberty to appeal to Heaven, whenever they judge the Cause of sufficient moment."

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[–] [email protected] 34 points 1 week ago

Like the US justice system gives a flying fuck about precedence anymore.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 week ago (4 children)

I have faith that there are many people in the military chain of command who are smart enough to ‘interpret’ orders and posture deployments in a way that does not escalate and lead to killing.

ICE and the civilian LEO have less discipline and the risk of escalation is immensely higher. I’d take the National Guard who follows orders and is subject to court martial over the jack boots any day of the week.

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[–] [email protected] 28 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

The British soldiers at the Boston Massacre and Nazi war criminals of the Holocaust had their day in court.

That's what due process is. Everyone -everyone - enemy or not, gets a trial. That's how it should be, that's how it needs to be, or there is no justice.

That's why "expedited removal" is nothing but fascism. No due process, no justice at all.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (5 children)

It is important to add that even though the US has committed atrocities, for decades, from Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos through Iraq, Afghanistan, and Gaza; illegal invasion, torture, genocide, war crimes; nothing meaningful ever came from it. There has never been Nuremberg trial equivalent for the United States, and there never will be. Every single president since Eisenhower, every single one, no exceptions, has been a war criminal by the standards of the Nuremberg trials and the Tokyo tribunal, and not one of them ever spent even a day in court for it.

There are no consequences for war crimes committed by Americans. None. Aside from 9/11, but the ones who died, the ones who suffered, were not the ones responsible for the atrocities committed by the US. So sure, "just following orders" isn't a valid defense, but you won't need one anyway.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 week ago

The Nuremberg trials did not happen because the Nazis were wrong. They happened because the Nazis lost the war.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 week ago (8 children)

Remember that in reality the US saved the top Nazis and made them head of NATO.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago (1 children)

What? Really? Source/subject?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 days ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 29 minutes ago

Yooo... If that's real, that's really fucked up.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 week ago

I mean we're talking about the US here which explicitly reserves the right to invade the Netherlands if any of their soldiers end up in The Hague for any reason.

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