That is the common response, one repeated by the likes of FoxNews, Breitbart, and the NRA, but I do not buy it entirely.
What we have in evidence of from left leaning organizations like Antifa is an increasing appeal to violence, that part I would agree with. We have a group designed to be as secretive as possible with membership difficult to track appealing to intimidation and violence. There are plenty of articles documenting their events and the results. But people like Chuck Schumer, or Maxine Waters, or Eric Holder, or the like calling for protests are not necessarily calls for violence even if a subset of that group who shows up intends to do harm.
But we also have evidence from right leaning organizations capitalizing on the nationalism theme from Trump and immigration position of Republicans these days, and on the extreme side that comes from white supremacist groups. Today their protests are not exactly peaceful demonstrations nor is the background of these more extreme groups peaceful either. When immigration is protested (or some other similar subject) these far right leaning groups will show up with their own intentions to do harm.
What I am seeing is the extreme of both sides of the fence being applied to the whole of each side, and it all ends up disingenuous.
More importantly it does what it always seems to, takes us further away from discourse as the focus is on the extreme of either side all the while ignoring the much larger group from each side who have no real interest in harming anyone. But those voices are diminished, probably on purpose.
Our challenge is still the same, how to invoke change through discourse in the face of groups intending for their own change via intimidation and violence. It is all made worse by those who deem an entire group as responsible for the extreme of either side, and it accelerates mob mentality.
