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Comment by fshr | Hacker News Reader

My guess is he was referring to financial predators. Greed and lust rather than wrath.

No, he's saying that predators tell their prey not to fight back.

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I don't think this is true. How many popular movies are war movies where the heroes are most certainly not pacifists? Even the movie starring a real-life pacifist (Hacksaw Ridge) is about how he, too, fit into the war machine.

First, I meant pacifism is promoted as the only recourse for the general citizen, not for the government. Of course, war movies promote the acceptability of violence by the state. Two totally separate phenomena.

The state promotes violence by the state, and being docile for the citizen.

Ok, but the word pacifism means something specific. I agree with your statement about docility, I think many would call it "civility." Same thing that black people were accused of, being "uncivil," when they were rioting for civil rights.

That is true. It's an important definition distinction.

> I meant pacifism is promoted as the only recourse for the general citizen

What media are you consuming? Take a look at any list of top-grossing films of the past few decades and it's riddled with non-state lone wolf actors using violence to solve their problems.

You're saying that John Wick, Creed, Spider-Man, The Fall Guy, Furiosa, Venom, etc. are teaching Americans to be pacifists?

This misunderstanding was already solved in a sibling comment.

Of course. Movies are an outlet to let off steam. We experience the violence in the theatre that is increasingly precisely because the pacified masses need a strong outlet to escape the lack of recourse for injustice in the real world.

This is a good explanation without supporting the idea that there is no propaganda of violence. There is. And btw, the US are one of the most violent advanced countries.

Only because the violence is a side effect of having fairly unregulated capitalism. But eventually the system will stop that.

You're moving the goal posts. First you said that "pacifism is heavily promoted in mainstream media". When I pointed out that American mainstream media is absolutely riddled with "non-state invidualist hero uses personal violence to solve their problems", now you claim that the media is for "letting off steam".

> why pacifism is heavily promoted in mainstream media and society

Yes, America's problem is it's just too peaceful, at home and abroad.

Like, it's a neat hypothesis. The data just don't fit, certainly not for America. We have high rates of gun ownership and gun violence (as well as other violence, e.g. at bars and schoolyards) precisely because we like taking justice into our own hands.

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