Governments and repression

[Al Billings]

On Wed, 31 Aug 1994 rishab at dxm.ernet.in wrote:

> jamesd at netcom.com:
> > Obviously most people do not call MIT a government.
> >
> > And if MIT built some prison cells under the Admin building and started
> > locking people up in the dungeons for long periods, then people would
> > call MIT a government.
> 
> Hezbollah, Hamas, the IRA, the Khmers Rouges lock people up. You may not
> believe it but there are those who accept their 'rules' under the threat of
> violence. I suppose 'most people' call _them_ governments?
> 
> I'm amazed at the way some of you keep screaming about the violence of 
> governments. Maybe you need to experience some _real_ repression.

I see. It's the ole "It's worse in other places so quit bitching." Sure, 
it's worse in a lot of places. This is the U.S.A. (or it is where I am). 
We use most of the world's resources and we are leaders in quite a few 
technologies (or close to it). That doesn't mean that when things are 
getting shitty here I have to tolerate it because "it could be worse" or 
"you could live under a REALLY repressive government." I don't want to 
live under ANY repressive government, period.