Donald Trump on Sunday proposed a new policy that many critics said is equivalent to legalizing “The Purge.”

Trump spoke at a rally in Pennsylvania, where he admitted that his attendees were “falling asleep” at one of his earlier rallies. Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign noted that, as Trump was still speaking at the swing-state event over the weekend, rallygoers placed directly behind the former president started to funnel out of the building.

One comment Trump made drew condemnation on social media, as well as numerous comparisons to The Purge, a film series based on a dystopian world in which the government makes all crimes legal for a 12-hour period.

As reported by Sebastian Smith, AFP Washington desk chief, “Trump in Erie, PA, says in US ‘the police aren’t allowed to do their job.’ To stop crime, you need ‘one really violent day.’ He says: ‘One rough hour and I mean real rough, the word would get out and it would end immediately.’”


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  • MehBlah@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    People who think something insane like the purge are the ones who can’t imagine they would die.

    • ByteOnBikes@slrpnk.net
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      Lots of “Hero mentality” when you’re a conservative. That’s why they cosplay military so much.

    • DJDarren@thelemmy.club
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      The older I get, the less I care about surviving a zombie apocalypse.

      As a kid I was all “I’d find a great hideout and make a plan!”, but these days I think beyond the first two weeks, and how everything will have fallen apart real fucking quickly. It all just seems like a hassle, y’know?

      • MehBlah@lemmy.world
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        I’m still gonna stick around as long as I can. A Zombie apocalypse would be pretty easy. You only have to watch the walking dead for a season or two to see its only the stupid people who will have a really hard time.

          • MehBlah@lemmy.world
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            That whole series they find a place and when it gets overrun they never go back. They should have went back to the farm.

      • Phoenicianpirate@lemm.ee
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        If a zombie apocalypse happens I don’t plan on surviving it. If anything I assume I will be among the first wave of zombies. The people who got infected before anyone had any idea what the hell was going on

  • vortic@lemmy.world
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    Normally when I see a headline like this it is taking Trump out of context or giving a very uncharitable take on what he said. Every once in a while, though, what he said is truly as ad as the headline makes it sound. This is one of those times.

    He is literally calling for either The Purge or Kristallnacht! This man is calling for mass murder as a way to solve crime.

    • immutable@lemm.ee
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      I remember when I first heard the “we will build the wall and Mexico will pay for it”. I thought, “oh they must be taking him out of context that makes no sense”. Nope

      He is pretty consistently advancing absolutely batshit insane things. I don’t think he actually gets taken out of context that often, not because the media is fair, but because the shit he says is so goddamn insane there’s no need.

      Is there something in recent memory where you think there was a headline that misconstrued what he said?

      • vortic@lemmy.world
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        Actually, an example of this just popped up. This article states that Trump admitted to stiffing his employees by not paying overtime. If you listen to the video at the bottom, though, he said that he hates paying overtime and would “get different people in”.

        He didn’t require people to work, then fail to pay them overtime. He would send the workers home and bring in a new shift.

        I wouldn’t call that stiffing his employees. I wouldn’t even call that controversial. This article twists Trump’s words to make up a story about him rather than focus on the very real threat that he poses. It dilutes the negative press against him and makes it look like the left are liars, just out to get Trump.

        This kind of journalism needs to die. Trump is an awful human being and says plenty of awful stuff. We don’t need to bend the truth or lie about him. We just need to report the actual shitty stiff he says.

        • immutable@lemm.ee
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          Yea that’s fair. I agree, it’s shitty to work someone until they are about to get overtime and then swap them out to avoid paying overtime.

          I would agree that to “stiff” someone of something is to deprive them of something they’ve earned, like not paying out overtime once someone has worked it.

          I wonder why they bother, it’s not like the thing he said isn’t already shitty.

          Thanks for the example, have a cool day

      • vortic@lemmy.world
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        I don’t have anything at my fingertips. I thought I had some comments on articles that bothered me in that way, but maybe I never finished those comments. I had problems with lemmy not letting me post with my vpn turned on…

        I’ve had several times recently where I felt that an article was making a mountain of a mole hill to make Trump look worse. I wrote, but apparently didn’t post, comments saying, effectively, "Trump makes himself look bad enough without exaggerating or lying. Tell the truth about what he says and he looks like a fascist maniac. Exaggerate and you make people wonder if you’re always stretching the truth.

  • ATDA@lemmy.world
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    Crime is going down, let’s purge to bring more attention to how crime is going down and my idiotic rhetoric makes less and less sense.

    People are voting for this…

  • Godric@lemmy.world
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    Unrelated to the content, how does a self respecting journalist start an article’s title with “Omg”?

    Like I feel dirty even giving them a click when I have no obligation to society, it’s just depressing to see them presenting as a credible news source

    • Freefall@lemmy.world
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      how does a self respecting journalist start an article’s title with “Omg”?

      Probably the same way we don’t start them with “VERILY!” or “FORSOOTH!”. Language evolves and makes old people mad. Tale as old as time.

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        Oh my god, is that what those funky-wunky little lines around Omg meant?

        Before I just thought it was just a sensationalist garbage headline, I had no idea someone ACTUALLY said “Omg” in relation to the article, mind blown, thanks

    • Samvega@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      Unrelated to the content, how does a self respecting journalist

      The fact you lack respect for other living beings does not indicate that they necessarily lack respect for themselves.

    • CaptDust@sh.itjust.works
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      Sadly he’d have his little safe room to quiver in until the dust settles. Like the rich people in the movies that would drop security shutters and party through the holiday.

    • octopus_ink@lemmy.ml
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      Seriously.

      He says: ‘One rough hour and I mean real rough, the word would get out and it would end immediately.’”

      Word would get out all right. And the 2020 protests would be a handful of angry karens in comparison.

    • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
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      Getting way too real but those movies are actually well worth watching. No, not the first one where Ethan Hawke and Lena Heady are rich white upper middle class people who are betrayed by their neighbors because they didn’t own enough guns. Like… every other Purge movie

      The reality is what we already see. The Holy Second Amendment is supposed to let people defend thmselves but it results in rich (predominantly white) people owning forty ARs and heavy body armor whereas lower class ethnic folk MIGHT have a pistol for self defense. And when shit hits the fan? Fat white kids cross state lines to mow down some protesters with their assault rifles.

      And every movie (except the god awful first one) addresses this. Bubba Gump’s convenience store lost their purge insurance so he is forced to try and defend his livelihood. Hispanic women are openly told they will be raped when the clock hits 6 (?). Impoverished black neighborhoods have klan members bussed in to murder them all (its cool though because Y’lan Noel goes John Wick on the nazis). Totally Not Hilary Clinton gets the biggest target ever painted on her head on purge night (its cool though. Frank Grillo is mostly only a dumbfuck that Chris Evans will never talk to again but damned if he isn’t an awesome white guy with a pistol). And the rest of the rich white fucks just hang out in panic rooms with the poors they bought the rights to torture and murder.

      Because that is the reality. Privilege is everything. If you have enough money you can avoid the consequences of anything. Whether it is the decades of horror because people were too busy looking at Marisa Tomei’s ta-tas to realize she should not be allowed to write legislature, the fucking idiocy of wanting a heavily armed populace, or just driving drunk and running over a few kids in a car.

      • mPony@lemmy.world
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        Privilege is everything. If you have enough money you can avoid the consequences of anything

        For more information, please watch Infinity Pool (2023)

      • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        It’s an outrageously idiotic idea if you put more than 3 seconds of thought into it. It’s cool they were able to make some kind of allegory for the lowest common denominator to understand classism or some shit, but I don’t know how anyone could suspend disbelief given such a ridiculous premise

        • Thomrade@lemm.ee
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          I mean, I dont disagree that the concept is insanely idiotic but all they’ve done in the purge is take the concept of a pogrom and applied it to modern day america. The premise isn’t that rediculous. It has happened, in real life. Yeah they’ve leaned into it, and dialed up the crazy fevor a bit, but its not so removed from real life accounts of pogroms.

          • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
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            Also we literally have a presidential candidate with far too high of a chance of winning advocating for it. A period of ultraviolence against the people he doesn’t like to scare everyone else from doing anything for the entire year.

      • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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        That was a purge though. Also the night of the long knives.

        Yeah the message is getting across.

          • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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            Which isn’t what he said. He said let the police loose for one “very rough” hour. Not everyone gets to do something for a day. He did not describe the movie like the media is suggesting. That would involve people shooting back at him. Which he’s not a fan of. No he described something altogether darker where he and the police get to kill people with no accountability.

      • TrippaSnippa@lemm.ee
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        Unfortunately the press and the peanut gallery have it very wrong on this one.

        Deliberately. Comparing it to the Purge rather than the Kristallnacht gives the majority of people who only read the headline the wrong idea about what he actually meant, which derails the discussion towards “crazy old man says another crazy thing” rather than “crazy old fascist says another fascist thing”.

    • Lets_Eat_Grandma@lemm.ee
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      He will say absolutely anything to get in power and avoid the catastrophe that awaits should he fail.

      With all the crimes he’s committed that are well documented and easily proven and thus far only some convicted but not sentenced, he’s walking a tightrope. If he falters the consequences are dire.

      At best his debts catch up to him and his family legacy is in tatters.

      At worst he is in prison for the rest of his life from a treason charge.

      If he wins no judge will sentence him until he’s out of office, which he may never be with all the GOP groundwork being laid to create a puppet dictatorship controlled by conservative oligarchs.

        • grue@lemmy.world
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          I expected that on Jan 7, and for a long time afterward.

          I don’t anymore, because I realized something: he’s literally too narcissistic to be able to comprehend the concepts of failure and consequences. He will never run because in order to make the decision to do so, he would have to admit to himself that he lost.

        • girlfreddy@lemmy.ca
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          I would expect him to ask Putin for help in controlling ‘the mob’ in exchange for Alaska and the rest of the North Pole, so Putin can rule the world.

  • Todd Bonzalez@lemm.ee
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    Donald Trump: “I will literally do a Kristallnacht, and kill queer and ethnic minorities with impunity using a standing army. I want to use the police to extrajudicially slaughter undesirable citizens.”

    Media: “Donald Trump thinks the movie The Purge is real! 🤪 What a goofball! 🤣”

  • dubious@lemmy.world
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    at any given moment on any given day, with a little bit of covert communications, any group of people could rise up against another in a Rwandan style genocide. we are all connected via our phones. all you have to do is have a willing population and the right person to give ‘the signal’.

    which group are you going to be?

  • blady_blah@lemmy.world
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    Look, Trump is going to say more and more deranged things as time goes by. This is how he ran as president, say something deranged to distract from the last thing that he said was so deranged.

    I bet he’s actually really upset that two people have tried to kill him, but nobody has tried to kill Kamala. He’s going to say more extreme things, get closer and closer to the line, try to give people more upset… This is how he owns a new cycle. This is his gimmick. This is his playbook. He wants the violence, it feeds his ego.

  • Baron Von J@lemmy.world
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    So just let the cops go out and hit the streets free of ethics and legal restraint to just do whatever the fuck they want for an hour to beat the public in submission. That’s not at all dictatory. Nope. Not one bit.

    • SeattleRain@lemmy.world
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      That’s what they do now and we live in a free and democratic society so no it’s not.

    • 800XL@lemmy.world
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      They forget that the people have guns too. As a matter of fact, this is the exact reason the second ammendment exists in America. To defend against those like Shit Stain Donnie.

      • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
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        What are your guns going to do against a fucking tank? Or grenade launchers? Or just a generally much more equipped militarized police force who will call the national guard in (who have even more fire power) like the little bitches they are?

          • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
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            Only in the most stupid and overextended of positions.

            Everywhere else? It was modern ATGMs that halted their advances and evened the battlefield enough that borderline WW1 levels of (en)trench(ed) warfare became viable.

        • 800XL@lemmy.world
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          You’re right. Better let them just have their way instead. I don’t know what I was thinking. There is no point in defending the country from a fascist takeover.

          /s

          • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
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            Yes. Defend the country. Fight for the country.

            Don’t pretend that having a tacticool gun is going to accomplish anything. Whoever controls the military controls the country. No amount of firearms stashed throughout the house are going to change that because the cops will literally drive a tank through your house and shoot you and your family’s corpses.

            • krashmo@lemmy.world
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              Cops have families too. Generals need to buy groceries. There are plenty of ways to resist a fascist government given the proper motivation. Firearms are just one (pretty effective when used correctly) way to accomplish that goal.

              Vietnam and Afghanistan are both great examples of how a guerilla force with access to primarily small arms can force a much more powerful army to expend so many resources fighting a war of attrition that it eventually becomes untenable to continue. It’s not glamorous or particularly quick but it’s an option that isn’t on the table if the most resistance you can muster is trying to get close enough to stab the right people.

              • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
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                So… your assault rifle exists just to pop Mrs O’Coppy in the face and not much else?

                And Vietnam and Afghanistan ARE great examples.

                The Vietcong basically only stood a chance because they were entrenched in a low visibility jungle that negated most of the advantages the other side had. And Afghanistan? The Brave Men And Women Of The Mujahideen ™ were getting slaughtered until they were given stinger missiles to counter soviet air superiority (wonder who gave them those…). And the more recent conflict was more about IEDs than any form of stand up combat.

                Also: If you are at the point where you have no hope of progress and just want to bleed an occupying force dry? Assault rifles are bulky. What you want is a high velocity pistol round that you can conceal and unload point blank on. Also you want to roll back time ten or twenty years and get rid of all those cameras that will immediately trace you back to the neighborhood you are hiding out in.

                • krashmo@lemmy.world
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                  Yes guns are used to shoot people in the face in war. What’s odd about that to you?

                  We get it, you don’t like guns and you don’t think they have any place in society. However, you haven’t made any other statements than that. In this hypothetical situation that’s looking more and more like our future reality every day, your plan to resist fascism is what exactly? Because at the end of the day I think you know that having a gun opens up more options than you would otherwise have and you’re just having a hard time picturing guns in any other context than you’re used to talking about them in.

        • b161@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          Also many of the people with guns will be using the guns to help the police murder poor minorities (and call that “fighting tyranny”).

    • SassyRamen@lemmy.world
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      As much as I know Trump is a piece of shit nazi, it’s far more likely that he watched a movie, rather than anything to do with reading.

      • sandbox@lemmy.world
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        No way he read the book, but he’s immersed enough in that far-right shit scape that it’s not really much of a stretch to believe he picked it up somewhere. I’m sure people on Truth Social love talking about it.

          • Phoenicianpirate@lemm.ee
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            That’s why people like me and other lefties often take one for the team and read it so you don’t to

            Firstly there is thought slime’s video on the thing describing it in great detail, and then there is the TV tropes that also has some great information on it.

            What do I have to add? I need to mention that one aspect of the Turner diaries plays up is that somehow the opposition is so incredibly afraid of being labeled racist or 'politically correct ’ (now usually called woke) and will allow all manner of heinous crimes committed by non-white people in order to avoid that.

            This is a trope that is often employed by right wing authors, including Ben Shapiro and Glen Beck. They have this idea that liberals and lefties are so terrified of the racist label that they would never describe a suspect as black or Asian for fear of ‘racial profiling’ (even though that isn’t what it is) that blacks somehow commit crimes with impunity until a conservative calls it for what it is and gets the job done.

            The Turner diaries does the same… but only far worse. There are several parts of the book where blacks all form cannibal and rape rings and just kidnap at random white girls (and only white girls) to rape and eat and all the white authority figures are powerless to stop them due to the fear of being called racist.

    • helenslunch@feddit.nl
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      Hard to imagine Trump has read very many books. More likely it’s just something he made up on the spot, because that’s what he’s been doing for decades. It’s why he sounds so stupid all the time. He doesn’t think about anything, he just spews out whatever is on the top of his mind. That’s how we got to injecting bleach and putting light inside the body and windmills causing cancer and an absolutely insane medley of incredible bullshit. It’s not because he’s researched the topic in any way, shape, or form.

  • nifty@lemmy.world
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    This is all you really need to know about any of this

    University of Texas law professor Lee Kovarsky said, “People confuse telling hard truths with just being a total f------ idiot.”

    Not enough people are shamed into keeping quiet these days, they think they’re being politically incorrect or edgy or owning woke libs. They’re really just letting everyone who knows how things work that they don’t know

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    They make it sound like he shouldn’t have said it out loud. This is the shit his loyalists love! He means to say it and they were meant to hear it.

    He wasn’t “caught” doing shit.

  • Konala Koala@lemmy.world
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    I think Trump wanting to “make all crimes legal for a twelve hour period” should be enough to dump, disqualify, and imprison his @$$.

    • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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      I think if he made all crimes legal, for 12 hours- and gave people plenty of warning, he’d be dead in the first.

      I mean, it must be an exercise of immense self control to be on his security detail, and not constantly wonder about the good that could happen. If they just.

      Also. Throw in all his cooks and food delivery people, the people that maintain his vehicles. The people that maintain the golf course… the mail people. The people that do the laundry. Change his diapers. The people that manage his medications.

      There’s an awful lot of people that he relies on to survive. Any one of them could end it, and he shits on them near constantly.

      Remove the threat of consequences? Oh yeah. It’d be a battle royally, and he’s the king to regicide.

    • ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca
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      Not what he said

      It was cops should be allowed to be as violent as they want one day a year to deter criminals