[karthikk]

Non-American here, from the outside it seems like the Jan 6 thing was way overblown. It feels like similar things happen in other govt buildings in the USA all the time but the perpetrators were not targeted the same way. Not condoning either, but there seems to be selective govt retribution.

[coffeefirst]

I live in DC; it was not overblown.

Big rowdy protests on all matter of topics are fine. I actually used to work across from an embassy and they had huge street-closing protests every year. I'd walk straight through them to go grab a sandwich, I never felt unsafe.

This was something else. They stormed the fences, smashed windows, broke into the Capital building, they trashed the place, they beat the shit out of the cops. People died. DC Metro Police officers—let's be clear, they deal with real crime—described this as the most brutal hand to hand combat they'd ever experienced.

I'm not sure what you've heard about America. If you ever have a chance to visit DC, do it, it's a very cool city.

This does not happen here.

[siliconwrath]

This article gives a lot of context for why Jan 6 is a big deal, especially in light of the pardons handed out afterward. It's a long read, but it's enlightening: https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/evenhanded-injustice--j...

[jeremyjh]

They were trying to overturn an election that they lost. Historically, failing to overthrow the government is unhealthy.

[scarab92]

There was zero real prospect of that occurring, especially with broad agreement across the aisle that Trump lost.

It was a protest that got out of hand. Those who committed violence deserved custodial sentences, but the rest who were mere trespassers never should have seen the inside of a jail cell.

[jeremyjh]

Right. So treason is fine as long as you are fucking clown about it?

[PixyMisa]

The total number of people charged with, much less convicted of treason, is zero.

[bagels]

Seditious conspiracy is pretty close, but also, Biden dropped the ball on prosecuting.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/proud-boys-leader-sentenced-2...

"To prepare for the attack on the Capitol, Tarrio and the other leaders of the Ministry of Self Defense established a chain of command, chose a time and place for their attack, and intentionally recruited others who would follow their top-down leadership and who were prepared to engage in physical violence if necessary."

[suzzer99]

This is just willful ignorance. See the links others have posted.

[altcognito]

Oh yeah, if you erase the fake electors, and the entire scheme by the presidents men to overturn the results, you can pretend that

[intended]

Absolutely. This is how it was during Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush 2, Obama, Biden. There’s always a protest.

It’s totally a normal part of the past half century plus of the peaceful transition of power.

People get together on DC to help the outgoing president threaten and scare congress, to see if they change the way the election is called.

It’s just one of those things that people do to see if America is actually strong, and if congress folds, well you know you need a new congress.

Its tradition! Its like a hazing!

[Goronmon]

There was zero real prospect of that occurring, especially with broad agreement across the aisle that Trump lost.

I mean, there was a whole plan around certifying the results of the election and it's not entirely clear how many people would have gone along with it if things had gone just a little bit different.

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

[hackyhacky]

> It was a protest that got out of hand.

I agree that Jan 6 was not that big a deal. However, Jan 6 was just one part of a larger, nearly successful conspiracy to overturn the election. The conspiracy included pressuring the Vice President to exceed his authority; fraudulent electors; and extorting false claims of fraud from states.

[bogomog]

How is not a big deal that a few thousand citizens were various levels of conscious and unconscious participants in an organized coup attempt?

[scarab92]

Explain Trump getting re-elected in 2024.

As on-the-nose as the Democrats are, I don't think that would have been possible if the public thought he orchestrated a serious attempt at a coup.

[hackyhacky]

The public are misled, thanks to omnipresent right-leaning media and increasingly hard-to-penetrate echo chambers.

In the immediate aftermath of Jan 6, even his fellow republicans called it a coup, until they changed their minds for political expediency.

[zmgsabst]

Yeah - they should’ve just had a court overturn it like Romania!

[dylan604]

In comparison to other countries where coups are almost normal, for a country that has not come close to that, this was a big shock to the accepted normal. When other countries like Syria overthrow their leaders, you almost go "of course they did", but to see anything approaching that in the US is totally out of left field. That's what makes it a bigger deal than what you want think.

[suzzer99]

> It feels like similar things happen in other govt buildings in the USA all the time

This is exactly how public perception will instantly normalize things if Trump ever gets the power to throw political enemies out of windows. "Oh this stuff happens all the time. Politicians have always been killing their enemies. Look up Seth Rich and Whitewater. Don't be so naive."

It will happen in the blink of an eye. And then it really is over.

[altcognito]

I can assure you, despite superificial anecdotes — nothing similar happens “all the time”. protestors will find their way in buildings, but they typically don’t show up, destroy barricades, get shot, plant explosives. And they certainly don’t do it right as they were attending a rally designed to stroke exactly this situation

[scarab92]

Agree with this. Not to condone Jan 6, but the prosecution of those protestors was punitively harsh. People who should have been given simple fines for trespassing were instead given custodial sentences.

[ta-2847281492]

I sat on a January 6 jury that voted to convict the accused, who was then sentenced to several years in jail. I watched hours and hours of participant and security camera footage and listened to testimony from a Constitutional lawyer of the Senate and many law enforcement officers who were there that day (and could be identified in the footage).

Most of the Jan 6 trespassers got off pretty easy, especially if they settled. Most of them who made it into the rotunda stood around gaping with dumb looks on their faces, like the proverbial dog that catches the car. They didn’t know what to do and they sensed they shouldn’t be there. Many of them then listened to Capitol police offers in the building and exited.

But many didn’t exit and they formed a tense, violent, and scary mob, in the seat of our government, to disrupt the Constitutional transfer of power. It is amazing that more people didn’t die (a SWAT team quickly dispersed the mob outside the Speaker’s lobby right after the lone shooting) and there were many acts of heroism and smart policing to distract, disorient, and delay the mob, buying more time for evacuation of Members of Congress and for law enforcement to regroup in force. Many in the mob had weapons, which is a couple of felony counts right off the bat (possessing weapons in the Capitol, which is looser than you may think, and possessing weapons in the Secret Service restricted area around POTUS and VPOTUS, which is a felony that doesn’t mess around).

The felonies and misdemeanors at issue in the case I was on were pretty clear and the jury reached its verdict thoughtfully, carefully, and quickly (we all quietly read through the many pages of the counts and judge’s instructions before opening discussion; it was an excellent group of people).

January 6 was an insurrection. Most members of the mob were sad sack idiots, and I can feel sympathy for them as individuals. But if anything, the government did not treat them harshly enough, nor quickly enough.

I am a bit worried about my own safety now, with all the insurrectionists having been pardoned. Fun times.

[k3vinw]

You had hours of video because the National Guard was intentionally delayed while waiting only 2 miles away from the Capitol. DOD officials were caught lying to Congress about it.

[ta-2847281492]

The mob was inside for really only 45-50 minutes. There was hours of video because there’s obviously a huge amount of video evidence from all the devices seized by FBI and from the many cameras inside the Capitol. The prosecution showed us video only relevant to the accused, but there was a lot of it.

[k3vinw]

Ha. Hours in terms of video footage from multiple devices doesn’t explain the delayed response from the National Guard nor the DOD’s lying about it to Congress. They only had to delay long enough for them to get inside.

[tomp]

What kinds of weapons fid they have?

If it was an insurrection, why didn’t they use them?

Or was it the peaceful kind?

[ta-2847281492]

They didn’t use them because:

1. They got lost. 2. When they got to the House, Cap Police was there, and distracted/delayed them for a few minutes. 3. Officers with guns drawn were on other side of doors. 4. Ashley Bobbitt was shot as soon as she started to climb through the Speaker’s lobby doorway, stopping and upsetting the mob. 5. The Capitol police SWAT came up the stairs into that area a minute or two later and cleared them out. 6. And finally I can’t emphasize this enough: these people were morons.

I don’t really want to argue online with a redpilled HN idiot about Jan 6. If you think Jan 6 wasn’t bad, then you, too, have likely been mislead because you, too, are likely a moron. Or if you’re not a moron, then you’ve just turned heel for the lulz, a moldbug wannabe.

[foldr]

Ctrl+F ‘weapon’ and ‘gun’ in the House Jan 6 report. The details of what happened are exhaustively documented there and elsewhere.

[tomp]

ok thanks, I did, here: https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-J6-REPORT/html-submi...

it mentions exactly 7 people that carried guns:

Garret Miller

Christopher Kuehne

Guy Reffitt

Jerod Thomas Bargar

Mark Andre Mazza

Lonnie Leroy Coffman

Joe Biggs

also, Alex Kirk Harkrider brought a tomahawk axe

not much of an insurrection, we could say a mostly peaceful one

[mcm1954]

Garret Miller did not have a gun Jan 6. I have contacted Loudermilk to get this corrected.If you look up his case you can see he was not charged with having a weapon. He was searched by an officer when briefly detained on steps leading to entrance on east side. Very easily to prove wrong. The J6 committee report has many inaccurate statements

[ta-2847281492]

Knives are weapons, too, as are other things.

[foldr]

You have the answer to your question.

I find it odd that you’re ok with peaceful insurrections. It’s not ok for a small mob to attempt to overthrow the government, whether they go about it violently or not. (Ironically, the fictional election fraud that was being protested would itself be a peaceful insurrection, so one wonders what supporters of peaceful insurrections would have found to complain about in Biden’s victory!)

You can read the rest of the report if you are still inclined to view this disgraceful episode in US history as a ‘mostly peaceful’ one.

[dekhn]

Here's a guy (known as "zip tie guy") who made it to the house chambers: https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/7E1B/production...

He was carrying zip ties (intent was to tie up house members), a taser, and wearing body armor. Later, he was found guilty of felonies and sent to prison, then pardoned and released by Trump.

That's right, Trump pardoned a guy whos intent was to go into the house of representatives, secure the representatives, and taser them.

Now, to be fair, I think most of the protestors were yokels who had no intent of doing that. It's typical in any protest to have a distribution- from peaceniks to fuck-shit-up people. If all you did was stand outside holding a sign and moved away when asked, I am not worried at all. If you go in an sit in nancy pelosi's chair in her office... that's worrisome but not truly scary. If you go in with weapons and attempt to kidnap representatives... you should go to jail and stay there and not be pardoned.

[update: there are a few factual corrections. It was the senate gallery, not the house chambers, and he stole the flexicuffs from a closet inside the building)

[bobmcnamara]

169 people were sentenced relatively lightly for brawling with capitol police.

[stuffoverflow]

As a non-American I don't think Jan 6 was overblown. It had some real potential for escalation had Pence given in to Trump's demands. At the same time I do think the prosecution was too harsh, though that can be said from just about any crime in the US. Morally Trump is way more responsible for Jan 6 than any of the protestors.

[bcoughlan]

As a non-american I also thought the same. Reading a synopsis of evidence completely changed my mind [1]. Pipe bombs planted at party headquarters to divert the police, maps of tunnels under the Capitol building and so on. Not amateur stuff.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planning_of_the_January_6_Unit...

[Goronmon]

Outside of it being a "thing that happened in a govt building", the goal of Jan. 6th was to prevent the certification of the election, have the results be declared invalid and for Trump to declare himself president instead of Biden.

The fact that this failed doesn't really mean that the underlying intention was just "protesting".

[Terr_]

What would be a good example of these "similar" situations you were thinking of?

Do they involve a crowd smashing through doors and windows specifically to reach or at least terrorize human victims inside?

[likeabatterycar]

The Floyd riots in Portland a few years ago which got memory holed.

Rioters were shining high power military-grade lasers at peace officers, assaulting cops. They sieged government buildings and destroyed and burned much of their own city. Nothing happened to most of them.

A young boy was shot and killed in Seattle (where a few blocks of the city 'seceded' from the US) and I watched some LARPing teenager dressed like a dollar-store ninja hit a cop in the head with a baseball bat (the ninja turned out to be a local politician's son so I can imagine the punishment levied). The mayor went on TV and described all this madness as a "summer of love".

The behaviour I observed was abhorrent and eclipsed anything that transpired on Jan 6.

Yet it was all conveniently forgotten.

Smashing some doors and windows was child's play in comparison, and the melodrama surrounding 1/6 was over the top. I actually heard someone describe it as "worse than 9/11". They were serious, too.

And you want me to believe the guy on 1/6 with the buffalo horns is somehow comparable to the cowards blinding people with industrial lasers? The Portland riots to this day is some of the most insane footage I've ever seen and the lack of punishment and length of time it was allowed to go on is unbelievable.

Most of the Portland rioters should still be in jail but most got off with a slap on the wrist if they got any punishment at all.

It's an inconvenient truth for some because I remember even middle aged Google engineers were arrested for acting like fools. You would think educated people would know better.

There is a 100% chance some posters on this very website were at the Portland or Seattle riots and somehow have justified that their participation was righteous.

I imagine the 1/6 folks felt the same way.

[nxobject]

Where on earth are you getting “burned and destroyed much of [Portland]” from? As a Portlander, the biggest effect of the Floyd protestors was boarded up buildings in the 10-block radius around the local county jail, in the middle of a moribund pandemic-era office skyscraper district. Please, if you believe an American city’s been destroyed, at least pause and double-check before making it the centerpiece of an argument.

(Many of those arrested were let off because of insufficient evidence. I think that requiring evidence to convict someone is a good thing.)

[likeabatterycar]

"Uhm acksually, it was only 10 square blocks"

I know what I saw, it was repugnant behaviour, don't try and split hairs. The fact that the madness was contained to only 10 blocks is, on the whole, irrelevant.

Good luck with your future riots.

[nxobject]

Oh no, I was disputing the "burned and destroyed" part – don't pick and choose what I said and ignore the rest.

I know what I saw: between 2020 and 2024 I worked at PSU and took a bus that went over the Hawthorne Bridge, went past the Justice Center, and dropped me off near City Hall. Once in a while I went to Pioneer Square to eat lunch. I worked late nights, and on the way back home after midnight I either walked back on Broadway or 4th, to City Hall, and took the same bus back. Those are the "10 blocks" you're talking about. The fact that they were all standing, not burnt, and were in use during business hours is fairly relevant to the conversation.

The worst I saw was the glass broken in the fancy glass entrance to the Oregon Historical Society. The best I saw was murals painted on the boards Apple had put up to protect their store in Pioneer Square.

So: what did you see?

[selimthegrim]

Portland is the seat of government of the USA now? (I used to live in Kenton/St Johns when the latter was still called Tweakville, although I moved away well before 2020)

[nxobject]

Homes there are going for at least 500k now, I think…

[kelnos]

Ok so even if I agree with your description of those two events, two things don't make "happens all the time".

[macrael]

American here, nope! It was a huge deal. An attempt to disrupt the peaceful transition of power. Not sure what other examples you think were on par but it was the kind of big deal where people went home sick to their stomachs for the day because I've never seen anything like it in my life. A desecration of something sacred.

[k3vinw]

Yes. Sadly, abusing the justice system to harshly punish your political opponents by forcing them to either accept trumped up charges or bankrupt them is something new here. The circus has been quite the spectacle.

[kelnos]

Can you provide examples of when something similar has happened in other US government buildings? I'm American and I can't think of anything, at least not anything that happens "all the time".

Jan 6 was not overblown. Rioters rushed the building, smashed windows, and broke into the offices of Congresspeople and staffers. People were injured and hospitalized. Capitol Police were understaffed and lost control of the situation, and were physically attacked.

Those convicted of crimes due to their part in Jan 6 deserved what they got. It is a disgusting miscarriage of justice that nearly all of them have been pardoned.

[tsanzer]

Five Puerto Rican nationalists stormed the Capitol in 1954 and shot 30 rounds at lawmakers. 5 injured. They were later commuted by President Carter.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_United_States_Capitol_s...

[lemonberry]

"It feels like similar things happen in other govt buildings in the USA all the time but the perpetrators were not targeted the same way."

Huh? American here. Can you point to any examples? I can't think of a single one.

[chasd00]

People break into state chambers all the time to disrupt votes. It’s happened in Texas a few times in the last 5 years or so.

[Terr_]

That many in Texas? Can you link to a couple?

I'm not seeing much in a quick search... unless you mean people who arrive normally and then are removed for heckling, which is totally different.

[kelnos]

"A few times in the last 5 years or so" != "all the time".

[pseudalopex]

With protest signs. Not weapons and restraints. And gallows outside.

[dylan604]

What? When? Where?

[tatrajim]

Remember May 31, 2020?

"Secret Service agents rushed President Donald Trump to a White House bunker on Friday night as hundreds of protesters gathered outside the executive mansion, some of them throwing rocks and tugging at police barricades.

"Trump spent nearly an hour in the bunker, which was designed for use in emergencies like terrorist attacks, according to a Republican close to the White House who was not authorized to publicly discuss private matters and spoke on condition of anonymity. The account was confirmed by an administration official who also spoke on condition of anonymity.

"The abrupt decision by the agents underscored the rattled mood inside the White House, where the chants from protesters in Lafayette Park could be heard all weekend and Secret Service agents and law enforcement officers struggled to contain the crowds."

As near as I can find, some 6 people were arrested for this violent protest by the Secret Service, and some 16 by DC police. Is is vanishingly difficult to find if anyone was subsequently charged and convicted for this event, which was without parallel, at least in my lifetime. This followed the events of May 30, 2020, when the Church of St. John's Episcopal In Lafayette Square, across from the White House, was sent on fire. To date it seems that no one has been arrested or charged for this destruction.

https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-ap-top-news-george-f...

[DangitBobby]

So they didn't even attempt to enter the building and they certainly didn't attempt to overthrow election results? I just cant see how you think these are the same category of event with respect to political impact.

[tatrajim]

They burned the church and tried to break into the White House forcing an evacuation of the president! The 1/6 riot, by contrast, was by turns both violent and civil, but no one was armed and attempting "to overthrow the election results". In fact the Trump plan of continuous debate over the merits of the election was thwarted by the riot. It was diametrically opposed to his interests and ended up favoring the Democrats. Many questions still linger over the identities of major participants, including the "pipe bomber" and the "scaffold commander", whom the FBI unaccountably never identified. Note that the 1/6 participants were relentlessly tracked by the state for years by some 6000 FBI agents and tried in DC courts, unlike the 2020 rioters aiming to storm the White House.

[qwerpy]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitol_Hill_Occupied_Protes...

This one wasn’t restricted to just a govt building, although it did start with the takeover of a police building. Kids were shot and killed. But the rioters were initially aligned with BLM so there was a lot of sympathy from the government and media. Barely anyone was investigated or punished, in contrast to Jan 6th.

[titanomachy]

They didn't take over the police building. They protested outside it, and the police boarded it up and voluntarily vacated it.

This was basically a very long street protest, which is fundamentally different from taking over the US legislative buildings by force.

No children were shot. A 19-year old named Horace Lorenzo Anderson Jr was shot and killed. His killer, an 18-year-old mentally disabled person with a history of conflict with Anderson, was sentenced to 14 years in prison.

No matter your ideology, I'm not sure how you can believe this is the same category of thing.

[qwerpy]

The link I posted has a crime section. There were 5 separate shootings. A 16 year old boy was shot and killed and a 14 year old was shot and in critical condition. From a loss of life due to violence perspective, CHOP/CHAZ was worse.

[ModernMech]

> From a loss of life due to violence perspective, CHOP/CHAZ was worse.

But from a potential to overthrow the government perspective, Jan 6 was worse. The entire Senate and the Vice President were in that building. The stated goal of the mob was to stop the transfer of power ("stop the steal"). They chanted their methods, which included hanging the Vice President and Speaker of the House, 1st and 2nd in line of succession. They brought a gallows. That's why it was an insurrection and not just a protest.

[pseudalopex]

> There were 5 separate shootings.

Most of the shootings had no known relation to the protests except police broadcast they had abandoned the neighborhood. It was predicted this would lead to violence. Protesters did not ask for this.

The 1st shooting was outside the protest area. The killer and victim had a history of conflict.

The 2nd shooting was outside the protest area. The victim said he was attacked by white supremacists.

The location of the 3rd shooting was unclear. The victim refused to talk to police.

The 4th shooting was outside the protest area. The victim refused to talk to police.

The 5th shooting did involve protesters. The 2 boys drove through the occupied park and at a group of protesters. Protesters working as security guards shot at the vehicle in defense.

[UltraSane]

Their goal was to prevent The Vice President from certifying Biden's electoral college victory as the US constitution mandates. That is a VERY BIG DEAL.

[Terr_]

"Your honor, I was just shoving the guy a little cuz he pissed me off, that happens all the time!"

"Mr. Redcap, you tried to shove him off a cliff."

[tayo42]

More then one person died. That doesn't happen. What are you talking about?

[hn_throwaway_99]

> It feels like similar things happen in other govt buildings in the USA all the time

That is a laughable assertion, most importantly because the job that Congress was doing on Jan 6th, and which the deliberate goal of the protesters was to stop, was the peaceful transfer of power, which is probably the most important (and historically rare) job in a modern democracy.

Saying "but hey, some left wing protesters surrounded a police station" is a ridiculous false equivalence, because what they were trying to accomplish was orders of magnitude different.