I didn’t say start blasting. Right wingers show up strapped all the time showing they mean business and are given plenty of space as a consequence. The cops can do the same for other Americans. If they can’t then it shows the public that it was never about individual rights and all about allowing one group they favor to get away with it.

Protesters urged not to give trump administration pretext for what it is already doing

edit: Oh, what the hell. Let's add a snippet.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass publicly urged protesters Monday not to give the Trump administration any pretext for what they’re already doing and will keep doing no matter what. “Angelenos—don’t engage in violence and give the administration an excuse to inflict all the damage they have been inflicting carte blanche for months on end,” said Bass, adding that Trump and his team are just looking for a reason to respond with violence, as they would have done whether or not any of this happened.

Where does the goal post moving stop? It’s not an escalation of violence if you don’t use it. It’s a threat to escalate to violence. If they aren’t afraid of you then they’re not going to change.

When they declare martial law are you going to be saying the same thing and hoping by just chanting loudly you change their mind?

So what? Do you just watch until you're being herded into concentration camps anyway? This is the first instance of effective resistance to Trump (the April parades don't count) since January and they're calling in the Marines already. This was simply never going to end peacefully, because any effective act of mass resistance was going to be suppressed violently; avoiding escalation means avoiding resistance.

Edit: This person is not arguing in good faith. I cornered them in this thread and they claimed that ICE won't shoot people unless provoked and then that they're shooting people to provoke an escalation. Their argument seems to hinge on the idea that rubber bullets are harmless pranks you should just suck up.

Escalation to violence is exactly what they want.

Are you sure? It seems like the escalation is what they don't want. And that's why they're having to call in the marines to try and scare people back into submission.

Passive acquiescence and blind obedience is what they want. That's why the news media is so eager to label these protests as abnormal, intolerable, and anti-American. If the conservatives wanted protests, they wouldn't be so eager to censor the protests' advocates and so worried about valorizing these opposition efforts.

Problem is the situation won't improve without an escalation

Californians have a right to defend themselves

If they want escalation then they can take it when ever they want. Police just wear plain clothes and throw a brick. Bam and done, at this point it’s best to just assume violence and act accusingly, it’s not like the media are impartial.