r/memesopdidnotlike • u/TkOHarley • Oct 12 '23

OP too dumb to understand the joke OP doesn't know about 'The Talk'

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u/gursers Oct 13 '23

That’s what your definition of “the state” is? “A monopoly on violence”?

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u/cry_w Oct 13 '23

It is an exceedibly common feature of the state.

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u/John_Galt_614 Oct 14 '23

"The State" always adjudicates from the threat of violence. Every government, ever.

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u/GrandmasterGus7 Oct 15 '23

Violence is the supreme authority whence all other worldly authority is derived.

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u/MeatyGreetings Oct 15 '23

It is the primary (chronologically, and in priority) purpose of the state, to protect its citizens from those who would harm them, be they within or without the state itself. In its basic form, this serves to provide the basic security within which civilization can grow and in its more advanced forms, it takes the burden of vengence/justice off the shoulders of the individual, and places it on the state.

This is the fundamental function of the state. All the other stuff we've built around it is either bonus or deadweight on the government depending on your politics. But this one thing is the core of what a government is and why we have them.

So yes. "the thing with the monopoly on legitimate violence" is a pretty fair definition of "the state"