Well, you know. You expect the violent person to be ashamed of themselves. That's a very bold assumption. A psychopath or sociopath won't feel a thing when they order their army to mow down peaceful protestors.
It's a beautiful idea really. But when you are given no option other than to fight, do you think it's wrong for them to do so? Jewish, Armenians, Chinese under Japanese occupation? Might have not mattered, might have. I guess it depends on the person. An exaggeration of course compared to the issue at hand, but it seems wishful idealism. In some cases, yes, it works. But when your adversary doesn't care, it's quite ineffective. Game-theory wise I think equal repercussion works quite well, where violence is met with violence in order to prevent it from happening. Sure not always, but if there is no punishment it's simply much too advantageous to use violence if it solves the problem.
I mean school bullies probably won't stop unless you hit them or they get some sort of punishment. Sure you'll feel probably mighty wise if you don't resort to violence or any kind of resistance, but it's unhelpful if it doesn't stop it. And in the meantime you'll be suffering tremendously.
I'm not disagreeing that in this case non-violent approach isn't the best. But depending on the setting, the parameters if you will, that approach might be inefficient. Another example would be the people living under the Stalin's rule in Soviet Union. Even if you resisted peacefully, I'm sure you would have been taken to the gulag either way.
The circumstance where non-violent behavior works is very specific and is best when there's:
A) much stronger opponent (British Empire, Chinese government)
B) level of civilization where both parties do not want to engage in violence (the majority of modern civilizations)
C) good chance for massive unrest if violence were to happen (no ruler wants to deal with domestic terrorism and internal squabbles, unless of course your regime is breaking up already and that's the only way to keep control)
The more primal the opponent, the worse are your chances. Aztecs would have welcomed non-violent behavior with open hands, they would have cheerfully enslaved people who didn't put up a fight. The reason why they stopped was basically the destruction of their civilization by the Spaniards. But maybe I'm mixing here war with protesting, which is a more of problem after you have lost and are under the oppressive regime. Then your options are limited: it's either violent insurgency or non-violent protesting. In modern world luckily we have electronic mass-media that helps immensely with the non-violence.
It's a beautiful idea really. But when you are given no option other than to fight, do you think it's wrong for them to do so? Jewish, Armenians, Chinese under Japanese occupation? Might have not mattered, might have. I guess it depends on the person. An exaggeration of course compared to the issue at hand, but it seems wishful idealism. In some cases, yes, it works. But when your adversary doesn't care, it's quite ineffective. Game-theory wise I think equal repercussion works quite well, where violence is met with violence in order to prevent it from happening. Sure not always, but if there is no punishment it's simply much too advantageous to use violence if it solves the problem.
I mean school bullies probably won't stop unless you hit them or they get some sort of punishment. Sure you'll feel probably mighty wise if you don't resort to violence or any kind of resistance, but it's unhelpful if it doesn't stop it. And in the meantime you'll be suffering tremendously.