''protective' violence is what the US state purports to do when it ritually murders people.' - you mean with capital punishment? My first thought was the 'responsibility to protect' doctrine. Either way I'd view it as the state perverting & exploiting natural human impulses for its own purposes. Cold blooded and calculated to achieve certain goals which have nothing to do with justice or stopping the behaviour in question (if the US really wanted to stop civilians killing eachother then it would address poverty, mental trauma other root causes; if the US really wanted to protect civilians in Libya, Syria, fmr Yugoslavia then they would stop undermining those countries and stop funding, arming and training fanatical deathsquads to overthrow their governments).

Anyway I think my point stands about the urges to violence coming from different sources. I doubt the Droogs were motivated by wanting to free the woman being attacked by the Hell's Angels (don't remember, been ages since I read it). In that case it's an accidental justice, whereas what is needed is a whole-society response to address the problem. Fwiw I think violence is usually a terrible way to respond to destructive behaviour. It never 'teaches a lesson', and even if the perpetrator is defeated they go off, lick their wounds and plot their revenge which will be even worse after the sting of humiliation. However, in the absence of any real, good faith attempt to solve a problem by wider society I think it is justified when used protectively to try and halt or minimise further atrocities. Which explains the difference, for example, between Hamas/Hezbollah violence (mainly targeting Israeli military) and IDF violence (no qualms about murdering civilians by the tens of thousands). Or pretty much any other resistance movement against colonial/imperial powers. As Che Guevara put it:

'At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love.' - https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Che_Guevara

cheers,
I