A shooter opened fire on a group of politicians at a baseball practice, wounding the Republican whip, Steve Scalise. See, this is why we need more gun control, to keep deadly weapons out of the hands of dangerous fanatics. Maybe finally when white Republican congressmen are the targets, they’ll be motivated to do something about it…
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
This was about three miles from our house. Scary.
Snowflakes are shooting back.
Condemn me if you want, but after they paint a target on Giffords, shoot her, then spend years mocking her and promising to finish the job; after they’ve increased their violent hysteria year after year; after the waves of violence in the wake up Trump’s “victory”; after they murdered people in Oregon; after their national politician assaulted a reporter, and they responded with cheers and “rope. tree. journalist. some assembly required” –
I think it’s about time they started to get the message that we’re not going to lay down and die for their masturbatory macho fantasies of violent domination. We will defend ourselves.
I’m beginning to see the start of the Republican response. Scalise is in the leadership, so he was accompanied by armed security who took out the shooter. Therefore we need MORE GUNS, or it would have been a bloodbath out there.
So . . . a lone wolf then. Not a terrorist, apparently. No need to worry.
Good thing he was white, otherwise he would be dead.
I think the gunman would have had to reload for this many shots. I am not up on the amount of ammo a clip will hold, but I think it is around thirty.
EVERYBODY. WOULD’VE. DIED. Hyperbolic much?
I would like to add that Paul is in a position to actually do something about gun violence, but I am sure any attempts to point that out would fall on deaf ears.
Sure. The only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is an even worse guy with a gun. Or something.
http://theweek.com/speedreads/705653/rep-mark-walker-says-gunman-targeted-congressional-baseball-practice-kill-many-republican-members-possible
The week is reporting that Republicans were his specific target. Perhaps someone condemned – or has family condemned – by Republican healthcare destruction? Or other policies? Or maybe just cares about those condemned. Hopefully he’ll get to tell his story soon.
At any rate the sooner we can take control of the narrative soon. Laying down and agreeing with republicans that we’re terrible violent oppressive murderers who deserve to be destroyed won’t appease them, it will only hasten their violence.
Adam Lanza literally machine gunned a 1st grade class (and his mother and the principal and teachers) and they don’t care, why would you expect any different now?
And yes I know he didn’t actually use a machine gun, I could give a crap about their bullshit semantics, I can see Victoria Soto’s home town from my neighborhood, my daughter went to school with Maren Sanchez, I have seen enough traumatized children to last me a lifetime. There are too many shootings (any is too many) in both the cities bordering my town. I have no fucks to give about their stupid Republican fee-fees today. I feel bad for the people who were hurt, I feel bad for the officers who got shot doing their job (and I hope they have insurance that doesn’t suck) but why should I care about them (NRA loving Congressional representatives) when they could give a crap about the rest of us?
I don’t want to hear from them about how this proves anything except its too damn easy to get a gun and take it anywhere
And as a reminder that people get shot often accidentally, every single day:
http://m.dailykos.com/story/2017/6/10/1649646/-Is-no-one-safe-Embarrassing-wave-of-accidents-befall-experts-GunFAIL-CCXL
“Our findings for the week of April 2 include nineteen people who accidentally shot themselves, nine kids accidentally shot, six accidental gun fatalities, six people who accidentally shot family members or significant others, four gun range accidents, three people who accidentally fired guns into their neighbors’ homes, and three who had gun mishaps while out shopping and dining among the general populace.”
Nope. I don’t want to hear his “story”; this kind of violence is unacceptable, regardless of who’s committing it.
He used a semi-automatic rifle, therefore we should make it easier to get semi-automatic rifles for everybody?
Besides, if those congressmen had been carrying assault rifles, they would not have needed any police, right?
…and if these had been Democrats, Fox would now be mocking them for hiding behind policemen, instead of carrying guns themselves and shooting the assailant the way Harry Callahan would have done….
Walker is also a christian republican so the odds of his claim being false are pretty high.
There are claims that the shooter asked if they were Republicans first. I’ll note that this claim came FROM a Republican, so it’s safe to assume it’s a lie until we have more evidence.
Talking Points Memo:
“UPDATE: House Natural Resources Committee says the hearing on @RepJeffDuncan’s bill to deregulate gun silencers has been canceled.”
WP reports that the shooter is a 66 year old man from Belleville, IL.
Junior is jumping in with “Events like today are EXACTLY (sic) why we took issue with NY elites glorifying assassination of our president…” Right, and not to echo certain rhetoric herein, but exactly like Sarah Palin’s crosshairs on a map of Democrat candidates in 2008 or the horrid lynching posters of Obama.
I have to agree with Junior on one thing, though: he’s not one of those “NY elites.” No sir.
Getting everyone armed is a good way to start a civil war. Each side will blame the other for making the first move, and it will all explode.
I see What a Maroon is continuing the liberal fetishiziation of nonviolence. Bigly.
This particular incident is likely unjustified, but this kind of violence may be the only thing that saves us. The left has not reckoned with this correctly. The commonwealth is fundamentally, irrepairable broken. A non-trivial portion of the right would see millions of us dead.
Damn right violence may have a role to play.
Not by me of course.
For the record, he’s talking about a production of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar.
Mike Smith,
Bless your heart.
“Latest reporting has 5 victims injured in Virginia attack:
Rep. Scalise
2 Capitol Police officers
Congressional aide
Tyson Food lobbyist”
From TPM:
The WashPost has identified the shooter as James T. Hodgkinson III from Illinois.
Trump is saying the suspect is dead.
“one year ago”
@18, Mike Smith
What the fuck. “this kind”…”of violence”…”may be the only thing”…”that saves us”.
What the fuck.
I’ve written before about the actual options available and how too many people seem to think that violence is the only option left when it isn’t. Not sure what else to say here, other than what the fuck.
The TPM article links to a facebook page for one James T. Hodgkinson of IL. It’s way too early to know if he’s the shooter, but one of his favorites was Tom Perriello, the Democratic candidate for VA governor who lost the primary last night. Makes me wonder if he was in the area working for the campaign.
Brian Pansky,
Apparently being opposed to attempted mass murder is a “fetish”. So says Mike Smith, and Mike Smith is an honourable man.
I’m concerned that the Republicans, who hate political dissent anyway, will use this as an opportunity to clamp down on civil rights.
Dumpster has announced the shooter has died.
Guardian reports someone who knew him saying that “Hodgkinson was a passionate progressive and showed no signs of violence or malice toward others.” Adding, “I met him on the Bernie trail in Iowa, worked with him in the Quad Cities area. He was this union tradesman, pretty stocky, and we stayed up talking politics. He was more on the really progressive side of things.”
The shooter’s local paper has published his letters to the editor from 2012.
@Brian Pansky
If I thought it was worthwhile to try to change minds while America is morphing into the Weimar Republic c. 1929 I would do so. “changing minds” by spreading the values of curisoity only works if socitial conditions are favroable, which among other things requires partisans to be trustworthy to be have in good faith. I think les deplorables have shown themsevles untrustworthy on that part. (I lost all patience with this question when they cited the botched Clinton investiagation as the reason to fire Comey). I can’t trust them to meet a basic minimal of civil behavoir of saying what they believe in and hold to it consistently. As such there no reason to bother engaging with them.
As for a seperation without violence, cool story bro. Any attempt to seperate the mortally wounded country the USA into smaller workable political units (which for the record is my preferred path) will, like gravity, produce civil war. Hopefully small and short lived.
Bottom line: the Trumpianist movement is an existential threat that has, and will, continue to use violence against people it percieves as enemies. Any political orientation that does not reconginize the necessity of violence and force as part of the response to it is doomed to fail.
liberals, with their fethisization of nonviolence and misremembering of the civil right movements, are completely worthless.
progressives are only slightly better but still to blind to face the facts.
Only the various AntiFa groups that have gotten more loud as of late are responding correctly.
Bernie Sanders’ statement.
“10 months ago”
@What a Maroon
Your kneejerk dismissal of the guy’s reasoning is what I am complaining about. Look, if he is upset over losing healthcare coverage for himself or a family member, I am far more sympathic to that than some other reasoning. But you don’t even care to look into that. You catergorically reject politicalized violence. This is nonsense. It’s the same impluse that condemns rioters but not the conditions for riots. It has already gotten millions killed.
Mike Smith,
This man went to a public park heavily armed and began shooting. Yes, there were some repugnant congresscritters there, but there were also people out walking their dogs and otherwise going about their daily chores.
I know the neighborhood fairly well (in fact, I have a close relative who lives across the street from the park)–it’s a mixed residential/commercial neighborhood, mostly lower-middle and middle class, where people are out walking around doing their thing; it’s just luck that no bystanders were hurt or killed. So yeah, I don’t really care about his motives–nothing can justify his actions.
And I don’t “catergorically [sic] reject politicalized [sic] violence”–I reject attempted mass murder.
So once again, bless your heart.
@What a Maroon
The Republicans are empowered by the white lower-middle and middle classes. The man’s action may have been ill-advised but it was still an open question of whether his action can be justified. Society has denegerated to the point where, yes political violence may be legitimate. Not enough is known. This was an attempted political assassination by the looks of it…
You are trying to cleave the obivous political aspects from this. It wasn’t just attempted mass “murder.”
@Mike Smith
What does your “win” state look like? What is the ideal world that you want to live in?
Because my ideal state is not one where everyone has to learn how to shoot and purchase firearms for a potential shoot-out. My ideal state does not involve me killing anyone. My ideal state does not jump to shooting people to solve a much bigger problem when the unfun, unglamourous, non-instant work of calling, protesting, donating and talking accomplishes the goal I want for a longer term.
Do you value peace? Do you value human life? Then I wouldn’t wish for bombs and bullets.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a rich guy with a tax cut.
Del Ray where the shooting happened is a very blue neighborhood. Lots of Latino and Black families in the area.
But yeah, I’m the one jerking my knee.
@32, Mike Smith
If you think this is a point against me, then you misread my “cool story”.
Don’t equivocate between:
1) civil war happening as a result of attempts to separate peacefully
2) skipping to violent means without having tried to separate
I was clearly criticizing the latter. Hence why I keep pointing out the proper order of means, I never absolutely forbid violent means.
Now, if you can’t split up the USA without civil war (which I have my doubts about, despite its difficulty), then the option remains: to flee. And so on. There’s always a million ways to solve any given problem.
If it’s actually bad enough to warrant even those drastic measures (which I have my doubts about). They are far less drastic than violence.
I’m no pacifist, at some point, violent means are justified. But the criteria for justifying specific violent actions have to actually be met. Not just “hmm, maybe met, let’s not try other methods”.
“Now, if you can’t split up the USA without civil war (which I have my doubts about, despite its difficulty), then the option remains: to flee. And so on. There’s always a million ways to solve any given problem.”
How on earth is that a realistic solution to the problem? The countries that exist now won’t even deal with Syrian refugees, let alone the prospect of something like 20 million black people taking your idea seriously (since except for the really committed Uncle Ruckuses like Clarke, you can’t possibly tell me that most black people don’t fantasize at least somewhat about getting out and letting this country die in its own racist filth because I certainly do) and all leaving. Canada wouldn’t even accept one black person who documented that he was being abused by police, tried to make the case that this was political violence, and asked for asylum. Especially not after this nation has given people falsely lifetime criminal records which means that immigration efforts for a lot of countries come to a screeching halt.
Furthermore, it doesn’t even solve the underlying problem: which is that the neo-Nazi tide is international and no matter where people fled to, any example of a successful country that wasn’t a bigoted exclusionary ethnocracy would be an example that people actually could be better than them and they’d come along to exterminate it sooner or later.
antigone10:
Oh? It accomplishes it? That’s an actual assertion, not just a general statement. Let me take a look at that.
What was the platform that Donald Trump ran on? I don’t need to recount the specifics. He was a badly-written third grade morality play villain. A moral society, hell, a barely functioning society would have rejected his platform the moment he came down that escalator. This isn’t a matter of winning against it – it should never have been in that fight.
And why was it in that fight? because the Right Wing has spent the past decades corrupting and radicalizing their half of society, to the point that they are fanatical, irrational zealots. And what were you doing in that time? Calling, protesting, donating, and talking?
So it looks like what you’ve “accomplished” is smiling vacuously while our enemies turn our society into the kind of horrifically monstrous degeneracy that would select Donald Trump and his inhuman platform to be leader.
Thanks for all the “accomplishing” but I think I’d like to try a different track of ‘accomplishments” before you “accomplish” the final destruction of the Left and the people who depend on it.
Hodgkinson’s history of violence.
Just for clarity, if “any attempt…will, like gravity, produce civil war,” this is exceedingly serious. Serious enough to warrant some clarification. Is it gravity, as in the attractive force of matter, that produces civil war, or gravity, as in seriousness?
@Mike Smith
#35
Your kneejerk dismissal of the guy’s reasoning is what I am complaining about.
It’s the shooting, not the reasoning, that is getting pushback.
And the history described at my link @ #44 suggests that it wasn’t any kind of reasoning that led him to the act. He was a violent man who lately turned to political violence.
1. This could also be considered terrorism.
It’s no different from any other ideologically motivated random like attack such as the Pulse nightclub shooting or the London Bridge van/knife attacks.
2. You’ve got me here.
I fetishize not killing people I don’t know for no particular reason.
I’m also fetishize not approving of mass murder or terrorism.
@Mike Smith
In addition to what Brian Pansky, What a Maroon, Antigone10 etc have said, it was not very effective violence. The shooter is dead (he looks like someone who could have done a lot of good by staying alive and out of jail) and 3 right wingers are wounded. There is now the risk that this will lead to a greater crackdown on civil rights and sympathy for the Republican assholes.
We need keep reminding people that right wing Trump supporters have succeeded in killing people in Oregon, Quebec and wherever it was that the the 2 East Indian guys were shot.
me
While I am writing my comment Salty goes and digs up evidence that I am full of shit.
If only people thought that violence against women was actual violence.
If only violence against women disqualified people from owning guns…
rpjohnston
And what “accomplishments” have taking a gun and shooting random people garnered? Do you feel safer after hearing about this? Do you think this country is more peaceful? Less likely to resort to violence to cause problems?
What the fuck were you doing when feminists were pointing out, over and over again, that domestic violence is a pretty key indicator that someone is going to be a mass shooter, what were you accomplishing? Have you tried to do any of the things necessary for political change?
Or do you just like dehumanizing the other side and dreaming of action-movie shoot-outs? And do you think that’s liberal?
Have you felt safer in the past year, antigone? the past two? More? Has your sense of safety increased?
Do you think I have all the answers? Think I’m some sort of prescient demigod? That I can predict the next 500000 chess moves after a few hours?
Do I feel safer? Not in the short term, no. Would I feel safe if this hadn’t happened? Hell no.
Do i think this country is more peaceful? No. Do I think rolling over for rightwing terrorism, a one-sided shootout, is peaceful? hell no.
Do I think [the right wing] is less likely to resort to violence to [solve] problems? In the short term? Probably not. In the long-term? Maybe if they learn that there’s consequences to their violence. Do I think they’ll stop terrorizing us if we do nothing? No.
I don’t know if there’s any way to avoid a societal war. The real world isn’t kumbaya. There’s not a perfect solution to everything and sometimes there’s no solution that isn’t bad. I do know that we’ve tried peace and it’s just convinced them that we’re too weak and scared to fight back. I don’t advocate proactive violence, and I don’t condone this shooter’s actions, but I also am not terribly interested in individual actions so much as I am movements and trends. I am in favor of defending ourselves, and making it known damn well that we’ll defend ourselves anytime the Right Wing decides they’re too macho to bother with a civil society.
And I sure as fuck am not interested in always being the one to condemn the rare out-of-line on our side while they not only fail to condemn, but CELEBRATE the constant terrorism from their side. We can preen about being the adults in the room but it doesn’t matter if the children kill us.
And by the same token I will not acknowledge the humanity of a movement that refuses to recognize my, and our, humanity. If it has to be us or them – and they’ve forced that choice – then I’ll choose us.
As for what I’ve done – I’ve done some phonebanking, and I’m looking to get more involved in political campaigns. I’ve been a passive commentator until November, but I’m working on changing that and doing substantive work. And what have you done?
Self-flagellating whenever there’s violence on our side while they laugh and congratulate themselves every time there’s violence on their side – and there’s a hella lot more of it – does nothing but reinforce the narrative that we are Bad and we are Violent and we are the Problem while they’re Right and Entitled to whatever they want.
I have some familiarity with this. My father wasn’t violent, but he was on an eternal crusade to be right about everything. Anytime there was an argument or a fight – which he almost always started – I would try to reconcile by acknowledging the points where I was Wrong, where I had gone Too Far, where I made a Mistake, in the hopes that he would do the same and we would come to an understanding.
Believe me, it never works. He just ran the narrative that I was a fuck-up and that he was a saint magnanimously tolerating me, despite the burden. When I said “I’m sorry, I fucked up at this point” he would agree and use it as evidence that it was All My Fault.
And this isn’t to complain about my family life, I’m saying that I’m seeing the same thing in society – we can be the “bigge person” and accept responsibility when our side does something bad, but they won’t reciprocate. They’ll just press the attack, put us on the defensive to distract from all of THEIR shit, and move the line that we’re allowed to cross further and further back.
Violence on our side is almost unheard of compared to violence on their side. Yet listen to them now – the Congresspeople are portraying us as violent, animalistic. Headline from The Week: “GOP Rep. Chris Collins suggests Democrats’ ‘rhetoric’ les to congressional baseball practice shooting”. Steve King had similar sentiments. This is patented horseshit, but it’s the narrative they push – and as we fall to our knees and wail “WE’RE SOOOORRRYYYYYY! FORGIVE US!!!!! WE’RE SO AWFUL!!!!!” they just sit back smugly as we plunge the knife they stabbed us with deeper.
So no, I don’t advocate violence but I’m not going to play into the narrative that we’re uniquely awful by condemning it either. I’ll condemn it when they start condemning theirs.
Well, this was just… spectacularly unhelpful.
When someone on the right goes on a shooting spree, it serves the purposes of the right. When someone on the left goes on a shooting spree, it serves the purposes of the right. Terrorism, mass murder; this is the kind of thing that the “Law and Order” types absolutely love. They can claim that it proves their point. That we need to “get tough” and crackdown on all those awful civil liberties that tie down the “good” guys and prevent them from keeping us safe.
It’s bullshit. The only thing “getting tough” does is breed more violence- and the right absolutely knows this. They’re positively pissing down both legs in excitement over today’s violence. They know exactly how to spin the narrative to their advantage. They know the congressional Dems will give them even more ground, because enough Democratic voters are stupid enough to believe the Republicans give a fuck about the people who were shot, and that they are “hurt” by today’s events.
The Republicans are currently working on a bill that will kill tens of thousands of vulnerable people (and that’s just in the first year after it goes into effect). The Democrats are going to be falling all over themselves to show “solidarity” with their Republican colleagues now. Some form of Trumpcare is inevitable, now.
This wasn’t an act of rebellion. These weren’t shots fired for a revolutionary cause. This was an asshole losing his temper and doing something colossally stupid, something which will ultimately hurt far more people than the five he shot.
I hope those injured make a full recovery.
I’m hoping that the Senators will be shaken enough to hold off on their destruction of Obamacare, actually. They’ve been reminded that while tar and feathering has fallen out of vogue and there’s no French Revolution on the horizon, they aren’t invincible…and they’re heading home in a few weeks.
But I don’t know that for sure, I just hope. And Democrats do have a record of responding to every crisis by capitulating. So I can’t say that you’re wrong, vucodlak…I just hope that you are, for the good of all of us =/
rpjohnston @54: Here’s what you’re missing. This isn’t a Republicans vs Democrats issue. This is a “people who think that murder is an acceptable means of getting your way” vs people who don’t.
Oh for fuck’s sake.
I am intimately familiar with violence. I bear the marks of it both physical and mental.
As pre-adolescent I was left with my cupped hands filled with blood and a nose that has never worked well enough to breath through.
As an adolescent I was left with misaligned tooth and the memory of my head hitting the pavement over and over while I wondered if he would stop before I died.
As a young adult I was left with memories of a half hour of threats “We own this street.” before the money in the till was taken. And the memories of the four subsequent times, each with it’s own different knife and the hand that held it. I cannot remember any of their faces.
As an adult I was left with impression of a white flash as the fist met my skull from behind, and the almost sad resignation when it connected with my throat. “Oh great, now my throat will swell up and I’ll die.”
Just this year I was left with months long anxiety over the safety of my family after the neighbour showed up at my door, threatening “I’ll cut your fucking throat!”
This last bears expansion, as it directly relates to the OP.
That neighbour, let’s call him Luke, had a goat that kept getting onto our property and eating our immature fruit trees. Luke refused to do anything about his fences, he seemed to think it was our responsibility to keep his goat on his property. After maybe a half dozen iterations of bringing his goat back I tied it to a tree on our block and sent a text saying that if he didn’t come and get it himself I’d give it to the game warden.
This man had cameras all over his rental property and we hardly ever saw him. Our interactions with him never went smoothly and every effort to be reasonable was rebuffed. So the frantic banging on our door minutes after I sent that text came as no surprise. The fact that he had a knife and was threatening to use it was a bit of a shock though.
All my past history with violence has left me with an ability to remain rational when confronted with it. Not that I wasn’t scared, I was terrified, but I don’t panic anymore. The first thing I noticed was that he was at least 3 meters away from the door. If he really wanted to stab me he could have been right up close as I opened it. I wouldn’t have had a chance.
I could have ducked back into the house and have gotten a weapon of my own. I didn’t. I stayed right where I was and talked him down. I persisted in the face of his spittle flecked irrationality until he could no longer maintain it.
Later, the cops came. Luke had called them. I have no idea what he told them, but clearly he wanted to get his side of the story in first. The cop wanted me to charge him but I demurred. Not that he didn’t deserve it, but because he was completely irrational and there was no reason to think that that would change.
Everything about him, every interaction I had told me that he would take any action towards him as a threat and that his response would be disproportionate. I had no guarantee that he would remain in custody for any length time, especially as it would be my word against his and his girlfriend’s and no one had gotten hurt.
I chose to deescalate. I chose to let him think he won. I did the very minimum I could in regards to reciprocal violence in order to keep myself and my family safe. It told the cop that I didn’t want anyone getting hurt, even him. It worked. I never saw him again in the time from then until he fled in the night from his unpaid rent.
The only violence that is acceptable is in cases of immediate physical threat to one’s self or others. And in those cases the minimum amount that will ensure your and other’s safety is all that is allowable.
When I was attacked from behind because the asshole was mad at his girlfriend and didn’t want to take it out on her, all I had to do to defend myself was to straighten up and look at him. He backed away until he was across the street before beginning to posture and preen. “Why? Why!? Because I CAN that’s why!” When I walked forward, not to get at him, just to get home, he ran. I stopped telling this story after the first couple of times because the inevitable response from men was a variation of “I’d have kicked his ass.” Fuck that, I think that my response was the best, most moral one possible.
Power fantasists, with their masturbatory delusions of martial competence, always seem to forget the part about ensuring one’s safety being the cut off point. I’d love one to demonstrate exactly how the act of the OP, the killing of politicians will ensure people’s safety. Every case of such things that I’ve ever seen the result is escalation. It’s a recipe for a spiral of violence that ends up in places like the middle east, with generational hatred that appears to be insurmountable.
I’m not just a lefty, I am a progressive. Sniff all you want about a supposed fetishiziation of non-violence, but I want to find a better way. I want humanity to progress beyond this cycle of violence. That doesn’t mean not defending oneself or others, it means do so with the bare minimum of violence required for safety. It means working hard at no little risk to come up with a better way
And fuck anyone who pretends their retaliation fantasies are not a surrender to fatalism.
From The Onion: “In the wake of this morning’s mass shooting in Alexandria, VA, every single American from across the political spectrum was reportedly able to cite the tragedy as irrefutable proof that they had been right about everything all along.”
This isn’t self-flagellating. You don’t seem to understand the words you’re writing. I’m not saying the left is more violent. That’s obviously on the face stupid. I’m saying we shouldn’t advocate violence. Do you not understand the difference?
Conservatives are not monsters. They are human. We can’t pull out some supernatural cause to human interaction. I’m not about to go shooting my families and neighbors because they are wrong and causing harm. That’s like spanking a kid because they hit their siblings. It doesn’t work to teach them not to hit- it teaches them that only the biggest psychopath can win. They haven’t “Radicalized half of society”. 58.6% of the eligible voting population voted in this election total. 26% of the total eligible voting population voted for Trump. Most conservatives are “not highly engaged in politics”. That is not 50% anyway you slice it.
The fact that you feel safer after this shooting is concerning. Violence does begat violence. This isn’t kumbaya. This isn’t hyperbole. This is sociology. You are moving what counts as acceptable political action.
We don’t have to apologize for a damn thing. We have no forgiveness to ask for. This isn’t your (or my) fucked-up abusive family. We can condemn this without owning it. In fact, condemning it is perfectly acceptable way to not own it. We can also say that we should not be called animalistic without calling what was done acceptable. The choices are not binary: neither “Roll over and accept punishment” or “say what was done was okay nor “Do nothing” or “Start shooting people”.
Phonebanking is good. Keep doing that. Don’t pull out a gun and shoot people.
FossilFishy #58
+∞
.
antigone10 #60
you, too
As any fule kno, the Second Amendment Solution is only available to white MRAs, NRA devotees and alt-reichers, for use in solving the problem that libruls and progressives exist. It may never be used by pats of the problem against parts of the solution, dontchaknow. Specifically, it can never be used by a black victim of police racism against the racists in the Dallas police, nor by an Illinois semi-progressive against alt-reich promoters.
Who do you libruls think you are, anyway? People or whut? Rights? Why would you think you have any rights oppose the Trump Outfit?
You reap what you sow.
The sane me repeats “violence is never acceptable”
But another voice whispers “perhaps, but let’s not pretend these people are the innocent oppressed”.
What could the broader dividend be if the perpetrators and promoters of systemic violence were brought face to face with the handiwork of their greed and bigotry?
Looks like we are going to find out.
antigone10, #60
Woah, woah… easy there! That’s too radical an idea for progressives and secular humanists.
I did not see this one coming:
“GOP lawmaker: Trump ‘partially to blame for demons’ making Americans act ‘weird and different’ http://www.rawstory.com/2017/06/gop-lawmaker-trump-partially-to-blame-for-demons-making-americans-act-weird-and-different/
Trump is connected with the devil! And since the Regressives are biblical fundamentalists, can we blame the shooting on demonic possession? In that case, it is Trump’s fault.
Antigone
I didn’t say that YOU said the Left was more violent, I said that is the narrative being pushed by the leaders of the Right, and eagerly swallowed by their followers. I said that clear as day – including that it was obvious horseshit. And I also said, clear as day, that I don’t advocate violence but I’m not going to fall over myself to condemn it either. You are being deliberately disingenuous.
@birgerjohansson Alright well…I hope voices like sanford’s can win out. They haven’t so far but if they do we can hopefully avert our society becoming even more violent. I applaud him for this stand…and hope that I can keep applauding.
@vocadlak, #55
“I hope those injured make a full recovery.”
But they’re trying to kill us off slowly. What kind of a fool wishes for the recovery of people that are just going to go right back and try and slaughter them?
alkaloid,
What exactly are David Bailey and Krystal Griner doing to “kill us off slowly”?
@ alkaloid, #68
As ‘What a Maroon, living up to the ‘nym’ said, most of the people injured weren’t even Republican congresspeople, so the justification argument just doesn’t work from any angle.
Besides, I don’t like to see people suffer, period. Even if those people would like to see me suffer (or simply don’t care). That’s the primary reason that I am a progressive (or call myself one, if you don’t think I merit the label). I want to end/prevent unnecessary suffering. The same goes for unnecessary deaths.
And then there’s the purely pragmatic argument that I made in my previous comment:
Even if the shooter had only hit Republican congresspeople; even if he’d killed every Republican congressperson on that field, it wouldn’t help the cause. It would only hurt it. Shit like this isn’t going to make the Republicans think twice about killing us all, but it might make some Democrats consider helping them.
@What a Maroon, #69
“What exactly are David Bailey and Krystal Griner doing to “kill us off slowly”?”
Absolutely nothing.
What’s Steve Scalise, the man who called himself as a compliment “David Duke without the baggage” and spoke at a chapter of the same racist group whose web page helped radicalize Dylann Roof doing? If it was anyone but him who was in his position who was poor his institutional, political response would’ve been to tell them to go suck on a bottle of OTC ibuprofen.
@antigone10, #60
You wrote “Conservatives are not monsters. They are human.”
That is absolutely not what I’ve seen out of them in either their treatment of people like me or their statements. However you don’t have to take my word for it. In fact, you shouldn’t as an atheist. Go to a site called Truthdig and read their comments section sometime. They might have basically been soft leftist to liberal authors/reposts but their comments section is a hard right nightmare because (not much unlike the Hell of Christianity) it largely consists of basically sane people trying to hold their own against a tide of right wing bigotry because their mods punish those posters who finally get sick of the abuse and lash out, but leave the worst among them to keep spouting filth over and over again.
When you see someone laugh at victims of police brutality tell me you don’t think that the person who did that is a monster.
When you see someone cheer on violence against the Keystone XL protesters because as far as they’re concerned Indians are primitives and they all should’ve assimilated or died out tell me you don’t think that the person who did that is a monster.
When you see someone say that black people should be grateful for slavery because all Africans were cannibals and they basically laugh in your face about how they managed to get the liberal ‘butthurt’ tell me that you don’t think that the person who did that is a monster.
When you go elsewhere on the net and you see how many people defend Richard Spencer’s fascist bigotry (usually laden with the n-word or similar statements) and you see that any blog post by a black person will attract the bigots within five posts, maybe ten, tell me you don’t think that the people who do this are monsters.
When you see someone in a chat room say (and their response would be to try and harass you off if they knew you were black there and then) that they’re glad they live in Kansas because there are fewer black people and Mexicans there, that black people are more aggressive because they have more testosterone, that Pinochet was a “good dictator” and you know that he was a murderous butcher tell me that you wouldn’t think that the person who said that was a monster.
You’ll probably tell me that maybe you’d get angry with them, maybe you’d think that they were monsters, but you’d be wrong in your anger. But that’s not correct. You should be angry at them. You should think that they’re monsters. You should hate them. You should because doing so is part of the taking the only steps that have ever stopped them from hurting more people. Not being more moral than them when you and I know damn well they’ll never reciprocate it.
One of the best comments I’ve ever seen about this came from The Root:
http://fusion.kinja.com/bigoted-homophobe-steve-scalises-life-was-saved-by-a-qu-1796135276
“We all know that if the shoe was on the other foot, no conservative voter would condemn a radical conservative shooter. She did her job, but she should have let them die. Being a bigger person has no purpose in conservative America. It is the scumbags who hold all the power and they got there by lying and holding the government hostage. We have to stop pretending all lives are equal when the people who hold power want to disenfranchise everyone but straight white christian males. We have a congress who in 5 months has:
Voted to eliminate the congressional oversight committee
Voted to steal healthcare from 25 million people and introduce a bill that would kill 45,000 people a year
Voted to repeal Dodd-Frank, the bank regulations whose sole purpose is to prevent another financial meltdown.
They’re not humans by any definition of a human being. They’re ids, they are remorseless, incapable of compassion or basic human decency.”
Exactly. I know you want to believe differently. In any other circumstances it’d be commendable but it really is about having a politics that will protect us from them. Right now (to put it mildly) that’s basically not happening and part of the reason why is because everyone that takes advantage of us and hurts us, whether it’s the Democrats, the Republicans, or the even worse fascists, knows that we’re always going to be better than them even when that means being a laughingstock and a victim over and over again.
@antigone10, #60
You wrote “Conservatives are not monsters. They are human.”
That is absolutely not what I’ve seen out of them in either their treatment of people like me or their statements. However you don’t have to take my word for it. In fact, you shouldn’t as an atheist. Go to a site called Truthdig and read their comments section sometime. They might have basically been soft leftist to liberal authors/reposts but their comments section is a hard right nightmare because (not much unlike the Hell of Christianity) it largely consists of basically sane people trying to hold their own against a tide of right wing bigotry because their mods punish those posters who finally get sick of the abuse and lash out, but leave the worst among them to keep spouting filth over and over again.
When you see someone laugh at victims of police brutality tell me you don’t think that the person who did that is a monster.
When you see someone cheer on violence against the Keystone XL protesters because as far as they’re concerned Indians are primitives and they all should’ve assimilated or died out tell me you don’t think that the person who did that is a monster.
When you see someone say that black people should be grateful for slavery because all Africans were cannibals and they basically laugh in your face about how they managed to get the liberal ‘butthurt’ tell me that you don’t think that the person who did that is a monster.
When you go elsewhere on the net and you see how many people defend Richard Spencer’s fascist bigotry (usually laden with the n-word or similar statements) and you see that any blog post by a black person will attract the bigots within five posts, maybe ten, tell me you don’t think that the people who do this are monsters.
When you see someone in a chat room say (and their response would be to try and harass you off if they knew you were black there and then) that they’re glad they live in Kansas because there are fewer black people and Mexicans there, that black people are more aggressive because they have more testosterone, that Pinochet was a “good dictator” and you know that he was a murderous butcher tell me that you wouldn’t think that the person who said that was a monster.
You’ll probably tell me that maybe you’d get angry with them, maybe you’d think that they were monsters, but you’d be wrong in your anger. But that’s not correct. You should be angry at them. You should think that they’re monsters. You should hate them. You should because doing so is part of the taking the only steps that have ever stopped them from hurting more people. Not being more moral than them when you and I know damn well they’ll never reciprocate it.
One of the best comments I’ve ever seen about this came from The Root:
“We all know that if the shoe was on the other foot, no conservative voter would condemn a radical conservative shooter. She did her job, but she should have let them die. Being a bigger person has no purpose in conservative America. It is the scumbags who hold all the power and they got there by lying and holding the government hostage. We have to stop pretending all lives are equal when the people who hold power want to disenfranchise everyone but straight white christian males. We have a congress who in 5 months has:
Voted to eliminate the congressional oversight committee
Voted to steal healthcare from 25 million people and introduce a bill that would kill 45,000 people a year
Voted to repeal Dodd-Frank, the bank regulations whose sole purpose is to prevent another financial meltdown.
They’re not humans by any definition of a human being. They’re ids, they are remorseless, incapable of compassion or basic human decency.”
Exactly. I know you want to believe differently. In any other circumstances it’d be commendable but it really is about having a politics that will protect us from them. Right now (to put it mildly) that’s basically not happening and part of the reason why is because everyone that takes advantage of us and hurts us, whether it’s the Democrats, the Republicans, or the even worse fascists, knows that we’re always going to be better than them even when that means being a laughingstock and a victim over and over again.