I didn’t sleep much last night and woke up feeling sick with sorrow and dread. Yesterday was a monumentally shitty day in this corner of the blogosphere, what with the confirmation of General Stuck’s death and then the horrible news about Tunch, John’s feline doppelgänger (a big ol’ sweetie disguised as a badass) and this blog’s floofy, fabulous, irreplaceable mascot.
Hard on the heels of that, we learned that George Zimmerman skates after shooting an unarmed teenager to death. Many of us expected this, but it was still hard to hear. I watched a bit of the coverage after the verdict came in, and the most affecting commentary I heard was from Joy Reid, my fellow Floridian before MSNBC wisely signed her, whom I first became aware of when she and I were slugging it out with some jackasses in the comments section of a Florida newspaper during the first Obama campaign.
Reid described having “the talk” with her teenage son, walking him through the steps involved in optimizing a black male’s odds of making it through an encounter with police officers without getting tased, beaten or shot. Be respectful and non-threatening. Don’t make any sudden moves. And now she wonders how to tell her son that he needs to walk on eggshells with virtually everyone, not just the local authorities. Because now just about anyone down here can appoint themselves Sheriff of the Sidewalk or Cop of the Cul-de-Sac.
We’ve spent a lot of time and energy here in spirited discussions (and interminable internet slap-fights) about the NSA revelations and what that all means. It’s a discussion worth having, and despite a few extreme exceptions that prove the rule, I think most of us agree we don’t want to live in a police state and most support greater transparency and want to ratchet down the war footing, however we may disagree on the true nature of our current status and the methods for getting to a better place.
But honestly, I’m more worried about the fake police state, the mindset that compels a shlub like Zimmerman (and millions of others) to think it’s perfectly normal to shove a loaded pistol in his pants for a trip to Target, which is where he claims he was going before he profiled, pursued and killed Trayvon Martin.
Zimmerman’s horrible brother Robert Jr. was on CNN last night and noted that he’s glad George Zimmerman’s gun will be returned to him since he needs it for protection. He cited death threats on Twitter. Well, Zimmerman thought he needed that gun in a far more fortunate time, before any of us knew his fucking name.
Florida issues more concealed carry permits than any other state – over a million so far. But don’t think that this is the answer, as amusing as it is:
[Edited to replace “Bugs Bunny sawing off the state of Florida” GIF with a link.]Because it’s not just Florida. It’s a sickness at the heart of this country, which is ass-deep in guns from coast to coast. It’s a putrification of the soul that would allow a Zimmerman to put words from a Dirty Harry script into the mouth of the kid he just killed: “You’re gonna die tonight, motherfucker!” “You got me!”
The laws in this state are particularly fucked up because, thanks to the tireless efforts of the NRA, they were designed to specifically remove the “duty to retreat.” But please don’t make the mistake of thinking this is a Florida problem.
Remember that 20 mostly white children were gunned down in affluent, civilized Connecticut. So far, despite the tireless efforts of their families, President Obama and Vice President Biden, not a damn thing has been done to address it.
This is an America problem, this obsession with guns, this fixation on dispensing hollow-point justice to “the other,” and it will take the combined efforts of all of us to change it. We have to try.
gogol's wife
Beautiful post.
Just Some Fuckhead
It’s a Christian nation, duh. On Judge Jeanine Pirro’s Facebook page, she posted “Not Guilty” shortly after the verdict. The comments are the vilest collection of “Praise God/The Lord/Jesus” and “Locked and loaded, bring on the riots monkeys.”
I’m sure Jesus would be proud of His legacy, after all, He founded our Christian nation.
Tim C.
Darn straight.
Botsplainer
This is what too many elements of the population want to return to – an environment where this sort of thing happens routinely.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi_civil_rights_workers_murders
Eric U.
there was a lot of noise when Florida pushed through the stand your ground law. Unfortunately, many states now have the same law without anywhere near the notice. Pennsylvania got a stand your ground law a couple of years ago with no publicity at all. It’s ridiculous.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
The most galling thing about this entire circus is how it became a trial in Trayvon Martin, and how in god-knows how many eyes, far too goddamn many, he was found guilty of being a hair-trigger feral thug. You brought up Zimmerman’s brother…didn’t he say something to the respect of how sorry he was Trayvon had to do something stupid and be a violent criminal that night?
That’s the enraging thing here. The Not Guilty verdict for Zimmerman, to many, necessarily meant that Trayvon had to be guilty instead. As I said in other topics, his memory’s become an indictment instead, upon himself and upon all black men as an icon of how inherently violent all blacks must be. And that’s a fucking depressing thing, to see this trial become proof positive of all the “reverse racism” these fucking holes of humanity perceive.
Violet
Excellent post, Betty.
In a thread below we are discussing whether a tourism boycott of Florida might have some impact on the gun laws there. Talking about regular folks and the Orlando entertainment area and high profile sports stars on road trips. Etc.
Stephen Brophy
I’m feeling a lot like you, and feel kicked in the stomach by the seemingly simultaneous exoneration of GZ and the horrible death of a cat I’ve never petted. Here’s my Facebook response.
You Don't Say
Very well said. Thanks for writing it.
TCG
I am exhausted by it all and I don’t know what to do. I remember a movie that came out years ago about a black couple that decided to not have children because American was just too racist to bring another black child into. I must say I have never been so happy to not have any kids. This country has always and still does hate black people.
Kropadope
Come now, there’s a lot of problems with our culture’s fascination with guns, but the knee-jerk reaction that we need restrict access or restrict where on your person you may carry a gun is not getting to the core issue of went wrong with Zimmerman/Martin and is irresponsible and off-putting as the people who use every opportunity to push universal armament and laws promoting citizen justice.
The real problems here include a culture which allows for privileged classes of people to be above the law in some or most situations and a media landscape that makes the concept of a fair trial in a high profile case a joke.
Elizabelle
Terrific post, Betty.
We do have to change this.
This does feel like the Birmingham Church bombing, and Emmett Till, and too many other grievous injustices that finally led to a better society with better laws.
George Zimmerman is an ugly man from an ugly, ugly family.
Last, the late great General Stuck noted frequently that we are seeing this ugliness and desperation because the right-wingers are losing, and they know their times are changing.
Much of this NRA and ALEC legislation is a rearguard action. We need to fight it.
greennotGreen
@Just Some Fuckhead: And when He saw what our nation has become, Jesus wept.
scav
The baseline gun obsession is national, the reverence for violence, frontier / mob-based justice and past race-based cultural castes is more regional. The enacted laws making it easier for some to get away with designating themselves 007 vigilantes are still more localized.
Comrade Jake
I read somewhere that the defense in the case decided not to use the Stand Your Ground law as part of their argument. In essence, they conceded that it wasn’t relevant.
No idea if that’s accurate or not. I really couldn’t bear to watch the trial. I have no idea how some people managed to take in most of it.
gene108
Gun ownership is down.
The gun lobby and right-wing media, to make up for lost sales, have turned the remaining gun owners into paranoid nuts.
These SYG and CC laws are purely about subsidizing and propping up gun manufacturers from the declining gun ownership rates in America.
There’s no rational way to counter irrationality.
The legislators passing these laws need to lose and lose big, otherwise there’s no reason to change.
EDIT: By gun ownership rates, I mean the percentage of Americans who own guns. Sales are probably brisk, because the remaining folks, who own guns now believe they need to create their own arsenals for various paranoid fantasies.
beth
What a great post. Every time I look at my white as snow, teenaged daughter I thank heavens I don’t have to deal with this problem. Then I immediately start crying thinking about Trayvon’s parents and all the other parents of African Americans children who do have to deal with it. I can’t imagine what it’s like and I just feel so awfully helpless about it, hence my tears.
JenJen
Thanks for this.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
41 shots, Lena gets her son ready for school
She says “On these streets, Charles
You’ve got to understand the rules
If an officer stops you, promise me you’ll always be polite
And that you’ll never ever run away
Promise Mama you’ll keep your hands in sight”
Well, is it a gun, is it a knife
Is it a wallet, this is your life
It ain’t no secret (it ain’t no secret)
No secret my friend
You can get killed just for living in your American skin
gene108
@Elizabelle:
Right-wingers are losing or have lost on cultural issues.
It’s the economic issues, where they remain firmly in the driver’s seat.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@Comrade Jake:
The defense was under FL’s vanilla self-defense laws, yes.
Betty Cracker
@Kropadope: Bullshit. There are a lot of issues at play here, including race and unbelievably stupid media coverage, but don’t try to tell me that the fact that virtually any fucking yahoo can walk around with a hidden gun down here had nothing to do with this case.
SiubhanDuinne
I mentioned in a thread downstairs that I heard Robert Jr. on NPR this morning saying that Trayvon was armed — armed with a sidewalk.
Comrade Jake
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik: Right.
I like what Coates had to say:
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Elizabelle: George Zimmerman is an ugly man from an ugly, ugly family.
Like I said earlier, I can’t believe the lawyers haven’t clamped down on them.
TCG
@Elizabelle: I am not sure that they are losing and they seem to be doing a very good job of turning back what marginal changes have been made over the last 50 years. I feel like our side is losing ground of every front.
Daniel
Thanks, Betty for always wise words.
It was a very sad day yesterday for many reasons.
I did not watch the trial of Zimmerman, but was shocked at how bad the prosecution was after reading about it this morning in an article in The Root, which I encourage everyone to read. Trayvon’s parents never had a chance for justice. Remember, it was only after weeks of national agitation that Florida even took up the case. I don’t believe the prosecution team’s heart was really in it…
All best to John…
Amir Khalid
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Mustn’t forget the video.
beth
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Like OJ, I think Zimmerman is a narcissistic punk who just can’t stay out of trouble. Now that he’s once again an armed punk, I don’t think we’ve heard the last of his bad behavior. Like OJ, he just can’t help himself.
raven
Charles Pierce
Angela
@beth: I have three white young adult sons. I had the same reaction last night when my 21 year old walked home from work at 12:30 without a care in the world.
And I woke up this morning, as BC said “feeling sick with sorrow and dread.”
I’ve done what I can to learn how to be an ally, and I will continue to pursue that course. But that hopeless and helpless feeling just doesn’t go away. And I can’t imagine what it must be like to be black in America.
TCG
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: What for? They clearly didn’t hurt the case.
A Humble Lurker
The Sandy Hook parents and the Martin’s should join forces. The more people with stories to tell, the better.
Kropadope
@Betty Cracker: I’m sorry, but I simply have a lot of problems with the idea that people can tell people you can’t own X inanimate object or do what you want with it that doesn’t harm someone. Banning is a sloppy, lazy form of lawmaking, creates illegal markets, and empowers bad people. I seek a prohibition on prohibition.
That’s not to say that I don’t think there should be registries or that you shouldn’t restrict certain people from certain things. I am not aware, however, of anything in George Zimmerman’s past that would have been reasonable grounds for disarming the man. This would have qualified for sure, if not for Florida’s blame the victim laws.
Cacti
@Daniel:
They never wanted the case and were forced into action by public outrage.
karen
The SYG law is really a “Kill Blah People Legally” law and coincidentally, it was created and passed after Obama, a blah man, became President. If you think that it’s really a coincidence, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.
karen
@A Humble Lurker:
The only thing that made the media pay attention to Sandy Hook is that Sandy Hook is an affluent and mostly white neighborhood. If THEY could be affected then that must mean that anyone could. But if it was some school in DC in a mostly blah and Latino neighborhood? No one would have batted an eyelash.
sacrablue
After all of the body blows we have taken lately, I think most of us are grieving and angry. I’m almost at the point of giving up. I’m so sad and frustrated. I know that at some point soon I will want to find some positive way to take action. I just can’t come up with any constructive ideas. Yet.
Nerdlinger
@Kropadope: You fuckers are part of the problem. Go sell your NRA snake-oil elsewhere.
aimai
@beth: I’ve got two white teenage daughters. Its true that I don’t have to expect that they might be killed being mistaken for a male black teen but I do have to worry about the immense amounts of drink and drug and culture fueled violence that will be directed at them as girls and that will be facilitated with guns.
I’m not going all “me too” on this. The injustice and horror of what happened to Trayvon Martin and his family belongs to the African American community and the special relationship that community has with the white majority, the southern power structure, and the police and the state. If my daughters are attacked and shot I might be able to expect to get justice for their murders. But if they are merely raped at gunpoint? Doubtful. In any event, we are all at risk from the extremely high level of paranoia and violence that the Zimmermans and their supporters are pushing on all of us.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@TCG: There’s a civil trial coming up, and IANAL and I’m not sure about rules of evidence, but I imagine that Hannity tape is gonna come back up, and his (new?) lawyers aren’t gonna want any more of those.
Cacti
Well, the “good people” of Sanford, FL can now rest easier, knowing that George Zimmerman will be free again to protect them from frightening negro bucks, clad in menacing hooded sweatshirts, and armed with deadly skittles.
aimai
@Kropadope: Wrong: he had been charged with assaulting a police officer and was also involved in a domestic violence dispute.
Eric U.
@karen: I never realized that SYG was racist until yesterday. I have come to undertand that the grand unified theory that explains the Republican party platform is that everything on their agenda can be traced to racism.
SYG in Floriduh was passed in 2005 though. You can look through the liberal blogs from the time, this sort of thing was predicted. I think that we missed the racist angle though
adog
I am so sad and discouraged today. I feel impotent. What can we do? I am so, so sorry for Trayvon’s family.
Gindy51
@Violet: Already canceled the Disneyworld trip for 20. I told them why too, no way was I going to allow my mixed race nieces and nephews a chance to get gunned down returning from a 7-11. We’ll go some where else and they can hit Disneyland in Cali next year.
Kropadope
@Nerdlinger: Speaking of knee-JERK, for the record I hate the NRA, laws they push for like this that allow for vigilante justice (read my original post), don’t own a gun, and find them distasteful.
People like you are the problem on the right. Always looking for pure views and to create a hostile environment for dissent.
Daniel
@Cacti:
My point exactly. Check out the article; it certainly raised my eyebrows. Mind you, I believe a case should have commenced immediately and Zimmerman charged at minimum with manslaughter.
Cacti
I went on a lot of family vacations to Florida as a kid.
My children will never set foot in that State prior to reaching adulthood.
Kropadope
@aimai: Not wrong, I simply said I wasn’t aware. Thanks for letting me know. So a regime of registration and revocation of rights for criminals, if properly applied, can work.
Chris
@Eric U.:
Every conservative I’ve ever met was a bigot. Every, single, last one.
I’ve heard the saying “not all Republicans are racists, but all racists are Republicans” and quite frankly I think the saying should go the other way around.
Nerdlinger
@Kropadope: I’ve dealt with enough fuckers like you before, so forgive me if I don’t give a shit about your whinging. Sell your plea for a rational conversation elsewhere; I know a fucking troll when I smell one.
Kropadope
@Nerdlinger:
Wear some deodorant and you won’t have to deal with that troll smell.
TCG
@Eric U.: I always knew SYG laws were Kill Nig*clang* laws. They weren’t passed so that white people could kill each other.
gogol's wife
@Gindy51:
Good for you.
Now what can I do, since I’ve lived my entire life without setting foot in Florida or having the slightest desire to do so?
SiubhanDuinne
@raven:
What a powerful piece of writing. Pierce can occasionally be a little too self-consciously clever, but when he’s on one of his righteous rants, he’s untouchable. And this was Righteous.
Wouldn’t have occurred to me to check for a Charlie Pierce post on a weekend, so thanks for linking.
FlipYrWhig
It’s really, truly weird that Zimmerman gets to act like a cop and carry a gun like the cops and presume support from the actual cops without, you know, being a fucking cop. Do we all get to do this now? “I haven’t seen you around here before, so get lost or I start shooting in 10, 9, 8…”
Mnemosyne
@Kropadope:
And yet you support the NRA in their aim to allow anyone, anywhere to own a gun and then throw up your hands and say Hoocouldaknowed? when it predictably ends in tragedy.
So what’s worse? Being an actual paying member, or merely supporting their goals and arguing in favor of what they want to turn this country into?
debbie
The real problem is that there are so many who feel entitled to profile. A recent episode from my neck of the woods:
http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2013/06/30/teen-wants-apology-after-officer-pulls-gun.html
A 16-year-old honors student walking to football practice and forced to the ground at gunpoint by a cop. Fortunately for him, another cop, the father of a teammate, recognized him and defused the situation. This, in what is supposed to be a well-off, enlightened suburb.
ETA: This was Xavier’s neighborhood. He lived there.
gogol's wife
@Nerdlinger:
they all say the same things. They hate the NRA and they don’t own a gun. Yeah right.
FlipYrWhig
@Chris: It’s not all racism. Don’t forget the homophobia, misogyny, and “Christianity”!
aimai
@Kropadope: It “can work?” Of course it “can work” to prevent those persons from committing crimes that were foretold by their criminal record. It “won’t work” to prevent the crimes that people who are merely stupid, vicious, incompetent, hysterical, etc… will commit in the future with the guns they are liscenced to own. You are the only one here arguing the absurdity that more and more stringent gun laws wouldn’t lower the gun violence rate significantly. The rest of us know that such laws would work. Every one of the hundreds of children shot since Sandy Hook would be alive if their moronic relatives who legally owned their guns hadn’t been incompetent and left the guns out for children to kill themselves with. Since gun laws focused merely on keeping guns out of the hands of criminals don’t keep guns out of the hands of incompetent morons a wider set of bans and rules and regulations would prevent more deaths and we should be working for a wider set of bans. We should not be suspicious of regulations that limit gun ownership, we should embrace them.
I would prefer a situation in which since “guns are outlawed” and “only outlaws have guns” since there are definitionally fewer outlaws, and their actions can be controlled by the police, than there are morons, incompetents, and vicious thrill seekers like Zimmerman and the various parents and grandparents who let their minor children play with their guns.
IowaOldLady
I used to teach report writing to college students, and as part of their reports, they often had to make recommendations on how to solve problems. Lots of times, their “recommendation” was that everyone should behave better. That was probably true, but I used to tell that that was a pious wish, not a recommendation because it named no action you could take.
To me, saying this is “the culture” is at fault is the same thing. It’s true but it give you no handle on the problem. You can’t wait for the culture to change from the inside out. You have to change it from the outside in, by changing laws and regulating public behavior. Gun laws are one possible way to do that. If folks have better ideas, fine by me, but get moving on them.
handsmile
Here’s what I’m doing: redoubling my commitment to GOTV efforts for the 2014 midterm elections. (Voter registration and GOTV has been an an area of my activism for a number of years.)
Particularly after the recent Shelby County decision on the VRA, it is imperative that the voting rolls be expanded by all means necessary and available if profoundly anti-democratic organizations like ALEC and the NRA, and the politicians beholden to them, are to be defeated and repressive legislation repealed.
The Neo-Confederates and the Neo-Feudalists may be losing demographically, but legally limiting access to the voting booth will maintain, indeed expand, their hold on political power and imposition of vicious social and economic policies.
amk
@Kropadope: Typical nra talking points. How much are they paying you? Blog management could really use some troll management.
eemom
This is a great post.
And I know it’s not gonna happen, but I’m gonna say it just to make myself feel better: can y’all please ban forever any gun apologist or otherwise asshole who shows up here today after yesterday’s tragic events? Just feeling kind of raw and it’s got my asshole tolerance all shot to hell. kthxbai.
gogol's wife
@SiubhanDuinne:
Yes, that’s a very good one from Pierce, whom I don’t usually like.
Kropadope
@Mnemosyne: I don’t support their goals. Are you deliberately ignoring the fact that I support registration and disarming criminals and psychopaths. The NRA would hate me just as mindlessly as you are. Are you trying to start a left wing though police to match the right? How about considering the content of what I wrote instead of holding on to one aspect of it you don’t like as if you were a dog with a bone?
Ruckus
Betty
This.
There is a level of racism still in this country, all of it, that taints everything, the laws, the police actions, the courts, the media….
Many are not racist but many, many are full blown racists, wanting to relive the civil war. And win it this time.
The guns are the tools that they hope to make this happen. The laws, like in FL are also tools that they hope to use to make this happen. It is an over ridding fear that rules all of this and I just don’t understand it. It is totally irrational and it is killing this country. I can’t think of any simile that applies because even a simile has to have some rationality. The NRA isn’t about selling guns, OK that’s not the whole truth, but it is really about fear. The fundies are about fear, the fear that their whole made up world is failing, which of course it always has been.
Cacti
Trayvon Martin’s death was a high profile tally in America’s 400 year history of violence and injustice toward people of African ancestry.
We’re a deeply racist country, with a deadly gun fetish, a high fear quotient, and too many people with fantasies of being Dirty Harry.
The only thing that gives me hope is that the most putrid racists no longer having a voting majority, and their political clout is on a trajectory of steady decline. However, I expect things to get worse before they get better, and the future will hold more vigilante killings.
piratedan
well lets start by shining a light on who makes the guns. We’ve started to tear down the facade that the Koch Brothers sit behind, perhaps it’s time to out who makes the guns, what are the businesses called and who runs them. I know that we have heard of certain manufacturers, but are they part of a bigger conglomerate? Who pulls those strings, who is channeling money to the NRA and pimping for these folks down on K Street. They have a healthy grip on our media and our legislators, time to out them and put names and faces to who is pulling the strings treating us all as collateral damage. Lets face it, those folks don’t give a shit about anything but perpetuating the fear that drives their business, fear of immigrants, racial enmity, religious poutrage, all just tools of the trade
Chris
@FlipYrWhig:
Yeah. Of the two words I used, “bigot” is the best.
Raenelle
I was under the impression that the Dred Scott decision was overturned. But I am very, very naïve. I always think Charlie Brown has a chance this time to kick Lucy’s football.
rk
@Just Some Fuckhead:
For me the pain caused by the verdict is less then the pain caused by the comments. The comments are so hateful and ignorant (Trayvon was a thug, he was staking out the neighborhood, he should have called the cops etc etc). Hundreds of comments basically stating that he deserved to be killed. It just goes on and on. Looking at the FB pages they are all ordinary white people. Until the advent of social media I had no idea that so many people were so hate filled, muddled in thinking and just downright awful awful humans. I fear for my sons.
Betty Cracker
@Kropadope:
Okay. I am your next-door neighbor, and I want to build a nuclear bomb in my backyard. Don’t worry — I don’t plan to actually USE it! It’s just an inanimate object, so what’s the harm?
Nerdlinger
@Kropadope: John Quiggin:
Pretty much describes what happened here, fucker. Do you have another can to sell me? This was a tragedy that could’ve been prevented, but fuckers like you continually abet thugs like Zimmerman.
Violet
@adog:
They want to beat us down so we’re cowed and discouraged. Do not let them. When you feel discouraged, take action. Playing offense is so much more satisfying than playing defense.
I mentioned above that in a previous thread we were discussing a boycott of Florida because of it’s fucked up gun laws. Gindy51 mentioned canceling a Disneyworld trip. That’s a good start. Get 1,000 families to do that, you’ll get attention.
Cacti linked to Ice Cube’s tweet. Celebrities, especially non-white celebs, are paying attention and feel strongly about this trial. It captured national attention. Get them on board. Get them to join the boycott. Why go to California when your non-white kid can be killed for walking with Skittles? Go somewhere else.
Another front on the war would be to make sure our gun-averse European friends who holiday in Florida are also aware they are not safe there.
Make Florida politicians and tourism-related businesses pay the price. The law will change because pressure will build to change it.
Has to start somewhere. Why not with us?
aimai
@TCG: I don’t agree. SYG laws were passed so that male honor could be defended. I think the racist element comes afterwards. The majority of the cases have been men shooting other men over slights to their honor. Where both parties were white the shooter gets off. The reality is that most conflicts happen between people of the same race because these are the people who come into enough contact to come into conflict. I’d be interested to see the no doubt substiantial amount of racism in which cases are permitted to be filed under SYG and which aren’t when both parties are of the same race, as well as which are charged/not charged when the shooter and victim are of different races. Anyone know?
Mnemosyne
@Kropadope:
Uh-huh.
Yep, that’s you calling for a strict regime of registration and disarming people unfit to carry a gun. How could I possibly have read it any other way? After all, it’s not like requiring registration would restrict access in any way.
Ruckus
@aimai:
This.
One only has to look at countries that have much stricter gun laws(like any at all) that have dramatically fewer gun deaths to see how it works. But we can’t do that, “mercia, fuck yeah!”
Cacti
@rk:
If Trayvon had called the cops, they almost certainly would have questioned…him. Probably even arrested him for something or other when they asked George Zimmerman what this dangerous black kid was doing in a nice, white neighborhood.
Scott S.
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Zimmerman’s lawyers didn’t clamp down on the family because they agreed with them 100%. They see this as a great way to kick non-whites down.
FlipYrWhig
@Chris: I’m not disagreeing. I might add that it’s both bigotry and resentment at how the people against whom one is bigoted are getting perks that the bigot isn’t.
Anonymous At Work
Is there a link to the Reid “talk”?
SteveOH
This has probably been asked or discussed before, but was there some legal reason why the prosecution could not use the Stand Your Ground law to defend Trayvon’s actions? He was the one that was being stalked through the neighborhood and would likely have felt his life threatened. Or does the law only apply to the use of a gun?
Violet
@aimai:
Seems like laws should exist so if a gun is used and someone gets killed, that there is a mandatory charge to the owner of the gun, unless the gun has been reported stolen. None of this “the parent has suffered enough already” crap. No. If you own a gun you are responsible for it. If it is used to kill someone, that’s your fault for not locking it up properly.
Is there any way we can start lobbying for those kinds of laws?
Just Some Fuckhead
@rk:
Are you white? White people already knew how awful white people are.
Kay
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik:
I just want to say it again, because Zimmerman’s fans have been saying that Zimmerman was smeared by media.
How do they feel today watching this parade of assholes gloating and smearing the dead 17 year old this morning?
It isn’t enough that he got off under that ridiculous self defense law. He has to now sell himself as a victimized hero.
Zimmerman’s “reputation”, his “honor” is much more valuable to a huge segment of this country than Martin’s is.
I want to know how they explain that.
burnspbesq
@Kropadope:
So wrong on so many levels that I can’t figure out where to start.
Kropadope
@aimai: Maybe we can put them in jail before they commit crimes too, that would definitely solve the problem. I never argued that banning guns wouldn’t lower the gun violence rate, simply that it wasn’t worth lowering in that particular manner. Bans are sloppy legislation, every bit as sloppy as stand your ground laws. Not only do they create underground markets, but on this issue you’re gonna feed into the right-wing victim narrative to a degree that I’m certain we’re going to have violent armed marches on state capitals and Washington.
Jeez, I’ve been coming to this site for a long time and posting for several months. Apparently you put one toe out of line and people are calling for heads to roll. Reminds me of what happened the time I tried to post on Ann Coulter’s message board, purity above all else. I know it’s not everyone or even most of the people here, but people like Mnemosyme and Nerlinger, maybe you should get a little perspective. We won’t all agree 100% of the time on everything and should not. Disagreement should lead to the assumption of bad faith. At least aimai is engaging me on substance, you too are as bad as my glibertarian friend who insists I want to take everyone’s gun away.
Betty Cracker
@Anonymous At Work: Not that I know of. It was a conversation after the verdict came down. Reid, Harris-Perry and Bloom were discussing it. If I can find a clip, I’ll post it.
Just Some Fuckhead
@eemom: We should ban everyone and just run without comments like Sully. I knew it sounds extreme but we never know when someone is going to be feeling raw or emotional and then someone else’s otherwise innocuous comment gets blown out of proportion and next thing ya know, everyone is a miserable wreck.
Just Some Fuckhead
Anya
@beth: I agree. In the in the age of smart phones and camera everywhere, we will soon see him acting bad. The first thing will be a domestic voilence.
Hopefully, he will live in a miserable existance where he’s looking over his shoulders all the time.
burnspbesq
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik:
It’s a major error to think of Florida law on self-defense as “vanilla.” The principles may look familiar, but AFAIK Florida is the only state to have adopted its insane reallocation of the burden of proof.
Alison
@Kropadope:
I cannot even with this.
kc
My impression of every gun nut I’ve ever encountered is that they all fantasize, a lot, about getting into a situation where they can shoot human being.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@Kay:
I’ve seen enough people explaining it by saying Martin was proven a criminal by law and thus his life was provably less important than a law-abiding upstanding citizen like Zimmerman.
I’m honestly about this close to upgrading from misanthropic to genocidal, the longer the day goes on.
gelfling545
@SiubhanDuinne: He’ll be twice as bad because when he gets those guns back he’s going to decide that everybody is out to get him and he already was none too good at assessing a threat to his safety. I wonder how many more people he’ll shoot because he feels uneasy.
Elie
Excellent post,Betty C. It was equal parts bitter insight, and sadness with a stubborn acknowledgement that we still have a lot of work to do and we had better be about that…
Kropadope
@Mnemosyne: Buddy, you grabbed the wrong quote, try:
“That’s not to say that I don’t think there should be registries or that you shouldn’t restrict certain people from certain things. I am not aware, however, of anything in George Zimmerman’s past that would have been reasonable grounds for disarming the man. This would have qualified for sure, if not for Florida’s blame the victim laws.”
I later acknowledged aimai’s correction that there was something in his past that, under a better system of law than has been put in place in FL, would have resulted in his not being allowed to legally own such weapons. Then again, I can be bothered to read and think about what people are saying to me.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@burnspbesq:
I didn’t mean ‘vanilla’ in that sense, god, no. I just meant that SYG wasn’t invoked, it was just the state’s standard self-defense statutes. The fact that their standard is an extreme one compared to every other state is an entirely different matter.
Unabogie
@SiubhanDuinne:
Here’s what I don’t get. Watching the disgusting victory lap being taken by the killer, his family, and his lawyers, it occurred to me that they just really aren’t capable of human decency. I thought of what a moral and decent person would say in the wake of this verdict, and it would be something like this.
“I’d just like to tell the Martin family that I’m truly sorry about what happened to them and to Trayvon. While my client maintains his innocence and is relieved at this verdict, we also realize the pain that they are going through and wish to extend to them our thoughts and prayers in what is a very difficult time for them.”
Would that really be so hard, even if you don’t mean it? Or is that something that only occurs to normal people, while sociopaths would never even think that the “scheme team” is actually a pair of grieving parents who are in abject pain over this. And if you really want to understand how George Zimmerman could commit a murder like this, and how the people around him could excuse it away, look no further than their refusal to take this moment of victory and use it to display the empathy they could not show during the trial.
Botsplainer
@Cacti:
Willing to bet we won’t hear a word from Greenbeck on stuff like this.
aimai
@Kropadope: How do you go from banning guns to locking people up for thought crimes or before they have committed a crime? That is an absurd abuse of the slippery slope argument. There are all kinds of things that are banned for private ownership–its not “sloppy” at all and there’s no law against sloppy legislating anyway. Children are not permitted to smoke cigarettes or drink alchohol, for example. We do that because they are a) more at risk and b) less able to choose rationally in a risky situation. We aren’t locking children up for thinking about smoking. Why shouldn’t we prevent people from owning private arsenals on the grounds that the harm they bring to society and their neighbors is greater than the benefit to them and to society? Theres nothing sloppy about that, its just one of many kinds of perfectly rational choices a society can make in limiting the harm one individual can do to the world around them. You have to make the case that private ownership of guns either does no harm, or can’t be avoided (as, for example, ownership of cars or boats or cooking knives can’t be avoided or is outweighed by proper usage.)
rachel
@Anya: Take this miserable asshole’s picture whenever he sets foot in public? I suppose it isn’t stalking if many and various random people who come across him do it.
Kay
@Just Some Fuckhead:
You’re right. It’s better.
The story he told was designed to do two things. Establish self defense and protect his manliness.
Martin sucker punched him. He was fumbling with his cell phone so couldn’t respond with his usual battle-trained reflexes. Just as he was about to defend himself, Martin tried to suffocate him! Worse, he went for the gun!
Reading it together, you just want to puke.
He has to turn this goofy 17 year old with NO history of violence and NO motive wandering around talking on a cell phone into a trained killer to protect his giant fucking ego.
Suzanne
Regardless of anyone’s feelings about the legality of guns, it is undeniable that some people, if given a hammer, think every problem looks like a nail. The weak-minded, weak-bodied, and the racist, when holding firearms, think every black kid looks like a criminal. Guns had everything to do with this. Had Zimmerman not been armed, he would not have provoked this confrontation.
I don’t know how we keep the weak-minded from arming themselves, but those are the people I’m afraid of. Having bad judgment isn’t a crime.
burnspbesq
@Unabogie:
I’m afraid you may be mistaken in assuming that the folks you mentioned actually feel anything resembling empathy toward Martin’s family.
aimai
@rachel: He’s going to end up shooting some other black person because he’s sure that they are all personally out to get him. Whether he gets off a second time, or not, won’t change the fact that he will inevitably kill someone else. And I doubt very much that he will move very far out of a bubble of people congratulating him and giving him money for having killed Martin. At least until he is replaced by another nine days wonder racist icon.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Noble sentiments, Betty. At this point I put solving America’s gun problems somewhere between world peace and cold fusion. We are awash with people who find the world threatening and incomprehensible. Various groups are hard at work reinforcing those feelings for their own reasons. These groups proffer guns and laws that encourage their use as a means of reasserting control over one’s situation. Frightened people do stupid things and they vote for assholes.
Add to that several decades’ accretion of modern-style (Using standard calibers and smokeless powder) largely unregistered, untraceable firearms and you have today’s mess.
It isn’t that the gun problem is insoluble. It is that it will take a hell of a lot more than an assault weapons ban or background checks to even mitigate the situation.
Kropadope
@Alison: I simply mean that there’s a right and a wrong way to do things. I agree with the goal of reducing gun violence, but banning property is a sloppy*, dangerous, and counter-productive** way to do it.
*Lazy method by lazy, inconsiderate people who can’t be bothered to think of a system of less ham-fisted laws to achieve their worthwhile goal. Leaves good, law-abiding people feeling persecuted.
**This need for ideological purity is an excellent way to push needed allies away.
Tehanu
Betty: a terrific post, so eloquent. Thank you.
@aimai:
They DO work, in every civilized country on the planet, just as universal health care also works. The American refusal to admit that we don’t have ALL the answers to everything, and that the despised furriners might actually know something worth knowing, looks more and more stupid every day.
@IowaOldLady:
You’re very thoughtful and I agree with you, but I think we can push the culture to change from the inside as well. Look at smoking, for example. We haven’t banned cigarettes; we’ve just made smoking them look stupid — and it’s worked.
Elizabelle
Sean Hannity and the Zimmerman family and everyone exulting in the verdict’s aftermath.
Keep the links on your cell phone. You don’t have to watch the ugliness now.
And have that cell phone with you, when you’re working voter registration, or encounter someone who thinks their votes does not count.
Do they want that ugliness to supersede their voice at the voting booth?
I think the Martin case, on top of gutting the Voting Rights Act and after not even background checks legislation following the Newtown and Auroro mass murders ????
I think it’s tragic gold at the ballot box in 2014 and maybe even 2013 in Virginia (and some offices in New Jersey)?
We need a better Congress and better state legislatures.
SiubhanDuinne
@Violet:
Yup. Chain of custody, every single moment.
rachel
@aimai: He should at least be put on a “watch out for” list because he has shown himself to be a remorseless, consciousless killer.
amk
@Tehanu:
Aussies did it. Despite the usual howling from the freedumb gun nuts. Their gun crimes almost vanished.
Kropadope
@aimai: How is preemptive confiscation of property different than preemptive arrest? You ask me about nuclear bombs and then criticize me for taking an opposing slippery slope argument to an extreme? C’mon….
As far as the rest of your post, those are children. There are a lot of things we don’t allow children to do. We don’t send children to jail, however, for smoking a cigarette.
Stillwater
@Just Some Fuckhead: eemom: We should ban everyone and just run without comments like Sully.
That’s a good solution, actually. Then people like eemom wouldn’t get their feelings hurt by folks expressing views without wondering “how would eemom feel about this?” before hitting submit.
Petorado
The verdict on Zimmerman diminishes this nation. All the platitudes the tea partiers love to use about freedom, liberty, and resisting tyranny are such bullshit when seen through the lens of the verdict, because Trayvon’s death proves we don’t really have the first two, and the Martin family now knows what governmental tyranny feels like firsthand. This case shows how deeply flawed this nation is and with all the recent state legislative railroading, intentional Congressional disfunction, and obviously erroneous court rulings, it seems the principle doctrine this nation is following is that the biggest assholes prevail.
Just Some Fuckhead
It would be nice if Zimmerman could use his future to work with minority children and show them how to conduct themselves in such a manner as to not arouse his suspicions and cause him to justifiably kill them. That would be a great public service he could perform.
Kay
@Elizabelle:
I hope Zimmerman’s family aren’t “speculating” on this media tour!
“Speculation” sends the Zimmerman Fan Club right to the fainting couch.
The rules are Zimmerman can say anything he wants about the kid he killed, but Zimmerman must be treated with the utmost deference and respect.
I knew they’d go on a trash the dead kid gloat tour if he got off. They don’t disappoint!
Cacti
@Elizabelle:
George is living the dream of every winger male. He got to dispatch a black buck with his trusty peacemaker, for freedom and America.
It was for this, and no other reason, that he became the mascot of Faux News.
DonkeyKong
Scene- Deep in the recesses of George Zimmermans brain, he takes the stand.
Zimmerman- You can’t handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls. And those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who’s gonna do it? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Trayvon and you curse George Zimmerman. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that Trayvon’s death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque, bloated, pathetic and incomprehensible to you, saves lives…You don’t want the truth. Because deep down, in places you don’t talk about at parties, you want me on that wall. You need me on that wall.
We use words like honor, code, loyalty.punk, fuckers always get away with it.We use these words as the backbone to a life spent defending something. You use ’em as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom I provide, then questions the manner in which I provide it! I’d rather you just said thank you and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon and stalk a nig- ah I mean punk. Either way, I don’t give a damn what you think you’re entitled to!
Fade to Black
In the end, George was right, these fuckers always get away with it.
Stillwater
@Just Some Fuckhead: Well, scared straight has had a big impact on the decisions young people make. Why not this?
“If you look or act like *this*, me – or my proxy – will kill you and be found innocent, OK. Any questions?”
amk
A letter to gz, the killer.
Kay
@Cacti:
How’s his head injury? The head injury he got when he restrained “the suspect” (his words) by straddling him just like real cops do, but “the suspect” had the temerity to hit him in the face and push him off, which is when he bumped his head.
ChrisNYC
Another fantastic post. Thanks BC.
RaflW
The NRA, and ALEC.
And ALEC gets funding from Chambers of Commerse and major businesses. The rot in America is deep, but also funded by the titans of industry and commerce.
J.D. Rhoades
This is one of the only times some NRA goon won’t pop up and say “See, if that kid had been packing heat like the second amendment says he can, he’d probably be alive right now. MOAR GUNZZZ!!!”
D. Mason
@Nerdlinger:
That should totally be one of the revolving taglines.
Kropadope
@RaflW:
The rot is deep because it’s funded by the titans of industry and commerce.
Betty Cracker
@Kropadope: I was the one who brought up nuclear bombs, and it was a perfectly valid response to the nonsense you posted here.
aimai
@Kropadope: I didn’t bring up nuclear bombs, I don’t think. But even if I had, so what? We confiscate “property” all the time–there are drugs that used to be legal when privately owned that aren’t after legislation changes. There are things that are legal in one state that aren’t legal in another and which get confiscated or bought back when you transit from one locale to another. There are things which you can own safely in an area of low population which you can’t store or house or own in an urban area because the two different kinds of community require different zoning laws. Aside from second amendment fantasies guns are not a special kind of property which the government can never outlaw or seize.
Kropadope
@Betty Cracker: Ok, sorry, my mistake, but I stand by what I said. Banning is just sloppy policy.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Stillwater: Look or act like what? Black people?
Unabogie
@burnspbesq:
My mistake, then. I was thinking like a “person”.
aimai
Things you can’t own or which can be taken back from you, historically:
Slaves
Cuban Cigars
Ivory
Endangered Species
Some drugs
assets you can’t account for
land that the state wants for eminent domain (ask george bush!)
etc..etc..etc…
aimai
@Kropadope: Well, I like sloppy policy. I think its comprehensive and needed. You say its sloppy. But you offer zero proof of that or any definition of “sloppy” other than the word itself. Again: I think banning guns is arguably an extremely fair way of going about it since it doesn’t discriminate between worthy and unworthy people or require any more legislation or licencing than simply banning and confiscating all weapons. That seems like the opposite of sloppy, to me. What’s your actual argument?
eemom
@Stillwater:
Go fuck yourself, you concern troll asshole.
How interesting that you show up here only when there’s tragedy to gloat over.
Kropadope
@aimai: I acknowledge my mistake on the source of the nuclear comment.
Banning drugs hasn’t gone particularly well for us, last I checked. We spend billions of dollars fighting a war on these drugs, now we have small town SWAT teams and haven’t begun to alleviate any problems related to drug abuse.
The rest of this gets to what I was saying before, there’s a better way. You have zoning laws so that you don’t build a fertilizer plant next to a school, unless your Texas. A plant explosion or a bombing shouldn’t lead to a ban on manure.
Applejinx
Minecraft’s 2013 convention is in Orlando. I’d absolutely love to go to a MineCon, but not if it involves going to Florida. I wonder if they have time to find a new venue that is not completely dangerous to attendees.
Nerdlinger
@D. Mason: Poorly worded, but I’m sick of gun-nuts pretending to be something they’re not.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@amk:
You’re onto something. It’s obvious that any laws quickly and easily enacted in a nation of 22 million with a parliamentary government will be just as easily enacted in a nation of 313 million with a congressional non-government.
Betty Cracker
@Kropadope: You know what’s “sloppy policy”? Allowing practically anyone who can fog a mirror to walk around carry killing machines on their person. The “sloppy” part comes in when someone has to mop up all the blood.
In my perfect world, I’d have the US adopt the far saner gun policies the rest of the “civilized” world gets along just fine with, thank-yew-very-much. But I’d settle for requiring paranoid little feckers like Zimmerman to keep their firearms in their homes, where the greatest danger would be posed to HIS family instead of the Martins. Or mine.
Nerdlinger
@Kropadope:
For someone who decries the NRA and glibertarians, you sure use their playbook a lot.
aimai
@Kropadope: But the NRA refuses to permit zoning laws to deal with the very real problem of gun violence in urban areas. Since they and their minions refuse *any* compromise and *any* limitation we are left with nothing but an outright ban. Now, mind you, no one in power argues for a ban. I would prefer one as the most sucessful way to bring down gun violence but I speak for no one but myself.
That being said gun ownership is obviously not at all like drug use. Guns in this country are owned primarily by 1) criminals and 2) a diminishing percentage of losers and hysterics who own more and more guns individually. The actual share of the population who owns guns is declining–why? Because hunting is dying off as a way of life, the rural population itself is shrinking and because gun use and ownership are not, in fact, addictive like drugs. So: no, if you banned guns outright, refused to issue lisences, and refused to permit limited liability to people who own and lose/misuse their guns you would not have the same crisis as the drug war.
HelloRochester
Ms Cracker,
Your eloquence gives me pause to reconsider my earlier comments on facebook regarding it being a suppurating hemorrhoid on the ass of the American legal system. Well, I still believe that part. But you’re alright with me.
HR
Kropadope
@aimai: Actually, I have defined sloppy. It’s lazy, is completely blind to potential unintended consequences, leaves real law-abiding people feeling persecuted, focuses attention on an inanimate object instead of the people who are using that object to commit crimes, it allows politicians to fail, say “I tried”, and actually solves nothing.
Kropadope
@aimai: So if both sides refuse compromise, that leaves us where, exactly?
Stillwater
@Just Some Fuckhead: Sure, that works. “Suspicious” works too. Lots of wiggle room in there for a justified killing. Better to educate the young on all the potentialities.
Mike in NC
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
Just modify that to “congressional non-government completely owned by the NRA”.
Stillwater
@eemom: I came back here because of Stuck. But even in that moment of collective respect towards the man himself you couldn’t help but act like you always do. With complete disregard for how others feel and think about things. It’s always all about eemom all the time, with you.
Why blame me for your own inclinations?
Just Some Fuckhead
@Stillwater: You are stone-cold stupid. The point of my original missive is there is nothing Zimmerman can teach someone else about how to stop them from killing him because he has the problem, not them. Christ.
aimai
@Kropadope: Its not lazy at all to look at the number of accidental/unintended deaths from gunshots compared to the number of lawful/meaningful protection events and determine that guns in this country, at this point in time, are not likely to be used for anything like self protection. Its not lazy to propose new legislation (which, by the way, no one has done) to limit the number of guns in private hands.
Also: people who oppose private ownership of guns because we notice that a huge number of gun owners are irresponsible morons or vigilante inclined shits have already been forced to compromise but plenty since we have zero control over our public and our private spaces thanks to the belligerent advocacy of the NRA. A little girl was just killed in the upstairs apartment because the drug addicted loser downstairs used his automatic rifle as a crutch to get up off the couch. The country is awash in guns and innocent people are killed by them all the fucking time. Its not lazy or sloppy to want to do something to end this reign of terror.
Stillwater
@Just Some Fuckhead: Damn, and I thought you were hip. Irony, my boy!
MaryRC
@Violet: Sorry, but you are setting yourself up for an exercise in futility. Fundie groups (Southern Baptist Convention, AFA, Focus on Family) boycotted Orlando for 8 years over Disney’s gay-friendly policies. Nobody noticed, least of all Disney. They finally had to give it up. I’m afraid you won’t convince people to stop taking the kids to see Mickey.
D. Mason
@Nerdlinger: From a slightly removed perspective he looks more like an anti-prohibitionist than a gun nut, and I can understand why one would be anti-prohibition, it fails. The nature of capitalism guarantees prohibition cannot succeed because it creates a lucrative niche. Regulation and market shaping on the other hand can succeed. Take a look at our national approaches to tobacco vs marijuana and their respective results to see an example of what I mean (tobacco use down marijuana use up). You might choose to call Australia a success but their gun ban wasn’t really that as some heavily regulated options for legal gun ownership still exist there.
Kay
@<a@Stillwater: href=”#comment-4535335″>Stillwater:
Scared Straight doesn’t work. It harms kids. The DOJ doesn’t recommend it be used and they have asked the gross people who run cable networks to stop exploiting kids by selling it.
Screaming at kids and threatening violence makes them more violent.
Adults love scared straight. It harms kids. The whole boot-camp scared straight 1970-2000 insanity has been discredited.
Mike Lamb
@Kay: Along those lines, I’ve never understood why even semi-rational gun owners would swarm to Zimmerman’s defense. You don’t want a guy like Zimmerman being the poster-child for gun rights. He is the exact opposite of responsible gun ownership.
smith
I’m really nor law-proficient when it comes to trials, so can someone help me out here?
If there is a civil trial (and I keep hearing conflicting opinions about whether or not the Martins will be allowed to sue Zimmerman in civil action), can they bring in all of Zimmerman’s past arrests and behavior.
*The two female relatives who accused Zimmerman of molesting them
*Zimmerman’s ex-girlfriend who had a restraining order against him and claimed his family made horribly racist statements all the time
*His past domestic violence incidents
*His past public drunkenness and assaulting a police officer
*His getting fired as a bouncer because he threw a female customer into a wall
The defense team and the defense witnesses claim Zimmerman was “meek” and “mild.” This contradicts that.
Hopefully in any civil trial, the attorneys for the Zimmerman family will be sharper than the prosecution in the criminal case.
All of this speaks to character and the fact that Zimmerman didn’t act well under pressure.
liberal
@piratedan:
This is the real story.
If it were my kid who got shot, I’d be very tempted to execute as many executives of the company that made the weapon as possible.
liberal
@Mike Lamb:
The issue isn’t “responsible gun ownership.” The issue is maximization of revenues for the gun and ammo manufacturers.
J.D. Rhoades
@Applejinx:
A church in my hometown’s having a Minecraft themed Vacation Bible School, will that do?
liberal
@Violet:
Completely agree. And the penalties should be draconian, like 5 years in the slammer, minimum.
lojasmo
@Kropadope:
This is not the first time you’ve been an obstinate, contrarian, dick here.
Kropadope
@aimai: It’s lazy to not try to think of another solution that actually has a snowflake’s chance in hell of becoming law. You say you’ve already been forced to compromise, but each new law requires new compromise.
We can’t be like nihilist Republicans. It’s been frequently suggested on this thread that I should be banned for even daring to suggest that banning guns or particular models of guns themselves isn’t a good policy and that things like registration, targeting gun trafficking, gun buyback programs, keeping guns out of the hands of maniacs and criminals, or even things I didn’t suggest but agree with, like holding gun owners liable for crimes committed with their guns, might be both preferable and easier to pass into law.
I’m sorry that I agree with you that gun violence is a problem and that the government needs to do something to address it, but fail to agree with you on one particular method, god forbid.
Nerdlinger
@D. Mason: Examine Kropatroll’s comments a little more closely, and you’ll find that every one of them are NRA talking points designed to obfuscate and deflect away from the issue. Everything from how guns are “inanimate objects” (guns don’t kill people, derp derp) to the equivalence of the second amendment with the first. Kropatroll even pulls the “both sides are equally bad” card, pretending that the Dems are unwilling to compromise or put any reasonable gun legislation on the table.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Stillwater: My apologies. I should have picked up on that. I’m doing yard work when it’s 150 degrees outside and I shouldn’t be.
Again, I apologize.
Kay
@Mike Lamb:
They’ve removed Martin from the “kid” category that you and I are using.
I don’t get it myself. There was a good opinion piece in Miami from a former US attorney who was baffled by how Martin was treated ( as an adult equal to Zimmerman).
He has 2 teenage sons and he says they’re really NOT adults.
I agree with him, and so does the US legal system. It’s the whole basis of juvenile law. They’re DIFFERENT.
Nerdlinger
@D. Mason: And note that I wasn’t calling for a universal ban, or proposing anything of the sort.
Kropatroll’s original comment:
What a sack of bullshit.
Stillwater
@Just Some Fuckhead: No worries. We all get confused sometimes. I voted for Reagan in ’84. I have to live with that.
SiubhanDuinne
@gelfling545:
I like this. It just showed up on my FB feed:
aimai
@Kropadope:
You seem to be under a misapprehension here–just because I’m willing to argue with you doesn’t mean theres a “we” here or that I have the slightest respect for you or any of your arguments. Your arguments have been limp, weak, wrongheaded, deceptive, and just plain incoherent or straight out of the NRA playbook. You don’t represent my “allies” or have the slightest interest in good gun legislation. Nothing you say has the slightest relevance to what the grown ups are talking about when we talk about trying to limit gun violence and since you won’t be lifting a finger legislatively or in terms of changing gun culture what you have to say here is of no relevance. I argued with you because I like arguing and I’m avoiding doing some other stuff. None of your points is worth a bucket of warm spit and I’m not interested in compromising or even really engaging in “you” in the sense of the the person you appear to be on the internet. I’d be even less interested in the real world you given the perspective on guns you have advocated for here.
Kropadope
@lojasmo: You mean this isn’t the first time I’ve gotten on the wrong side of a stubborn person, unwilling to consider the bulk of what I wrote and latches on to one aspect that they really feel strongly about. Sometimes I’m fully onboard with the general zeitgeist of the commentariat here, but I suppose it’s not worth your trouble to notice me at those times.
aimai
@Kropadope: People have considered the bulk of what you wrote–in fact people have addressed the bulk of what you wrote, the meat of what you wrote, and the filler of what you wrote. Just because people don’t agree with your points doesn’t make them “stubborn.”
Kropadope
@Nerdlinger: No, not that Dems are unwilling to compromise, just a class of people that are unwilling to hear a slightly different argument (read: four specific people out of this entire comment thread). I have advocated a lot of polices on this thread that the NRA certainly are not on board with. I support policies to help reduce gun violence, you’re doing the NRAs bidding by deliberately pushing people away who mostly agree with you.
SiubhanDuinne
@Unabogie: I have deliberately tried to avoid TV coverage of the Zimmerman trial, and haven’t even turned on the set once this weekend. So I’ve (mercifully) not seen the Z family/defense team “victory laps.” But the Charles P. Pierce column is illustrated with a photo of GZ looking so smug and smarmy that I just want to punch through the iPad screen and smack that shit-eating smile off his fat face.
Fully agree with you that anyone with a smidgen of decency would have made a statement similar to the one you suggested. That Team Zimmerman didn’t do so is disgusting but not at all surprising.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
Oh, god. Robert Zimmerman, apparently unable to keep his fucking mouth shut:
Again, it’s amazing how this became a trial on Trayvon Martin and how he was found guilty of being a total black thug.
Ruckus
@liberal:
This is certainly true but it is not the whole story.
The question is do the gun mfg use existing racism and fear to sell guns or do they encourage racism and fear to make gun sales stronger? Not that it makes a whole fucks worth of difference in the end but we should be asking it anyway.
Kay
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik:
They’re worried people will figure out Martin had no motive and no history of violence.
So generous of them to supply one!
I bet he starts a “foundation” and hires his whole family.
Kropadope
@aimai: You’re stubbornly fixated on the fact that I don’t agree with you on one particular method of gun control, banning guns, or some model thereof, themselves. You at least refrained from calling me an NRA lackey or anything to that affect, but instead of trying to convince me of the merits of banning the guns themselves, or openly discussing the merits of more circumscribed legislation, a handful of people here chose to attack me directly and personally.
I won’t let that bother me, because I’ve been around here long enough to know that won’t always be the case.
liberal
@Ruckus:
It’s not just racism and fear, it’s stupidity.
liberal
@Kropadope:
I might not entirely agree with what you’re saying, but the claim that you’re pro-gun or an NRA lackey, etc, is laughable.
rk
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Are you white? White people already knew how awful white people are.
No I’m not white. I’m an Asian and my kids can easily pass off as dark skinned Latinos. I’ve never really faced racism from whites. When I first came to this country I thought all white people were really really nice, in fact much nicer than my community (yes I shake my head at my stupidity). But it took me a while to figure out that it is a part of the white American culture to be very polite and always surface agreeable whereas in my culture it’s easy to spot an asshole (what you see is what you get so to speak).Even then I was surprised by the breadth and depth of the ignorance and racism coming from whites on social media sites. But I will say this, according to my kids (who are much more in tune with the young white American culture than I am and go to a predominantly white school) racism and anti gay behavior is very rare among the young and they are much more accepting of diversity. In fact gay marriage and racism does not seem to be even an issue for them and they sort of seem surprised that people are even discussing something so “obviously stupid”. But unfortunately the country is run by stupid old white men and frightened old men and women who vote for them.
Kropadope
@liberal: Thank you
Nerdlinger
@Kropadope: Now, who here called you an NRA lackey, Kropatroll? I’m sure you hate them, because they give “law-abiding citizens” like you a bad reputation. Doesn’t mean you don’t make liberal use of their talking points.
Stillwater
@rk: racism and anti gay behavior is very rare among the young and they are much more accepting of diversity.
And that’s the future of America. Actually, that’s always been the future or America. Or the promise, anyway.
Kropadope
@Nerdlinger: Remind me next time we’re on the same side of an issue and you’re insulting someone who disagrees with us not to have your back.
Nerdlinger
@Kropadope: Remind me not to have a persecution complex for being a sack of shit trying to excuse gun-rights assholes from their rightful share of the blame in the death of an innocent child.
Kay
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik:
I do think we have to remember it’s media exploiting the kid. They have choices. They chose to let the Zimmerman family spend the day ripping him to shreds.
Ruckus
@aimai:
He has kettle/black/projection syndrome. Stubborn? He and his ilk are the epitome of stubborn. And stupid. And moronic. And deadly. All for what? Lack of more effective genitalia measuring?
Kropadope
@Kay: Wasn’t that the media’s role in this from the outset? Defame the victim? Fox News is directly responsible for putting Trayvon Martin on trial.
smith
@Kay:
Agreed. The Zimmerman clan is trying to prejudice any future civil trial jury. The media is enabling these stains on society.
Too bad the Martins are way too classy to respond.
Mnemosyne
@aimai:
I linked to the Tampa Bay Times database of SYG cases in another thread, and I think it has at least some answers for you. I think you’re on to something with the “male honor” idea, because it does seem as though stupid arguments gone bad between men (ie arguments between neighbors, road rage, jealous rage over a woman) are the ones most likely to successfully claim SYG immunity. If a man kills another man over a threat to his “honor,” he’s probably going to be able to claim SYG immunity from prosecution regardless of the respective race(s) of the killer and victim. My “favorite” horrifying case involves a Middle Eastern man killing his ex-wife’s new (white) boyfriend and walking away a free man.
Kropadope
@Ruckus: In the War On Guns you’re either with us or against us. We must stop the axis-of-NRA.
Stillwater
@Kay: Kay, I appreciate your effort to bring things back to reality, I just wonder about your scope of your criticism. For the record, I don’t have a stake in “scared straight” as a methodology, but the evidence I’ve been able to find is pretty limited wrt evidential criticisms of the program. That it “harms youths” is a vaild criticism, certainly, but diametrically opposed to the purpose of the program, which is to reduce criminal behavior.
Does the psychological state of the individuals resulting from fear of imprisonment matter more than reducing crime rates by appealing to the consequences of imprisonment?
aimai
@Kropadope: You are the one who turned this discussion into an all or nothing ban/not ban discussion. You thrust that interpretation on everyone here who felt that Zimmerman owning a gun and openly carrying it was the root cause of Martin’s death. You were the first person to introduce gun banning into the discussion. Most people here, I daresay, are not interested in trying to get a serious gun ban on the books in this country. Even I am not proposing to try for one given the current Supreme Court interpretation of the 2nd amendment. I am merely arguing that such legislation would be neither sloppy nor lazy and would undoubtedly have a salutory effect on the rate of gun violence. I’m not stubbornly fixated on a gun ban at all. I’m just responding to your argument–you brought it up and argued that it would be sloppy, lazy, useless, lead to greater violence (a la drug war) and create resentment among lawful gun owners. These aren’t really great arguments against a theoretical gun ban and you didn’t do much to defend your propositions.
It should be obvious that fewer guns in private hands would result in fewer “oopsie” incidents of accidental, negligent, or suddenly criminal gun violence and death. I, personally, don’t care much how that happens. I will be as happy to discourage people from becoming gun owning home owners by making fun of them, by having doctors remind parents how dangerous guns are to their children, by having the CDC gather and disseminate information about the dangers of gun owning and negligent gun owners, and by pursuing (to the extent that ALEC and the NRA permit it, of course) community based solutions like limiting gun lisences, imprisoning gun sellers, creating a database of guns and gun owners, pushing for full liability for gun incidents/shootings, pushing for high insurance or no insurance coverage for gun owners. There’s more than one way to skin a cat but you have to really want to skin it. I do. You don’t.
e.a.f.
Shooting an unarmed child is monsterous. The “stand your ground” laws are simply ridiculous. Civilized countries don’t have such laws. Of course that would have to mean the U.S.A. was civilized. Not so much.
We now know a “white” adult killed a “black” child and got away with it. What I’d like to know is how is this working for women? If women started shooting and killing abusive spouses, how would the “stand your ground” law work for them?
Stand your ground is so outdated and ridiculous. What ever happened to just walk away? It is not unreasonable to conclude the legislators who passed the “stand your ground” law are afraid of their neighbours.
In any civilized country what Zimmerman did would be a min. of manslaughter. In the U.S.A. it is still O.K. to kill a black child if you are white. Not much has changed since the Civil Rights Era.
Kropadope
@aimai: I’m sorry, very little of that came through when it was proposed by commenters here that I be banned from commenting, that commenting itself be banned, that the idea that we can reduce gun violence without banning certain models of guns is so ludicrous an idea as to be beyond discussion.
All I did was to suggest that banning certain guns and concealed carry is not the best way to go about this, I was met almost uniformly with insults. I’m not your enemy, just because I only agree with you on most, but not all, of the details.
aimai
@Mnemosyne: Thanks for reposting that, Mnemo. It makes fascinating reading. You can’t really tell what the story is given that its basically all cases where someone tried to argue SYG and not the universe of all murder cases with SYG broken out. I can say that a quick scan reveals that very few women argue SYG and mostly in the context of domestic disputes. Also, there is a fascinating case of white on white violence, with a man shooting his weapon at a teenager, which really changes my mind about the case of the AA woman who got twenty years. Here’s the case:
Despite the Judge himself saying that the 20 year sentence was wrong the SA–same Angela Corey as in the AA woman’s case, insisted on the 20 years being served after the man turned down the same 3 year plea bargain she offered the AA woman.
Kay
@Stillwater:
Kids who act out are already fearful. If they’re at risk they’re in fear-filled environments. Adding to fear compounds the problem.
They respond to conflict resolution training. It’s what isn’t being modeled at home. They’re taught the same lesson we teach little kids, which is “use your words”. They didn’t get that when they were little. We catch them up.
I do juvenile mediation and it’s pretty amazing what they can accomplish just modeling the mediator. They soak it right up. They sometimes catch me being “combative” ( which I am) :)
Chris
@e.a.f.:
The notion of a “civilized,” “developed” world that’s outgrown the kind of nastiness you see in places like Afghanistan or former Yugoslavia is a lot more illusory than we think, IMO. This is a case in point.
Mnemosyne
@Kay:
I think I mentioned before that my nephew with severe ADHD (and possible bipolar) eventually had to be sent out of state to a boarding school that specializes in teens with psychiatric issues and, man, it was like night and day when he came back. Because his dad was abusive towards his mom, he had never learned to “use his words” and had instead learned from an early age that pushing people around was the best way to get them to do what you want. Once he had people modeling better behavior for him and (gently) enforcing it, he turned around really quickly. He not only graduated from high school, he was on the honor roll.
When his grandfather died last summer, he told his mom that he needed to stay with his friends for a few days to process everything and would come back for the wake, which I thought was incredibly mature for an 18-year-old. He was able to tell her what he needed and explain it in such a way that it made perfect sense for everyone. We were really proud of him.
Stillwater
@Kay: Thanks for the response Kay. Sounds good to me. Correction noted!
Ruckus
@aimai:
And so I stand by my assessment.
And I ask, is there any point to further discussion?
Mr Stagger Lee
@Daniel: Florida had to be dragged and kicking to even try Zimmerman. This was kabuki theater from the word go.
Wally Ballou
If Trayvon had been white
Kay
@Mnemosyne:
It’s interesting, because it isn’t a red/blue divide, politically or in policy.
Missouri was the leader. They got tired of incarcerating juveniles.
We have a great facility. It’s a former fancy boarding school, so the grounds and buildings are beautiful. They have so few “beds” though. I can get really little kids in-9,10,11 because they’re a priority but there’s not much here for older kids.
Douglas Wayne Wieboldt
Zimmerman will be offed at some point… This is not a good thing, but it’s going to happen… You can’t kill an unarmed man 60 lbs under your weight when you’ve taken some martial arts classes and expect to survive and YOU have the gun… He might have had a longer survival time in prison… He’s punked either way… He could do a Snowdon… Thats my best advice to you dude… Get out before someone offs you…
rikyrah
As a Black person, we’ve all had ‘ the talk’ with our parents when we get into high school.
Our parents, even the ones that usually ‘play’, are deadly serious with this ‘ talk’.
Us learning the lesson, as my mother told me..
could be the difference of me coming to pick you up at the police station vs. visiting you in the morgue.
there is no 6 degrees of separation for Black people knowing of an incident where someone – without the hint of a police record – winds up in the morgue for some sort of variation of ‘ resisting arrest’.
fundamentally, I don’t believe White people:
1. understand this
2. believe it
I’ve never once heard some White person tell me that they have the same conversation with their children…BECAUSE THEY KNOW IT’S A FLIP OF A COIN as to whether they will wind up going to the police station vs. the morgue.
because, when I’ve tried to have this conversation with White folks, they always want to go do , ‘ but they must have been doing something’.
um, no. they were BLACK…that’s all that they were doing.
So, to be told by White folks that we have to ‘respect the law’, and that the law can abuse us and our children is one thing….
The reason why the Trayvon Martin case cut so deep is because NOW, you’re saying that our Black children, have to grovel at the feet of some random White person, ‘ just cause’?
GET THE FUCK OUTTA HERE!
Stillwater
@rikyrah: I don’t think all white people are deaf to that view. I certainly ain’t. {{I’m white…}} The problem is that the issue you’re talking about is so infused with ideological, political and emotional content that lots of people won’t see the basic facts for what they are. They just can’t bring themselves to that.
So it seems to me.
asiangrrlMN
Oh god. I don’t come around so often any more, but goddamn it. Stuck and Tunch in one day?? I lost it over Tunch yesterday, and now, I can’t believe Stuck’s gone. We had many a laugh in the wee hours of the morning, and I always smiled when he posted pics of Charlie.
As for the Martin verdict (and I use that phrase deliberately), I can’t. I know it’s not just Florida or that jury, and I know it’s a deep, systemic racist pestilence that runs throughout our country, but right now, I’m just numb, weary, and sad.
Nutella
Here’s a suggestion for those who are feeling helpless and want to do something: Fight ALEC by dragging their sponsors into the light. Publicize the responsibility of the many corporations who support ALEC for the deaths of Trayvon Martin, the kids and teachers of Newtown, and all the many other victims of gun violence.
Some corporations that sell to consumers, such as McDonalds and Pepsi, have been shamed out of supporting ALEC. See the list of ex-contributors here, and the list of all corporate contributors here.
These companies need public reminders of the harm they’ve done.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
Imagine starting a foundation. The aims of this foundation would be to
(i) Buy black teenagers in Florida guns,
(ii) Facilitate as many black teenagers as possible to get legal concealed carry permits
(iii) Train said teenagers in the SYG laws AND
(iv) Provide lawyers for SYG self defence claims if these teens shoot people.
Now, i don;t think this is a great idea. But what I want to imagine is precisely how much screaming the sort of people who supported Zimmerman would be making over such a foundation.
Kay
@Kropadope:
I don’t know. They’ve done a horrible job, but they always do a horrible job. I get tired of hearing myself bitch about it.
Now it looks like they got SYG wrong. They’ve been saying for 2 weeks that SYG wasn’t used, but FL lawyers are saying the jury instructions came right from the SYG statute.
Were we lied to about SYG, or are they just dopes?
Ruckus
@Stillwater:
White people have no personal experience with this. Back people all have experience with this. As @rikyrah: says there is no degrees of separation here. The only way we believe it is if we listen and observe the larger world around us. It’s there, the evidence, but we have to open our minds that everything is not as mom, dad and our friends told us it was. It helps to live in an integrated area and see this first hand, for then there is no question but otherwise you just have to accept that breathing while black(or brown) is dangerous. Far more dangerous than being white. And not from roving gangs or muggers but from places/people of authority.
rikyrah
Stillwater
@Phoenician in a time of Romans: Hah! Excellent proposal. At a minimum, it’d separate the wheat from the chaff.
Err, so to speak.
Kropadope
@Kay:
From the sound of things, FL’s self defense related jurisprudence is already in bad enough shape to render SYG redundant anyway.
As far as the media, it has made fair trials impossible for these high-profile cases.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
I thought of what a moral and decent person would say in the wake of this verdict, and it would be something like this.
“I’d just like to tell the Martin family that I’m truly sorry about what happened to them and to Trayvon. While my client maintains his innocence and is relieved at this verdict, we also realize the pain that they are going through and wish to extend to them our thoughts and prayers in what is a very difficult time for them.”
They would never apologise to n****rs. Never. It’s not so much outright racism as never imagining that they’re human beings like Zimmerman and his family.
Stillwater
@Kropadope: FL’s self defense related jurisprudence is already in bad enough shape to render SYG redundant anyway.
Six weeks out Zimmerman’s attorney’s said they wouldn’t use a SYG defense; that the Florida laws re: self defense were already sufficient to guarantee a not-guilty verdict.
The legal culture in Florida was already predisposed to find Z legally innocent independently of the more recent SYG laws.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
@rachel:
@aimai: He should at least be put on a “watch out for” list because he has shown himself to be a remorseless, consciousless killer.
Every sign pointing to Sanford should have “George Zimmerman, murderer, lives here” stencilled on it. Every street sign pointing at his gated community should have “George Zimmerman, murderer, lives here” stencilled under the arrow. And on the street outside his house should be spray painted the words “George Zimmerman, murderer, lives here”.
And if he comes over to object, remember you’ve got good reason to fear for your life around him.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
@Kropadope @aimai: How is preemptive confiscation of property different than preemptive arrest?
Now, I ask this in all sincerity, because I’m detecting an honest confusion here, and I think you really really need to consider the following question very very carefully and give it the utmost thought –
You do know guns aren’t people, right?
Kay
@Kropadope:
I think the SYG issue is important, because consumer products companies back ALEC.
They don’t want their products associated with dead kids. They also do business world wide, so have a financial interest in “diversity”
If the jury instructions came from SYG, people should be told that.
ALEC dies without corporate backers. They took a hit the last time SYG came up. It’s time to hit them again.
Kropadope
@Phoenician in a time of Romans:
I’ll refer you to this post. Here,aimai suggests that since waiting for someone to commit a crime or prove oneself insane won’t stop all gun violence, that measures short of outright banning aren’t enough. Guns aren’t people, but denying people of their legally purchased property because they may potentially use it in a crime is in clear violation of people’s civil rights. I don’t like guns and don’t want them anywhere near me, but that doesn’t mean that my elected representatives can take those guns away. Besides, what is freedom if the government can just take your property away? What if, as retribution, a Republican elected government decides to ban solar panels or research into hydrogen fuel or books?
nineone
@beth:
Ah, but you do, Mother of white as snow teenage daughter, you do. That you do not realize it is what gives predators the room to prey.
You don’t suppose folks like GZ are limited to hunting POC, do you?
Stillwater
@Kropadope: Besides, what is freedom if the government can just take your property away?
Exactly.
Ruckus
How hard is it to understand that guns don’t make you free? They give you a false sense of power, which is not close to the same thing. But mostly they can make you or some one else, dead, usually for all the wrong reasons. Kids, wives, relatives, neighbors, strangers.
The government can’t take your property? Ever hear of eminent domain? Drug law confiscation? The IRS? Of course they can take your property. Do you have the childs view that freedom means you can do anything you want? Because that’s not freedom, that’s anarchy. Laws that limit that childs view of freedom is what societies do to protect all of society from people that don’t understand what living within a society means, that the old concept that freedom has responsibilities and costs is the only way to have an actual society. Arguing that an armed and shooting society is free is so fucking ridiculous and backwards that it shouldn’t even be given any consideration by anyone over the age of 7. That you are able to kill or be killed at a whim is freedom? If it wasn’t such a dangerous, stupid, illogical argument it would be laughable.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
Guns aren’t people, but denying people of their legally purchased property because they may potentially use it in a crime is in clear violation of people’s civil rights.
Once again, we point you at the example of nuclear weapons. Even if you make your own nuclear weapon, the government will take it away from you. Do you support that or not?
And if you DO support depriving people of the ownership of nuclear weapons, how exactly does that differ from “denying people of their legally purchased property because they may potentially use it in a crime [which] is in clear violation of people’s civil rights”?
More Americans have been killed by guns than have ever boon killed by nukes. More Americans have been killed by guns than have ever been killed by anthras, the bubonic plague, or nerve gas. And yet I don’t seem to see you objecting restricting access to those last three either.
Kropadope
@Ruckus: Again ignoring the fact that I do support restrictions to prevent criminals and otherwise irresponsible people obtaining weapons, registration and training requirements, liability for irresponsible gun owners. Furthermore you falsely imply that I’m in favor of shooting first and asking questions later. Keep beating that strawman, though.
Freedom does have responsibilities and costs. I think the cost of banning firearms will be far harder to bear than the cost of trying to live with them responsibly.
Kropadope
As far as someone building their own nuke, like I said before, acting in self-defense is a well recognized legal principle.
robuzo
@SiubhanDuinne: Trayvon was armed, with two, or actually going by GZ’s count, at least three fists of black steel. GZ probably also assumed the young man was packing one of those other envy-inspiring devices black men are reputed to have.
Kropadope
The IRS taking your money is payment for a service, arranged beforehand with your elected representatives. Want to change that? Can’t say I blame you, payment of services provided by the government should have a much clearer link to what service the payment is intended to provide. I don’t think that amounts to confiscation of property though.
Stillwater
@Phoenician in a time of Romans: And if you DO support depriving people of the ownership of nuclear weapons, how exactly does that differ from “denying people of their legally purchased property because they may potentially use it in a crime [which] is in clear violation of people’s civil rights”?
I think the argument is the second amendment, actually, which accords people the right to bear arms. I think that’s pretty clear, in one sense – I mean, it’s pretty transparent language, no? – even tho the justification of the second Amendment isn’t all that clear.
Nevertheless, and all that stuff notwithstanding, it seems to me the burden of proof is on the person who wants to use governmental power to limit the rights of individuals to own firearms. Personally, I don’t think that’s an easy thing to do – even given all the deleterious effects of private gun ownership.
The burden on prohibiting ownership of private property by the state is a pretty extraordinary, it seems to me. I’m not at all sure that the argument has been, let alone could be made, wrt guns.
Ruckus
All responsible gun owners are just that until they aren’t. Are people who leave a gun around for their kids to pick up responsible? They may very well have been until the moment the kid picked up the gun. Until that moment what had they done wrong? Legally purchased, legally owned and now their kid or someone else’s is dead. But that’s OK because it was all legal.
What the fuck do you think you are going to do against the 82 Airborne? The First Marine division? Hell what the fuck are you going to do against the local swat squad? You think you might win? You think that any military that is stupid enough to attack the US is going to be scared by a bunch of untrained idiots with small arms?
Ruckus
@Stillwater:
The second amendment, stated here, “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
The purpose was a well regulated militia, not the ability to shoot young children and each other. We have well regulated militia that protects the security of the free state, the US armed forces, the National Guard, your local police department even, things we didn’t have when that was written. We have over 80 times the population that we did when that was written. We don’t have the need that we did then. We don’t have the weapons that we had then. This isn’t 230 years ago. Things change, times change, populations change, weapons change, freedom changes. We can keep killing people for no reason or we can grow up. I choose grow up.
Stillwater
@Ruckus: I hear ya on that. I don’t mean to diminish those concerns. I think consequences (and consequentialism) are a significant and necessary part of the debate.
What I don’t agree with, tho, is that gun owners – in the US! – have to make an affirmative case to justify private ownership of those objects. That, to me, reverses things. People ought to (in fact, they do!!) have the right to possess objects unless and until there is a compelling reason to justify governmental restrictions or prohibitions. So the burden, it seems to me, falls on those who would argue for a legal restriction. And like I said, I don’t think full prohibition is to justify.
Stillwater
My earlier comment was written before I read the critique of the second amendment. So…
Yeah, I actually agree with that. Personally speaking, I think the second amendment was instituted to provide for the realization of a militaristic force to counter existential threats to either states or the US as a collective. And that realization requires an armed citizenry. I’m in agreement as far as that goes.
But the fact is that “the right to bear arms” is codified in the US Constitution. For whatever reason! And I think that’s right, actually. I mean, look, a recent supreme court case – Heller – affirmed that the citizens have a second amendment right to possess firearms for the “traditional” purpose of self-defense. That’s not a crazy determination, is it? That private ownership of firearms are protected by the Constitution? Why think it’s inconsistent with the Constitution? That’s a heavy burden, it seems to me.
Granted, alot of this will resolve to disagreements about the role of government in society and what constitutes an optimal society. The issue isn’t as clear to me as it is to other liberals, I suppose.
Nerdlinger
@Stillwater: It’s a crazy determination because guns exacerbate crime, not reduce it. There are other means of self protection. Pepper spray, for example. As I see it, private firearms offer no net benefit to society. Thousands upon thousands of people die for your right to fondle a shiny toy that goes bang.
Nerdlinger
@Stillwater:
Norway, including their gun laws. But with nicer, balmier weather.
Stillwater
@Nerdlinger: Man, what I wouldn’t give to live in a relatively gun free country with balmier weather.
liberal
@Nerdlinger:
Yeah, well, too bad—men with small penises have a right to a crutch to make them feel better about themselves.
A Humble Lurker
@karen:
You don’t think something considered worthy of a batted eyelash putting its weight behind something that’s not wouldn’t help the latter? And that both wouldn’t be able to help each other?
The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge
@Stillwater:
Yes, it absolutely is a crazy determination. I know repeating oneself is frowned upon in the blogosphere, but I’ll just link to what I said on the subject last time. I stand by every detail. The Supreme Court is nothing but a nest of vipers with no legal knowledge or integrity whatsoever—the RATS at least.
PanurgeATL
@gene108: They’re winning on male gender traditionalism (or, if you want, HAIRCUTS), which when you think of it is near the heart of so many cultural issues. People look at me funny when I say it, but if you want things to change, make long hair on guys cool again. I’m not saying it’s sufficient, but it’s plain that HAIRCUTS help the right wing. Apologies to all the men out there with HAIRCUTS, but I’m not budging on this one.
Nate
Damn you Betty, you obot, that was an equally beautiful and thoughtful post. How am I supposed to disagree with you when write stuff like that?
Phoenician in a time of Romans
As far as someone building their own nuke, like I said before, acting in self-defense is a well recognized legal principle.
Dude, you’re still not making sense. A nuke is an “arm”, and unless used, it doesn’t kill anyone – just like a gun; consistent with your own logic, what right does the government have to take nukes away from people?
And note CAREFULLY that bit about “consistent with your own logic” – because you argue out of one side of your mouth for guns, but out of the other about other things, and it really pisses people off.
TerryC
@Nerdlinger: It’s not about self defense. Ever try to get a concealed carry for a set of throwing knives? You can’t; only for a weapon that is more deadly. roflma
mclaren
I was wrong and you guys were right. I thought for sure Zimmerman would at least be convicted of manslaughter.
You people are infinitely more cynical and more brutal than I am, and sadly your view of the world seems to be more accurate.
Counting down to Zimmerman getting his own talk radio show in…3…2…1….
Ruckus
@PanurgeATL:
I like it.
Of course I’d like to have long hair. Or pretty much hair. But gravity has made all the hair on the top of my head slip down to parts of my body that never had hair before. So haircuts. Damn gravity.
Ruckus
@liberal:
Not when their stupidity and insecurities causes death and injury to others they don’t.
Put it another way.
Your tiny dick doesn’t overrule my right to life.
johnny aquitard
@gene108:
I don’t think so.
Yes, it has that effect but I think it is more an expression of just how fearful white bigots are feeling now. Their whole world took a huge hit when a black man was elected president. And they doubled down on the crazy when he was reelected.
Their paranoia and fear and rage got dialed to 11 because what they believe is Those People do not get to share the world with them on anything but white peoples’ terms. The white bigots are frightened and angry because they see their own place in society slipping.
There’s also a whole lot of projection going on of their hostility (one thing you can be sure is a defining trait of the our rightwing). They have a great deal of hostility and ill will and wish harm on The Other, and so they assume without question Those People of course have it in the same way for them. So they need to arm themselves and be allowed to carry those weapons everywhere. They absolutely know just how malevolent and remorseless Those People will be, given an opportunity.
Facts don’t mean nothing to these yahoos. Crime is way down, at the lowest in nearly a half century. But nope. They insist today is even MORE dangerous now, therefore gotta carry a gun everywhere because…
Well, because ultimately these white people believe some fucking punk black kid in a hoodie with candy and iced tea and an up-yours-you-crazy-cracker attitude is out there — could be right in their own neighborhood! — and that makes them crazy with hate and fear and they convince themselves they are in imminent danger of death or great bodily harm and need to defend themselves with deadly force.
To them it’s the end of the world as they know it.
And truthfully, it is. And the end of it can’t come soon enough. So sick of these stupid peabrained fucks.
johnny aquitard
@Kropadope:
Seems to work just fine with mortars, hand grenades, anti-aircraft missiles and anti-armor rockets.
Or do you think we have a constitutional right to own those weapons, however whenever and where ever we feel like it?
IIRC, slavery is banned too. Can’t say what the illegal market is in the US with that, if any, but I suppose you think the market should decide, amirite?
BTW, regulating the shit out of guns works really well too. The US has heavily regulated submachine guns, fully automatic rifles, heavy machine guns, and sawed-off shotguns for almost 80 years, and it seems to work just fine too.
e.a.f.
@Chris:
well in Canada, we don’t hve people shooting children and getting away with it. We don’t have “stand your ground” laws. We actually have gun control. Canada, like Australia, and most of Europe hve gun control, well Switzerland is the exception but for some reason the Swiss do not go around shooting each other quite as often as Americans do.
What has always amazed me, that a country which has so many guns, which shoot, maime and kill people, the country still doesn’t have a great medical system. You’d think with all the gun violence at least people would want a decent medical system. Never did figure that out.
You’d have thought Zimmerman would at least have been charged with child abuse.
The next time some American politician thinks its a good idea to invade another country because they don’t think they are “doing it right”; that politician ought to have a look around in the U.S.A. first. Shooting a child and getting away with it is no different than afghanistan where they go around killing girls and women because they want an education. In America black children are killed because they want to go to the local store for candy, while wearing a hoodie. there isn’t much differance between Zimmerman and his ilk and the Taliban.