If your response to each and every tragedy like this is nothing, which it is, why even bother to report these shootings? Why not leave them for the ‘and finally’ columns in newspapers? If Sandy Hook didn’t change anything, then I doubt the deaths of a bunch of Hispanic gays is going to change anything.
Well, you are right about that (and Charleston). The massacre of a bunch of rich, lily white seven year olds did send the Gated Community Democrats into a tizzy. They spent a good deal of money and they lost. They lost interest when black people were slaughtered by a white-supremacist terrorist (who, as Adam Lanza proved, could also be their son as well, give or take the Nazism) and besides a handful of wealthy gays, most in that clique up there have no interest in the lives of Hispanic gays in Orlando.
After Sandy Hook, a background check bill was filibustered in the Senate. An attempt to renew the federal assault weapons ban failed. A bill to allow the CDC to study the cause of and solutions to gun violence went nowhere. After Charleston, a bill to reform background checks went nowhere. After Roseburg and the President’s plea, no response was taken. After San Bernardino bills went nowhere. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.
And what did you do to help? How many calls did you make to your Senator? How much money did you raise for your cause? I’m playing my part in the pro-gun cause. I’ve volunteered and worked for pro-gun candidates. We’re not winning this issue because Congress is complacent; we’re winning this issue because you are complacent. An emotionally charged rant on Atlas does about as much good as Carl’s rant over on Facebook. Congratulations, you guys have changed absolutely nothing!
‘Oh but wait, but this was Islamic terror.’
No. This wasn’t the Bataclan. This wasn’t a mass planned, defying the odds series of co-ordinated attacks. It was an act of domestic terror. It does not matter what ideology someone taps into, or tries to self-justify.
I’m going to repeat this; IT DOES NOT MATTER WHAT IDEOLOGY SOMEONE TAPS INTO.
It doesn’t matter whether it was Islamist, or white-supremacist, or dominionist. The shooter was not a foreigner, he wasn’t a weird basement dwelling kid. He was 29. He was middle class, married. He was a security guard and he was able, last week to buy weapons and walk out the f-cking store with them.
This was terrorism. And this was exactly like the Bataclan. Just because Al Baghdadi didn’t sanction this action personally doesn’t mean that it was not terrorism. Dylan Wolf and Omar Mateeb terrorized people to prove their points. They wanted to inspire a ripple effect of further violence and foster a climate of fear. Dylan Wolf and Omar Mateeb are terrorists, and both were radicalized here on their own accord. But they didn’t become terrorists until they opened fire; Mateeb still had rights. He was never convicted of a crime. Had his wife reported for him for domestic violence, existing law would have made the terror watch-list irrelevant and he wouldn’t have been able to buy the guns. Had the FBI looked into the Mosque that he was, along with a suicide bomber in Syria, attending, they might have gotten something (and no, I don’t support spying on Mosques without probable cause, but they had that in this case).
The fact that the shooter had a father who publicly praised the Taliban (literally, he was waving a red flag right in the FBI’s faces) and that the son was born and raised in America and yet still became a radicalized terrorist is indeed concerning and the culture that formulated this hatred and the resulting attack is the main issue here IMO.
And he bought an AR-15. The weapon of choice for mass shooters. They should put it on the box. They should advertise it; why buy anything else? Why else would you need an AR-15? Is it a choice weapon for farmers, for hunters? Is it the number one weapon for law enforcement? Is there an Olympic shooting event that requires expert training with an AR-15?
My 81 year old Great Uncle has one though due to his Parkinsons he isn’t able to shoot it. Is he going to go out and kill people? Have you ever wondered that maybe, just maybe, some people like shooting. They like shooting at bottles hundreds of feet of way. It’s the same reason why 13 year old kids like blowing s
hit up with fire-works.
Plus the AR-15 is actually a popular hunting rifle; I’ve only been hunting a handful of times, and I’ve only actually managed to get a hit only once, so I’m not an expert on anything hunting related. But some of my friends, especially the real Florida crackers who grew up hunting and lived their whole lives in rural north Florida are very fond of the AR-15 for hunting. It's more popular than I suspected; hell, just a month ago I was sitting with a friend of mine who was showing me a video of helicopter based hog shooting with a gun that reminded me of something off a tank!
And like every other issue that directly affects LGBT Americans, this whole event get's turned around by right wing reactionaries to make it about them and their rights and their guns and their freedoms. The right of gays to marry became more about their right to not marry them, the right of gays to not be discriminated against became about their right to religious freedom or what ever cognitive bullsh**t they washed in public, the rights of trans people to use a bathroom becomes about 'rapists and mothers and daughters' and every mans stupid scatological fetish.
This wasn’t
just an attack on the LGBT community, though. Do you think that if for whatever reason he couldn’t have attacked a gay bar that he wouldn’t have instead shot up a Baptist Church, an army recruiting center, a Synagogue, or even another Mosque? This was an attack on all of America, on everyone who he deems an infidel. He just chose to exert his hatred towards the gay community, perhaps because the gay community in America is more empowered than ever before.
As for your other claims, that isn’t really an issue but since I’m on the subject of liberty here, I might as well address them: gay people have a right to get married, they should have had it decades ago, and it isn’t going to change because a group of social conservatives are angry. Likewise, Pastor Durante over at Trinity Lutheran back in my hometown has the right to his religious views and doesn’t have to marry two men or two women if he so chooses. The right to religious freedom is constitutionally protected and that shouldn’t be changed just because the tides are now in favor of marriage equality. As for the Wedding Cake stuff, that’s a case by case issue and the Bathroom issue is nothing more than a scam concocted by the Family Research Council and other groups to get the olds all hot and bothered.
So don't pretend you care about them for who they are and who they love and why they were there together in a 'safe space' an actual safe space to celebrate who they are and for their friends to celebrate with them. Don't offer hollow solidarity if you've never once showed it for a single LGBT person. You don't get to claim them now if you never claimed them before.
This is true; I too am annoyed that Franklin Graham had his “rapid response team” in Orlando ready to disguise their asinine conversion therapy as “grief consoling.” Likewise, it is annoying that many of those who are so strongly in defense of their gun rights are against your right to marriage, or the right of Muslims to practice their religion in peace without government monitoring (which should almost never be practiced, though the Fort Pierce Mosque and the two watch-list suspects who both ended up acting on their beliefs is the rare exception).
