Escalation of horror

(This leaves aside the fact that our national gov’t, as well as that of plenty of states, is run by assholes who think everybody should have guns and carry them everywhere…)

People with a grudge; outcasts; haters; people with mental health issues; people who decide to kill other people when they kill themselves. It’s terrorism, but not “traditional” terrorism. (Of course, any Muslim connection invites naming it “TERRORISM!!!”) At the same time, calling it terrorism allows the media to again ignore the inconvenient realities, and avoid the real conversations we should be having about these incidents. Perhaps such a conversation wouldn’t as easily facilitate sensational 24X7 coverage, or provide such a perfect opportunity for any politician who wants to comment according to their ideology.

What message does such sensation and coverage send to the next troubled person contemplating seeking worldwide fame in their exit? People have shot up schools and workplaces; the attacks keep escalating in sheer horror. Shooting on college campuses; shooting elementary school kids; shooting in a crowded theatre; shooting people in a church; killing 50 in a nightclub. Do these people feel they need to compete? Will a standard shooting spree prove insufficient? Does a shooter’s posterity require ever larger body counts? Do these urges feed off of the coverage they see others getting? Corporate media stands ready to exploit these events for all they’re worth as long as possible. They’re the perfect distraction. Does all that coverage inspire the next one?

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k9disc's picture

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“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

elenacarlena's picture

So by owning guns, you become one of the good guys?

Except we know it doesn't work that way. A lot of people who would respond to this type of video would just become another a$$hole looking for something or someone to shoot up.

Edited for specificity.

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Oldest Son Of A Sailor's picture

More like some guy that was just a small prick...
You see them all the time trying to find some sort of substitution for their real or imagined inadequacies...

The expensive sports car or, 4X4 truck with the obnoxious exhaust note or, in the case of the truck "Burning Coal."

The Cigarette Boat that he doesn't know how to drive roaring down the formerly peaceful river with a 40 mph speed limit...

The pistol that has no practical usage but it will fire an elephant gun cartridge...

Yea... I'm a small prick but this shit sure makes up for it!

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"Do you realize the responsibility I carry?
I'm the only person standing between Richard Nixon and the White House."

~John F. Kennedy~
Economic: -9.13, Social: -7.28,
jimpost's picture

I'd like to remind you about comments made in the "Two Questions" diary. Some by you, if I remember correctly. Denying that when you said 'gun nut,' you didn't mean every gun owner.

Yet here you are, painting all gun owners with the same broad brush.

Please be careful, hmmm? You sound like a hypocrite, and I don't think you realize it.

edit: I have to head off to work, so I won't be around to respond. I'm not being rude; I'll check this after I get back.

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The more people I meet, the more I love my cats.

elenacarlena's picture

casual references are certainly meant to refer to the gun nuts, or that pointing finger is definitely also pointing back at me. Not hypocrisy, but poor wording. Also in this case, specifically referring to the ignorant who can be pushed into ownership out of fear of some ill-defined other - the people who would watch that video and think "Sure, I'll get me a stash of guns because Murica!" The video has a definite "if you're a patriot, you'll defend yourself and your country with guns" feel to it.

And who are the ill-defined others? Minorities, usually. We don't need more George Zimmermans, but decidedly fewer.

But you're right, for the casual reader, we all have to be careful to say what we mean every time, especially on controversial issues like this. You know I own guns myself so can assume I don't mean everyone, but not every reader will. Edited, see if it reads better now.

(You memorize my comments? Not sure they're worth the effort!)

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jimpost's picture

Okay, not really. It just stuck 'cause I'd read the diary just last night.

And thanks for the edit. You are right, I had the casual reader/new reader in mind more than anyone. There are plenty of gun owners who think the NRA is full of shit. Plenty of gun owners also buy the shit those awesomely (original sense) poor examples of human beings sell.

What a cocked-up mess.

And then the bastards that legislate to keep the mess swirling in all its pusy madness have the gall to tweet and FB that "their prayers are with the families blah blah blah. That, THAT, is real hypocrisy.

Oh, and by the by - I find your comments well worth reading. (Even if I don't really memorize them.) Mosking

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The more people I meet, the more I love my cats.

Meteor Man's picture

Corporate media stands ready to exploit these events for all they’re worth as long as possible. They’re the perfect distraction. Does all that coverage inspire the next one?

Yes. Glorifying violence in the MSM, glorifying violence in movies, television and music inspires the next massacre. Glorifying violence in literature, history and on national holidays inspires the next massacre. Militarizing law enforcement and private security forces inspires the next massacre.

It is axiomatic in the advertising field that sex sells and violence sells.

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"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn

k9disc's picture

I am staying at a friends place in Cali and they watch a lot of corporate news -- I mean, A LOT!

The tone of the last few days has been monotonous and rather boring. It was a low intensity, bored howl. A bit aggressive and standoffish, to keep the edge, but it was sedate.

Last night I caught it after a long day, and they were fucking giddy. Nervous smiles, horrible images, and heart-wrenching stories pitched in a veritable orgy of emotion: fear, sorrow, alarm, anger, confusion.

It continued throughout the day -- and the custom graphics came out. The DVR stopped on a spiffy one of bullets laying next to a glock barrel, pointing right at us, with a heavy emphasis on the sight at the tip of the barrel. It was super creepy.

They are going apeshit on this. It's really quite gross and terrifying. It's corporate sponsored stochastic terrorism.

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“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

elenacarlena's picture

Now no one's talking about income inequality or even healthcare for all.

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k9disc's picture

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“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

People haven't forgotten, though.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Any day, on any channel, one can see death meted out to many in the name of "Justice" or "War" but one cannot see two people loving each other and possibly creating new life.

All over the world stand monuments to the Glorious Dead killed in the ongoing struggle for complete dominance over the world and everyone in it, yet nowhere is there a commemoration of peace that doesn't require pre-knowledge and a map to locate.

If there is such a thing as a primal religion, its Prime Directive is Thou Shalt Kill. Humanity stands ready to obey as our god-fantasies demand ever more blood, as their thirst for it remains unslaked and growing.

Kill For Peace.

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Vowing To Oppose Everything Trump Attempts.

snoopydawg's picture

keeps covering these events 24/7 is to keep the populace afraid that the terrorists are coming to kill them. And it works. I read a lot of right wing websites and people are saying that the military needs to bomb those people 'back to the Stone Age' so that they can't attack us again.
But if this 'was' a terrorist attack, then what is the difference between what this shooter did and what our drones and military have done?
Basically what many Americans are saying is that there lives are more important than the lives of the people in the Middle East.
I consider the drone attacks that kill innocent civilians an act of terror as much as what happened on 9/11.
If people want to be safe then they should be protesting against our government's foreign policy actions. That's the reason so many countries call the United States the Great Satan and the biggest threat to world peace.
And most Americans have no idea that our government is arming, training and funding the same Al Quada group of 'terrorists' that our military fought against during the Iraq war. Why? To take out Assad. Why? So that other country's corporations can get their hands on the oil and natural gas pipelines that Russia currently controls.
Again, most Americans don't realize that the military isn't fighting to keep us safe or to defend our freedoms. They are fighting for the corporations as they have been for over a century or longer as Smedley Butler told us back in the 30's when he wrote his book War is a Racket
He told us that he had spent 33 years being muscle for hire so that the corporations can steal other country's resources and for other corporations to get rich off defense contracts and other supplies that are needed during any so called war.

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

The military is at the service of international capital and those who volunteer to join the military are as much to blame as those who implement the policies they are told to implement. If no one joins the military, where does the raw material of oppression come from? I am not sympathetic with the argument that young people join because of economic desperation and I am certainly not in sympathy with those who enter the military academies.

"If you love your freedom, thank a vet." The Bill of Rights has been gutted about in proportion with the militarization of American society. I'd like to try to see how America does with a military budget 80% lower than it is now and permanently closing 14 of the 16 intelligence agencies.

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"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"

edg's picture

I grew up in a public housing project in Detroit. There were 4 boys in my family; I'm the only one that's never been in prison. Two of my brothers died at age 20; one murder and one suicide. It was escaping to the military that let me get training and later an education that led to a comfortable middle class life instead of the drugs, booze and crime my brothers succumbed to.

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PriceRip's picture

          I have known a few that found that route to escaping their "destinies". I was lucky it that I was able to go to a nearby community college.
          A few years after I left town I asked my dad about some of my classmates, and the few acquaintances from our scavenger days. As we progressed through the list the stories got bleaker and more depressing. We had that conversation only the one time.
          My hometown has changed so as to be unrecognizable, but I still am reluctant to even pass through the place. The ghosts of my past don't control or define me anymore, but they do inform me as to the dangers that really exist. I have met so many that think they are masters of their fate, and have no understanding of how tenuously we are perched upon the edge of the abyss. Some may consider me pessimistic, I prefer realistic, and I maintain a firmer grip than most.

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Lookout's picture

assault weapon sales were soaring. Normally stores sell a few a day, yesterday they sold several an hour. It really is astounding.

We have a problem that will not be discussed or even studied (the CDC is banned from researching gun violence and death) because the NRA has the politicians by their gonads.

Here's how we compare to other countries in firearm related death (upper left)-
List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate.jpg

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Hawkfish's picture

You can see it here. Whatever else you may think of the NYT, they do excellent data presentations.

Personally, I just can't seem to pay attention to the fear and outrage. Guns + stochastic terrorism = events like this. Always has, always will. Until we as a nation are willing to actually take military hardware away from everyone (like Australia did) this is going to keep happening.

The only other thing I can see making a dent in the problem is someone shooting up an NRA convention. I say that not to wish it upon anyone, but just as a thought experiment in social dynamics to illustrate how impossible the problem is in the current environment.

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We can’t save the world by playing by the rules, because the rules have to be changed.
- Greta Thunberg

riverlover's picture

How long has Europe warned travelers to the US about FL? 20 years? Remember all those rental carjackings that got all rental cars less-labeled as RENTAL. For the US.

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Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.

Thaumlord-Exelbirth's picture

with people carrying around guns en masse... if we had a good regulation system in place and a mandate for training and psychological screening, so that the only guys carrying around all those guns would be people who knew what the hell they were doing, didn't think that a handgun was enough to make them an action hero that would put Rambo to shame, and wasn't likely to be the one instigating a mass shooting themselves.

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josb's picture

Owning guns has to become socially unacceptable for most people, with some rare exceptions such as law enforcement, hunting for food (meaning rifles) and wildlife control. Until this changes, the killings at this rate will continue.

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