The Parkland Students Gun Laws Manifesto: OMG & WTF?
Awesome numbers have been reported from Saturday’s #March4OurLives mobilizations and demonstrations, some reporting a million globally.
As partisan politics would have it, Saturday’s #March4OurLives was strictly about gun control. But reporters from wsws.org were on the ground in several venues including NYC, Chicago, and Washington DeeCee, and interviewed some of the young ‘uns in high school, as well as few adults with stories to tell themselves.
What they discovered was that most weren’t there as single-issue protestors, but were flipped out about endless war and the glorification of militarism, the ever-deteriorating conditions of schools, the ever-increasing financial precarity and inequality, the spread of rationally induced mental health issues due to fears of all sorts, including police brutality. Now I won’t claim they hadn’t cherry-picked their published interviews, but I will say that the authors there have been over-the-top about the growing teachers strikes, and now…this movement built by Parkland students.
These are a few reports they’ve published since the march:
‘Hundreds of thousands of students march against mass violence in America’
‘Over 80,000 youth and students in Chicago protest against mass violence’ by the International Youth and Students for Social Equality at the University of Illinois at Chicago’
‘Students, youth speak about war, inequality at DC March for Our Lives rally’ and most recently:
‘The international significance of the March for Our Lives demonstrations’,
“The large turnout and prominent role of high school students is a powerful sign of political radicalization among a generation of youth whose lives have been overshadowed by war, state repression, and rampant social alienation and dysfunctionality produced by the extreme growth of social inequality.
The attempt by the Democratic Party and the media to present the protests as limited to calls for “gun control” is fraudulent. While the Democrats intervened as much as they could to block demonstrators from drawing broader conclusions, protesters who spoke to the World Socialist Web Site and the International Youth and Students for Social Equality readily connected violence within the US to imperialist war and the social crisis.
To the extent the Democrats’ calls for gun control won a hearing, it is because millions oppose the immense political influence of the fascistic National Rifle Association (NRA) and of the gun manufacturers who profit on the proliferation of military-grade weapons. In the United States, an 18-year-old can purchase an AR-15 assault rifle (the type used by the Parkland shooter) with fewer restrictions than required to obtain a driver’s license.
Regardless of the pandering from Democratic officials, the chasm between the demands of the demonstrators and the actions of the political establishment is stark. In the days before the demonstration took place, Democrats and Republicans agreed to pass a $1.3 trillion budget that will drastically increase funding for the military, the deportation forces and the police.”
Now in the Twitterverse I’d learned of the ‘Parkland Students Manifesto to Fix Gun Laws’ guest editorial at the Guardian (1185 comments) so I’d clicked in to read and…was immediately horrified, aghast, agape, agog…then at last: outraged. The Manifesto’s bullet points; the first five I’ve listed are at least reasonable enough, save for my not knowing why the CDC isn’t currently permitted to do so, nor what their proposals would amount to.
* Ban semi-automatic weapons that fire high-velocity rounds
* Ban accessories that simulate automatic weapons
* Close gun show and secondhand sales loopholes
* Allow the CDC to make recommendations for gun reform
* Raise the firearm purchase age to 21
* Dedicate more funds to mental health research and professionals
But these we get to these two horrors:
* Establish a database of gun sales and universal background checks
‘We believe that there should be a database recording which guns are sold in the United States, to whom, and of what caliber and capacity they are.
Just as the department of motor vehicles has a database of license plates and car owners, the Department of Defense should have a database of gun serial numbers and gun owners. This data should be paired with infractions of gun laws, past criminal offenses and the status of the gun owner’s mental health and physical capability.
Together with universal background checks, this system would help law enforcement stop a potentially dangerous person before they commit a gun crime.’
Seriously? The freaking Department of Defense should keep such a data base? The same Department of Military Madness whose duopoly-driven wars have killed millions (including other people’s children) around the globe since the first Gulf War? The same one that’s bombed dozens of nations since WW II as per William Blum? Have you forgotten about the survivors of those bombings and their mental health? Please reconsider!
* Change privacy laws to allow mental healthcare providers to communicate with law enforcement
‘As seen in the tragedy at our school, poor communication between mental healthcare providers and law enforcement may have contributed to a disturbed person with murderous tendencies and intentions entering a school and gunning down 17 people in cold blood.
We must improve this channel of communication. To do so, privacy laws should be amended. That will allow us to prevent people who are a danger to themselves or to others from purchasing firearms. That could help prevent tragedies such as the Parkland massacre.’
Jeeze, Louise; there are already laws on the books saying that shrinks need to report clients who could pose danger to themselves or others, and is part of the APA’s Code of Ethics (except for military clients, ha…ha,).
But picture this, as you’ve noted that you’ve given up your white privilege to note that ‘black classmates weren’t given a voice by the media’. Now surely you can see these things are so: i) that having the po-po in a therapist’s chair is quite an invasion of thought-crime privacy; ii) that having mental health issues doesn’t imply ‘spree killers’ or homicidal maniac; iii) that we’ve learned from the families whose loved ones who were gunned down by the po-po: “never call the police if someone in your family is having a mental health breakdown!”, and iv) blacks and other people of color of the rabble class are often judged guilty on the spot by the po-po. According to KilledbyPolice.net, Amerikan police have MSM reports of 295 people killed by police since Jan. 1, 2018; in 2017 1193 were killed.
Now the March organizer/spox at the link above, David Hogg’s father is former Fibbie, which may explain some of this last two bullet points on the DoD and the po-po/therapists ‘increased communications’, but it’s possible that he was one of the authors of the Manifesto, perhaps even the eloquent Emma González, as well.
And while I understand that this is well-meant, and better than arming teachers, but it’s smacks of potential danger to me:
* Increase funding for school security
Just for one compilation of cases and dangers, ‘Cops Rebranded as “School Resource Officers” Can Injure and Criminalize Schoolkids’; The over-reliance on law enforcement in the nation’s schools is reflective of a national attitude — one that is in dire need of adjusting’, mintpressnews, Feb. 5, 2018 One outtake after case examples:
“The Dignity in Schools Coalition, a New York-based organization, “challenges the systemic problem of ‘pushout’ in our nation’s schools and works to dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline.” The group defines “pushout” as “the numerous and systemic factors that prevent or discourage young people from remaining on track to complete their education and has severe and lasting consequences for students, parents, schools, and communities.”
Among those factors are “over-reliance on law enforcement tactics and ceding of disciplinary authority to law enforcement personnel.” As a necessary corrective to the presence of law enforcement in schools, the Coalition has created policy recommendations that encourage “Counselors Not Cops.”
According to Vox, the more nonwhite students a school has, the more likely it is to have a police presence; only the poorest students have more police in schools, and the biggest impact of police in schools is more “disorderly conduct” charges.”
One man on twitter observed:
“What this proposal will likely do is put anyone who sees a therapist or psychiatrist for any reason on a “watch list” and possibly bar them from buying a gun. Which is *exactly* why someone who is deeply troubled and contemplating murder will avoid seeing a therapist. In addition, the Parkland High teens are calling for greater school security. Turning our schools into day-visit prisons isn’t going to welcome students, especially those who are POC. I don’t want to teach in a school like that.”
I’ve read that Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school is considering using metal detectors, and has already, or is considering making clear backpacks mandatory.
(I just deleted my prescriptive wishes for schools as veritable palaces of learning, but you’ll no doubt have your own.)
(cross-posted from the rather ghostly café babylon)
Comments
it is misguided to causally connect extreme violence with mental
"If I sit silently, I have sinned." - Mossadegh
an excellent link, and thank you,
i'll add her wrap-up as similar to the (alleged) doctor/author on twitter in the OP:
"One effect that this stigmatization can have on people with mental illness is that they will avoid seeking treatment in order not to be labeled as dangerous. Clearly, this is a form of harm towards innocent people, since it compromises their recovery prospects and thus their quality of life. But this also means that potentially dangerous people—people with violent tendencies—will also not seek therapy since, they too, will not want to be labeled as mentally ill and thus carry the stigma that goes with such a label.
In the end, it is misguided to causally connect extreme violence with mental illness and, more importantly, it is unlikely that doing so will have any effect in preventing such incidents from happening again. Instead of taking the easy route of scapegoating we should try to understand and address the various determinants of violence, including sociocultural determinants, and make sure that people with violent tendencies have access to affordable therapy and that, regardless of their mental health, they do not have access to guns."
good point joro
The military trains the sane ones to kill on command. That is obviously immoral, but an accepted approach to resolve turmoil here in the wild, wild west. Hollywood has always loved killing in the name of justice and freedom. What message do the movie consumers glean from that trash? Gotta get a bigger gun! Sanity has very little to do with it.
question everything
killing in the name of justice by the police and Hollywood
That's making movies in the name of profit to protect celebrities' and investors' morality and ethics on the basis of some feel-good lies.
https://www.euronews.com/live
good-o,
bang on. as i recall there were a whole slew of teevee programs in amerika akin to 'homeland' (as in 'homeland security') promoting the good-guy v evil guy tropes, including the need to torture for safety. but you caused me to remember a man a café commenter loves: jay dyer, about whose book says he:
"Esoteric Hollywood is Jay Dyer’s (from JaysAnalysis.com) deconstruction of the deeper messages, symbols, and predictive programming subtexts that underlie modern film, including interviews with artists and experts in numerous media fields. Based on years of research into film analysis, comparative religion, propaganda,psychological warfare, secret societies and mind control, Esoteric Hollywood decodes the biggest movies in an unparalleled way, from the classics of the silver screen to today’s blockbusters. Learn to watch film with completely new eyes, as philosophy and conspiracy combine to enlighten the arts and awaken the masses."
his esoteric hollywood archives. his geopolitics tab. and very useful and insightful: 'Hollywood CIA – A Dark Cult Marriage Revealed'
aah, Wendy, now you gave me a lot of homework to do
but I make some progress to read your "style of wording". Nice.
I will do that. Thanks.
https://www.euronews.com/live
lol, just pick and choose, and only if it's fun.
i just listened to part of his podcast on 'black panther' ('get me outta wakanda! h/tip bruce dixon), and ooof, he's purdy cynical even about the *actual first* panthers being taken over by company men (nah). but his cia psyops one is written not recorded, so i like that.
but nah, not homework, just...illuminating for the most part. clooney's 'syriana' i might have to try to gt from inter-liberry loan given that he and don cheadle have life-time sinecures on the council of foreign relations, and he's ben very busy touting the empires fibs (lies?) on south sudan and is now working as a spox for nestle coffee there, lol. freakin' celebs.
but to add to snoopy dog's (populist) march funding, this: ‘Who Is Funding & Organizing March for Our Lives?’, heavy.com
“Much of the March for Our Lives event is being funded by donations. Celebrities like George and Amal Clooney, Steven Spielberg, Kate Capshaw, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and Oprah Winfrey all pledged to donate $500,000 each to the rally. John Legend and Chrissy Teigen donated $25,000. More celebrities may have donated less publicly, since many were tweeting about the event and talking about it on social media. Even the dating app Bumble donated $100,000 to the cause. Those donations can really add up and help with a lot of costs associated with the massive D.C. rally.
It’s not just celebrities who donated. Philanthropist and businessman Eli Broad pledged $1 million to the cause, Deadline reported. In a statement he said, “This must stop. I’m personally donating $1 million to Everytown and joining the courageous students of Parkland and millions of Americans demanding commonsense solutions to end the gun violence crisis.” Eli Broad, 84, is described as the only person to ever build two Fortune 500 companies in separate industries. In October, he announced that he was stepping down from public life. He made most of his money in homebuilding through his Kafuman and Broad Home Corporation (KB Home). He was the first homebuilder listed on the NYSE. He stepped down as CEO in 1974. He also earned money from buying Sun Life Insurance in 1971 and transforming it into a retirement savings company called SunAmerica, which he sold to the American International Group in 1999 for $18 billion.
Other business leader donations came from Marc Benioff ($1 million), Joshua Kushner (brother of Jared Kushner, $50,000), Gucci ($500,000), and the Miami Dolphins ($100,000)."
[snip w/ ‘Board members for March for Our Lives help determine how to use the funds, and more and more...]
"Not all donors may be known, since March For Our Lives registered as a 501(c)(4), which allows them to keep donor identities secret. Some sister rallies are self-funding and held GoFundMe campaigns to help raise money."
noblesse oblige, grin.
ah, if noblesse oblige, I like even noble folks- thx. for
all the great data !
https://www.euronews.com/live
The last thing we need is more police state and more
militarization. I don't know about the rest of their recommendations. Age 21? I can't help getting caught up in the fact that our government sends 18 year olds to boot camp to learn how to use automatic weapons to kill people in foreign countries for rich people. That's hard to reconcile. If we want to insist on the age of 21 being some kind of point when people become responsible adults, then it should go for the military also.
I've also heard there are a number of ways to rig weapons into auto and it would be impossible to stop it.
As for the DOD database, agree. Stupid idea. But then again, any government agency could feed that info to any other organization. And don't they have that info already?
As far as the CDC making recommendations on gun reform, I don't get that one. Like they're going to be able to come up with anything different on gun control?
None of it sounds new.
This will all die down until the next major incident. Maybe we're getting closer to something, but that something won't be better. That's not how our government rolls.
And really, without a major emphasis on anti-imperialism, anti-militarization at this point and time, it's all either coopted or tunnel vision efforts.
dunno about the 'age 21', but as it was so much more reasonable
than the other argggh-worthy 'wants'...
why would the DoD have the info in a database? now maybe DHS, but what a 'salute the military' bunch of assholery, especially if they should have been cognizant of my own extra reasons.
can't think what new preventions the CDC could possibly bring, myownself, other than the common sense ones about not bullying the outsiders in school (thinking Columbine goths), respecting students, and others. but a fellow at the café just brought this link from NPR: 'Spending bill's gun research line: Does it nullify Dickey amendment?'
"Since 1996, every appropriations bill has included some version of a line first crafted by former Rep. Jay Dickey, R-Ark., "that none of the funds made available for injury prevention and control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention may be used to advocate or promote gun control."
"The CDC had never been in the business of lobbying," said Mark Rosenberg, the director of the CDC’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control at the time. "But the Dickey amendment was a warning to the CDC. If you do research on guns, we can make your life miserable."
Rosenberg said that in 1996, the amendment was actually seen as a compromise to preserve work on injury prevention across the board. He said it gave nervous lawmakers political cover to continue to pay for injury prevention, while not shutting the door completely on gun research.
For a short while at least, the CDC continued to fund studies into the links between firearm and injuries, proof to some people that the Dickey amendment and research could co-exist."
But Rosenberg lost his job in 1999, and gun research funding plummeted." FWIW.
Looks like the CDC angle is political,
they don't want a government agency actually telling the truth.
As for the age 21 thing, I don't agree with it. Hell, my high school parking lot was littered with trucks in the fall with gun racks and 2-3 rifles in each truck. Something else is wrong here. If we follow the road of lowest common denominators, we all become the lowest common denominator.
The only way it could be palatable would be to also raise the military age to 21, which is probably a good idea.
bingo on raisin' the military age to 21.
but srsly, teen brains (especially males) are still 'under construction', so to speak, as in: not fully cognitive, as i understand it.
and i'd brought the quotes from the wrong piece above; here's the politifact one:
the main thrust:
"David Hemenway, director of Harvard’s Injury Control Research Center, said that answer was technically accurate, but it left out the politics.
"The CDC always had some flexibility, but it wasn’t going to fund firearms research since it knew it would, as had happened previously, get hauled before Congress and threatened with reduced funding if any research it sponsored suggested that having more firearms was not good for public health," Hemenway said.
As recently as 2015, House Republicans included a sweeping restriction in their majority report that came along with their appropriation bill.
game, set, match. 'you ain't gonna fight the NRA-ing of amerika! we luv our guns!'
the clearest push back I can see in this
the police / surveillance apparatus is trying to change the conversation to benefit their agenda. As in: arm the teachers, metal detectors, hire more cops in the schools, more weapons and more fear. The kids are saying enough of this police bully concept. Education does not require military presence. Get the gun laws reasonable so we can learn without the gun at our heads.
question everything
To understand what drives mass shootings
one must contemplate where the term "Going Postal" originates from.
And why do postal employees no longer "go postal"?
I'll wager that the causes that drove postal employees to that extreme are no longer present.
Can we identify the causes that drive these young people today that produce their violent behaviour?
Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.
Yes...
bullying, for one.
Is it bullying?
Or what bullying induces in a person? A sense of helplessness. A sense of shame. With no where to turn for help or council. Culminating in rage and extreme hatred and a need to lash out.
Exactly the conditions postal employees faced in the age of public union busting Ronald Reagan subjected them to.
Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.
And now it's everyone who feels that way
especially kids who see just how ugly their future is going to be in this nuthouse. Until the factors that drive that kind of rage and despair are dealt with, no amount of control is going to stop someone with the will to do it. It's almost like drugs really, get rid of the despair and the need for that goes away.
While I myself am definitely in favor of stricter gun laws, I don't see they'll do much in and of themselves. And as for banning all of them, yeah sure, good luck with that. Civil war anyone? Not to mention the sheer logistics of getting them all, I just don't see it.
Edit to add: Allowing law enforcement to decide who is and isn't a nutter is terrifying as hell. I really hope some of the more fervent among the ones who think controls will work will stop and think a minute about that. If we had an honest government and law enforcement then yes, try to get rid of as many as possible, but with this government? I see the other side of that argument now, not that anyone could hold off our corrupt military law enforcement, but there is something to be said for going down swinging I guess.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
Banning guns is impossible in the US
The only way would be to overturn the 2nd Amendment and 2/3 of Congress and 3/4 of all state legislatures will never go along with that. We will be cursed with this as a wedge issue forever. On the other hand, they passed an amendment to ban alcohol.
Beware the bullshit factories.
I personally get real nervous
talking about changes to our Constitution or Bill of Rights, messed up as they are, they CAN be worse and some on the RWNJ libertarian side would like nothing more than to enshrine what they're now doing as the law of the land. While we all know those laws don't apply to these nutters that own us, I just see too many risks in allowing them to go that far.
And I think it is very naïve to assume that our government as it currently is could "monitor" anyone's behavior in any helpful way, but I see plenty of room for abuse. Who gets to decide who's crazy and who isn't? LEOs of all stripes have been caught red handed framing people for shit, I see tons of room for that behavior when talking about taking away the guns. Too ripe for abuse IMO.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
I agree with that
Unless it's a change to get money out of politics, any amendments these days will be to the exclusive benefit of those who own the various governments in the US. We do need some changes but we need to trust the people who make the changes.
Beware the bullshit factories.
Stay terrified; it's the only sensible way to be.
BTW, what happens to things like the trillions of public money chronically missing from military budgets and the trillions of public money spent on war crimes and corporate welfare under this sort of a 'balanced budget'? How does a 'balanced budget' of public funds only get 'balanced' by deleting the public works which such public tax funding is collected and exists for, while the country crumbles and increasingly the public lives in 3rd-World conditions in 'the richest country in the world'?
Guess it doesn't matter so much, when ALEC apparently already has replacement Constitutions made up and ready to 'legally' make America a Constitutional dictatorship in this Constitutional Convention they;ve been pushing for for so long.
Anybody else heard anything about ALEC's 'Constitution for the Newstates of America' referred to in the bottom article?
https://www.prwatch.org/news/2014/07/12554/alecs-jeffersonian-project-pu...
http://inthesetimes.com/article/18940/alec-balanced-budget-corporate-con...
This following is from fall 2017 - yet I don't think I've heard a word about this proposed 'Constitution for the Newstates of America' or any of these other corporate/billionaire Constitutions already made up and any of which ALEC likes better than the old one...
Shouldn't surprise me, though; shove one of those ready-to-go suckers through in that apparently unstoppable runaway Con Con planned for, and nobody needs to ignore or evade the American people's inalienable Constitutional rights any more. America has then just become a Simon Says 'legitimate' dictatorship instead of an unconstitutionally imposed one in a country that was supposed to be a democracy right from the beginning.
https://publiushuldah.wordpress.com/2017/09/27/why-states-cant-prevent-a...
In the meantime, Americans still have the right to overthrow that oppressive government - right into international independent court trials for war and assorted other crimes. Unfortunate that everything from the Supreme Court and government agencies are also corrupted, because this evidently needs to be done soon, and it appears that the entire Justice system has been hacked, but that original Constitution needs to begin to be accurately enforced for the first time... somehow...
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
dunno how far to wade into on our culture of violence
as it relates to the current zeitgeist for this generation. yes, some self-medicate, obviously, and controlling guns with millions out there already seems to be a fool’s errand.
but you might like to consider my diary on ‘Poisonous Pedagogy and our Culture of Violence’ (alice miller’s work) that i’d updated a bit with the notion of ‘urban commandos’, but largely miller’s theme is that those who have been bullied and abused by male authoritarian figures ‘can’ turn into killers in response.
“Most severely abused children, of course, didn’t turn into monsters, and are able to have loving relationships, even though they may need to deal with plenty of emotional baggage, as most of us do. Miller writes of the crucial ‘helping witness’, a figure that is unable to rescue a child, but provides enough love and consistent attention that the child can learn some measure of trust in others; it might have been another adult, or even a sibling who helped to ameliorate much of the potential damage of abuse. Those who grew up without helping witnesses can benefit tremendously from ‘enlightened witnesses’, or those who intimately understand the consequences of child abuse, and can encourage us to find their own inner truths, thus neutralizing their needs to inflict hurt on others or themselves, and instead building healthy relationships.” those two concepts are key, of course.
i've run myself out of time for now...but the po-po deciding who's a nutter?? yeppers.
from mark ames’ ‘Going Postal’:
“Going Postal examines the phenomenon of rage murder that took America by storm in the early 1980's and has since grown yearly in body counts and symbolic value. By looking at massacres in schools and offices as post-industrial rebellions, Mark Ames is able to juxtapose the historical place of rage in America with the social climate after Reaganomics began to effect worker's paychecks. But why high schools? Why post offices?
Mark Ames examines the most fascinating and unexpected cases, crafting a convincing argument for workplace massacres as modern day slave rebellions. Like slave rebellions, rage massacres are doomed, gory, sometimes inadvertently comic, and grossly misunderstood. Going Postal seeks to contextualize this violence in a world where working isn't—and doesn’t pay—what it used to. Part social critique and part true crime page-turner, Going Postal answers the questions asked by commentators on the nightly news and films such as Bowling for Columbine.”
now i dunno if P.O. wage slaves are less under the gun at work now, but the P.O. is being shut down bit by bit by the oligarchs whose keen desires are privatising it all. diFi's hubbie has the contract to sell of the shuttered post offices, most grievously the ones with all the great stone work and murals during the WPA days. part of the privatization drive was forcing the PO to fund retirees benefits something 60 years into the future.
David Hogg is a media
hog. ~er whore, taking a page from the GOP Playbook, "never let a crisis go to waste," using the March, in this case, for self promotion. Nobody more anti-gun, pro-gun control than yours truly, but this kid is a "crisis actor."
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
well, he's definitely the rock star of the movement,
while givin' lots of love to his cuban-born homie Emma González on the twit machine.
she'd retweeted:
"if bullying caused school shootings, you would see trans shooters, queer shooters, female shooters, POC shooters. bullying does not cause school shootings; entitlement does. and white boys are the most entitled demographic by far."
and "I’m Black & Jewish. In 8th grade, a few boys called me a nigger, hailed Hitler @ me & hit me. The school did nothing. This was why I moved to S. Fl. When asked by a therapist if I’d kill those boys, I said no. Being bullied/the victim of a hate crime doesn’t justify killing."
anyhoo, i'd actually seen david hogg answer those 'crisis actor' charges, fwiw. er...he said 'No i'm not'. what i've concluded is any pushback against these folks is tantamount to treason (steve king, et.al.), but this manifesto? RU kidding me?
Entitlement causes school shootings?
OMG, really? I can't help but feel these kids are also being manipulated into saying some of this stuff. Not that they aren't smart enough to see through it, but here they are, still carrying the trauma of their school being shot up and now fawned all over by our disgusting MSM. They're riding a huge wave of emotion right now so I have trouble calling them out for these dumb remarks, but maybe I'm the one willing to give benefit of the doubt because yes, one just mustn't question them or one is a rabid RWNJ gun humping Trump/Putin lover.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
well that tweet was from a woman who'd said more
specifically 'white entitlement', so can i infer that cruz was not a person of color, then? that concept is quite a hot potato, i admit, but i readily admit that i'm an entitled white woman. mr. wd and i adopted a black/azteca son and a ute mtn. ute daughter, and we saw up close and personal how they were treated as minorities, esp. our son, who was followed in stores by security, stopped while driving for fictitious charges, hand-cuffed and shackled, etc., and subjected to epic racism at his high school.
of course, earlier i was a substitute teacher as that h.s., and the brown boys explained to me why the hell as soon as the final bell rang, they hit the ground running out the door...to escape the racist bullies who'd harm them. but any altercations always meant the kids of color were expelled, never the white 'uns.
that said, i'm totally befuzzled as to what 'white entitlement' has to do with these killings. maybe he was a mistreated, abused kid w/ unresolved rage...perhaps being further bullied at the school, maybe. but likely we know little about him save what the msm likes to hit him with. shucks, i don't know if he's alive, dead, or left parents or sibs behind.
that said, emma retweeted: @Aly_Sheehy ‘One of friends wrote this amazing piece. It is definitely worth the read. link to:
‘I Tried to Befriend Nikolas Cruz. He Still Killed My Friends.’
Isabelle Robinson, March 27, 2018, https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/03/27/opinion/nikolas-cruz-shooting-flor...
from the subtweets i tried to glean what was inside, as it's behind a paywall for me. but it *may* have included words close to some of the thoughts of alice miller in my 'poisonous pedagogy' above, but did include 'cognitive behavioral therapy', not my fave from what i've read, but... so the month's almost over, so i've saved the link, smile.
I don't think he gives
a damn about the "movement."
But I could be wrong.
As for the "white privilege" nonsense... we batted that around tonight, 27th, at the Dylan Ratigan appearance here in my town. Not many of us bought it, though most of us were white, north of 45, so... NY-21 is 96% white, about 2% black, so... Ratigan is a lot taller than I expected, 6'3"-ish. The hipster wore skinny jeans, Nike sneakers and a sports jacket. "pretty much what I used to wear on tv."
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
might you explain in what context y'all had batted around
the white privilege nonsense? in general terms, as in ;it doesn't exist', or as to that sort of contention about the parkland shooter? interesting and fun to hear that ratigan's still around.
Well, there were about
30 of us in attendance,
a black couple, 45-ish, and a single black guy, late 30s. Which surprised me, becuz African Americans generally don't show up for political events around here. Not that they're not welcome, just that they feel that they're not welcome. So, the three black people represented about 10% of the group. Pretty good for around here, and they all made great points! The single black guy, turns out he works for (or worked for) Homeland Security (my hearing not the best these days), said that his job was /is to monitor white supremacist websites. He then somehow made a connection between "white privilege" and the school shootings. We went back'n'forth with that for a min. or two, but most, including me, disagreed with the assertion.
A Very Short video of last night's meeting with Dylan Ratigan can be found on my FB Timeline (if you're on FB)... https://www.facebook.com/wink21
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
so if i get your drift, the DHS black man did say that there's
evidence that cruz was a privileged white? .333 of the blacks there? (kinda teasing w/ the math.) well, okay if the rest of ya didn't buy it, but class status also matters among all hues of people...when evident.
nope, i'm not on facebook, and i can't imagine why anyone be for the life of me. but thanks for the info, fwiw.
Only one reason:
to Organize.
I wouldn't have known of or heard of Dylan Ratigan's event otherwise.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
Glad to hear it was expanded to include so much more.
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
at least it was as far as the wsws journalists reported.
this is from today:
"The International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) mobilized campaign teams throughout the United States on Saturday to participate and campaign in the March for Our Lives rallies.
IYSSE campaigners were present in a significant number of the more than 800 demonstrations held throughout the United States, from the larger protests in Washington, D.C. and other major cities such as New York City and Los Angeles, to protests in smaller cities in upstate New York and Michigan. IYSSE campaigners were also present at demonstrations throughout the American South.
Below is a selection of interviews with demonstrators throughout the country":
but sure, they may have been stackin' the deck a bit, but...that's fine with me in the end; the more antiwar, anticapitalism, anti-Imperialism the better.
Horrible idea for more police involved in schools
We've seen how that has worked out for blacks and other minority students. Kids being slammed into walls, desks, dragged by their hair and being expelled for talking too loud, etc. The school too prison pipeline is busy as it is. The clear backpack is mandatory and there's going to be metal inspectors installed. Funny how security is always ramped up after the event, isn't it?
Oprah, the Clooneys and other celebrities donated $500,000 for the March for Life event. Oprah announced her decision on Twitter and a few people asked why she didn't donate to the BLM. This is such a good point. Imagine if she and some of the other high profile blacks had spoken out about this... but I digress.
There were so so many indicators that Cruz was going to go bezerk and yet no one was able to stop him from doing it. How many times did he say that he was going to shoot up the school? How many times did the cops go to his home after he was shooting where it wasn't legal? People also reported that he was killing animals and still nothing happened. The horses are out of the barn. Those kids don't need to have more police security around them. That will probably create more trauma for them. Besides they had security at the school, but the guy decided not to engage Cruz.
Many states refuse to take guns away from men who threaten their wives after they leave them and get retaining orders against them. We have had two incidents where the husband shot their wives in the street including one of his kids. Now if they aren't going to protect women from abusive men, then how will reporting people who have mental health problems to some authority?
Why do I feel like this is being orchestrated?
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
fascinating info on the donors;
and thanks for that. i’d meant to wonder aloud in the OP about how in the world so many marchers could get to deecee and other large cities. guess i’d reckoned the DCCC, really. but it reminded me of rockefeller-funded mckibben, et.al’s having flown (i assume) loads of indigenous to the various COP conference demos...so they could look great as heading the parades.
oprah would not have tossed BLM a few bucks...as she’s still thinking of running for the presidency. can’t be seen as being the prez of blacks! (Obomba line)
but see, i knew nothing of the school shooter at all, not even his name, so all that is news to me.
good gawd Yes on the school resource officers. tasing of elementary kids, shackled to chairs...for failure to obey orders, just what pisses of the po-po all over amerika. even if it turns out they Can’t obey orders: deaf, crippled, and on an on the wheel turns...and turns, like roulette. and where she stops, nobody knows; or: when your number is up: kapow!
Did she answer?
Many who donated were full throttle H> windsocks. They did it mostly to increase their celebrity status and stature among the masses who follow them.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
see the donor page i gave to mimi upthread, lol.
virtue signaling noblesse oblige? who can say?
When I was 17
The "adults" in the room listened to me.
Not.
What has changed?
Not C, D, G, the bridge.
"It doesn't mean that much to me, to mean that much to you."
It's not gonna change anytime soon...
Heh.
Prof: Nancy! I’m going to Greece!
Nancy: And swim the English Channel?
Prof: No. No. To ancient Greece where burning Sapho stood beside the wine dark sea. Wa de do da! Nancy, I’ve invented a time machine!
Firesign Theater
Stop the War!
if i promise not to critique neil's solo years,
will you decode your comment for me? (grin) but yeppers to c, d, g, and a bridge. good on the jefferson airplane lyrics, and given all the news on the dow/syngenta merger and monsanto/bayer one,
"sergeant dow jones 27 years old...commanding his very own tank." (loved buffalo springfield, tho, and CSN&Y.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRV5LoOMyBk]
guessing this may be a dead thread, even now i need
to bring this wretched news via RT today: ‘Assange’s internet connection cut following ‘agreement breach’ – Ecuador’
“\"The action was taken following Assange's breach of a written agreement signed with the Ecuadorian government at the end of 2017, in which he vowed not to send messages interfering in the affairs of other sovereign states,” the government said in a statement Wednesday. "The Executive remains open to the possibility of further sanctions in cases of future breaches of the agreements by Assange."
perhaps puigdemont? he’s been covering his arrest in germany.
#reconnectjulian on twitter.
Was looking for somewhere to post this I came across.
Bolding something adding greatly to the concern:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2GEYS7Xvec
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
thank you, ellen.
knowing this thread was likely dead, i didn't include the livestream, just the hashtag noting it, but did on the evening blues, and joe kindly embedded it.
the bit about if he breaks his agreement again there will be further sanctions. what? no food or water? booted onto the street? the long arm of the western empire is after him, and sadly, is making lenin moreno nervous. did spain make him an offer he can't refuse? .
The Live Stream was done, as was the thread,
but something in the text mattered and I knew you'd see that, if you hadn't already, and be certain to get the point of that.
If he has no contact with the outside world permitted him, how do we know if he's getting food and water now, or has been killed/snatched already? FSM forbid, but, in example, if anything happens to Julian, there's supposed to be an immediate release of information, and TPTB might want to delay that...
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
no, i hadn't seen the thread, even, and had just been
spit-ballin' about what might be next, so thank you. but yes, i know that some time in the past, he'd mentioned something akin to a 'dead man's switch'. when they yanked his connectivity last time, many supporters were kinda waiting for it, but i've forgotten how or where it might be, as in: who holds the key to the switch, how would they activate it, etc.
john pilger must be one of his staunchest allies, so there's that possibility, but it sure as hell won't be anyone in the 'freedom of the press organization unless he never changed it after he was kicked off their Golden Island so unceremoniously. but i looked at pilger's twitter thang and at his website, but i reckon he might be out and about showing his new documentary.
well, no need to get too exercised, i reckon, and the online vigil might have done some good, eh?
ay yi yi; this just in from popular resistance.
i wonder if they'd even read it!
‘Shut Down Firing Ranges in US High Schools’, march 28
“One thousand six hundred high schools have marksmanship programs affiliated with the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps Program and the congressionally-chartered Civilian Marksmanship Program, (CMP). Children are regularly taught to fire air rifles that are classified as lethal weapons by the military.
The Army taught Florida gunman Nikolas Cruz, the mass murderer at Stoneman Douglas High Schoolm how to shoot a lethal weapon in his high school cafeteria when he was 14. Nik was a member of the school’s U.S. Army JROTC Marksmanship Program. JROTC stands for the Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps. Nearly 2,000 high schools have military shooting programs. They should be shut down.
The marksmanship programs typically use CO2-powered long rifles that shoot .177 caliber lead pellets at speeds up to 600 feet per second. They are lethal weapons. America is the only country in the world that teaches riflery in its public schools.
(please sign this petition, etc. goes to this site, oy and veh), part of which states:
“This campaign will not concentrate on the removal of all military programs from the high schools. Too many of our allies in the counter-recruitment movement feel that calling for the removal of all JROTC programs from the schools would be counter-productive.”
well, tough nay-nays on your 'allies'.
Well there's a way to defuse a movement.
Create a vanguard with crap demands.
“Those who make Bernie Sanders impossible will make Luigi Mangione inevitable." - Dan Berger