To reiterate what Nett said in his sticky, the serious topics that have been (ahem) discussed in the WDT this past week or two have likely turned a lot of posters off to the the WDT thread in general. The WDT is not the place to discuss/debate controversial topics and its unfair to the posters who would rather engage in a more light-hearted and jovial discussion. We agree. However, we dont want to turn off or ignore those who do want to engage in serious discussion either. So starting today, we are going to have a Weekly Sober/Serious Thread (WST) alongside the WDT for that exact purpose. Some additional items: -Keep your discussions clear and try and support your views so you dont look like an idiot. -No ad hominem comments regarding another poster. If you disagree, state why. But do not attack someones character or bicker pointlessly. -The topics will flow based on whatever people want to discuss, which usually follows the current events in the new cycle. -No WDT-type quips, jokes, or sideline exposition. Posts should be constructive to the topic or a specific topic. Its a "serious" thread for a reason. -Conversely, the WDT should be used for its intended purpose. Keep your serious discussion topics here. -If you think a topic has enough traction to spin off into its own thread, let the mods know. Have at it and enjoy.
So it seems that conservative politicians and news outlets are trying to spin the AME church attack as an attack on faith instead of a racially motivated crime. Do any of the conservatives on this board actually buy that? It seems incredible insensitive, and insulting to try and spin this considering the shooter stated his motivation to his victims.
Nothing can stop the political narrative they have created. Religion is tied 100% into it now. If you stop, then people might question some of the more peculiar things various party members have sworn by. What got me is the capitol building is still flying the Confederate flag at full mast. Way to go guys. But it's ok, the flag has nothing to do with racism, it is our heritage by crackey.
Flag is still up because it was moved from the dome of the capitol building to a Confederate memorial as part of a legislative action. The flag cannot be moved without a 2/3 vote of both the House and Senate.
I heard about this yesterday. I could almost give them the benefit of the doubt that they made this claim when there was no info about the shooter and they hadn't even seen the pic of him with the flags on his jacket. They make their living trying to shape and mold the emotions of their target audience, so it makes sense from a marketing point of view that any news story that can be spun that their target audience has been victimized, will be. But if they continue to do so now that his motives are crystal clear, then I really don't know what to say about that.
It was known from at least 4:30 the following morning (the time most of the articles I saw went up) that it was a racial attack. Hours before any of the pundits and politicians were interviewed for the morning news. It is a completely disingenuous attack meant to continue the same tired agenda these people have been pushing since January of '09. Again, not to get too religious, but a recent study showed the number of people identifying themselves as Christians has dropped 7% in 10 years. That's a fairly significant number when something like 85% of Americans consider themselves as such. Things like the above, is one of the reasons why their numbers are dwindling. And Nett, we don't even believe ourselves to have a gun problem, let alone a mental health problem. That's commie talk. Look at the way Bobby Jindal went after Obama for stating the obvious about gun violence.
Sadly, we have so many problems in this country that are not being addressed. This event is a real body blow to race relations in America, in my opinion, far beyond what has happened with law enforcement. This is clearly a hate crime that many consider a terrorist act, racism in it's purest form. I feel terrible for the families who lost loved ones and for the whole community, there are surely tough times ahead, my heart goes out to them. I write this sitting abroad in a guarded compound amongst many French, Canadian, South African and English citizens amongst many other nationalities represented here. We get CNN, MSNBC, FOX and several other network news stations piped in here and it is really embarrassing to watch and to have to listen to foreign commentary on the state of our nation. The fact that the only topic of conversation people want to discuss is guns and continues to be guns sickens me. The answer, the only answer is to further limit rights instead of finding ways to fix problems. Could there be a more obvious blinking neon sign for America that there is a real mental health crisis going on in our country? How many people are on psychotropics and other drugs to handle depression and other infirmities, we have 22 veterans a day committing suicide which is merely a subset of a much larger figure that is utterly shocking, we have a drug epidemic and a failed war on drugs....which in many cases is individuals self dosing in order to deal with their reality and is also a symptom of severe racial disparity in law enforcement. But we are going to fix it all with more gun regulation.
Europeans are some of the most racist fucks on the planet, I wouldn't worry about their commentary too much. And South Africa? really? But I agree, mental health is not a salacious enough topic, so it wont get discussed. The media doesnt care. The government thinks its too hard. And people are too dumb.
What really bugs me is how people seem to take this as an example of daily problem that needs addressing. To me, the act itself is NOT a body blow to race relations, it's an example of one person doing something bad, and it's the media attention that's poking the bear and blowing it up out of proportion.
Yes. Guns are a problem here. To say otherwise is to further obfuscate a serious dilemma between constitutional rights and people blowing away innocent citizens at least once a year. This shit DOES NOT HAPPEN in other first world nations, at least as frequent (the exception of Norway, but let's face it that ONE guy was just as crazy as any of our dozens of shooters). Gun control is non-existent here. The background checks are a fucking joke. It pays lip service to the issue that any asshole who hasn't been caught yet can get serious fire power. THEN we have the motherfucker president of the NRA dare comment that Senator Pinckney brought it upon himself by voting against a concealed weapons ban. This is gun fetish. And it has to stop. The past two years I haven't heard dumbasses stop crowing about Obama taking away their guns. It hasn't happened, it will never happen. God forbid you get a firearm in less than 5 days while ATF or FBI or whoever does a proper background check into your mental status. Fuck Off with this argument. The only thing you're worried about is guns? There are 10 more Bill of Rights that need protection just as much, but people don't seem to care their media has been bought by corporations with political agendas. To be clear: I AM A SECOND AMENDMENT PROPONENT. We have a serious mental health issue in this country as well. I have brought this up several times in the past year on this board. As John Stewart said, and as I agree, we will do nothing about it. Not even addressing gun control for unhinged individuals like Storm Roof. Or his nitwit parents who possibly bought him the gun in question. But what slays me are the people who refuse to see the institutional racism, especially in a state who holds racism as family tradition. They're flying the confederate fucking flag, driving on roads celebrating confederate generals, and not more than 40 years ago were bombing black churches. But there isn't a race problem. No, not at all. Anyone saying this to you is willfully ignorant, lying, or a complete piece of shit, or all three. This kid thought he was going to spur on a race war. He has had the exact opposite effect, regardless of what some jerkoff pundit on Fox News has said.
I don't think this event can be seen in isolation like that. It's just the latest event in our country's history of racial violence. The killer seemed to extremely tuned into that history choosing the target and time that he did. To treat this as an anomaly seems disingenuous.
I dont think Oden was saying that there isnt a gun problem, I think he was saying the focus is continually misaligned on gun control rather than mental health control. As an ardent 2nd Amendment supporter and card carrying member of the NRA, I have no problem with strict background checks or waiting periods. The problem is that there is a major gap between background checks and public health. Legislation like HIPAA, MA Privacy, etc. prevents background checks from accessing mental health records, which is insane. The main issue with gun control is that there blatant ignorance on the people advocating it and a lack of flexibility from the opponents to it. Each side has to give a little. What I do know is these things need to stop happening. Whether its some kid wanting to storm an elementary school, or a black church, or a movie theater, this has to stop happening. I hate it when each side dusts off the usual soap boxes instead of actually considering a solution (and thats in general, not a reference to your post CJ). Go ahead and make a larger connection to racism, I have no issue with that and I cant prove otherwise. But the core issue is mental health, for better or worse, and its not being dealt with.
I'm not saying we don't have race problems, but all this about racism specifically geared towards South Carolina doesn't match up to how the actual people here have responded to this and the Walter Scott shooting.
There is no easy answer to mental health. The initiative would cost billions and be completely forward thinking. Re-opening clinics and public facilities. Re-imagining guidelines under insurance. You really think you can get bi-partisan support for that? They can't even agree on the same budget they've been passing for 30 years. We fucked ourselves as far back as the 60s when we de-institutionalized this country and let a million seriously ill people onto the streets, concurrently as seriously damaged kids were coming back from the jungle only to receive little or no help. And we've been doing it to them for 50 years now. The kid went in there explicitly to murder black people. He is nuttier than squirrel shit, but he's also a racist. It'd be one thing if he chose the place at random. But he didn't. His delusions came about comorbidly with his delusions about race.
+1 to much of what has been said, but especially this. I've lived in the South most of my life, but people are kidding themselves if they think the South and South Carolina specifically, is the only place there's racism. I know lots of people who harbor prejudice against minorities, some openly, some privately. None of them are walking into a church or wherever and shooting people because of it. Finding racial harmony, and encouraging closed-minded people to see people as simply human, with all their (and their own) flaws, can happen with dialogue, peace, common sense, legislation if necessary and education. But, not one of those things will fix somebody who's crazy.
Boston bomber: terrorist. Black shooters: thugs White shooters: mentally ill Yup, no problems here. My biggest issue is people obfuscating the causes of this issue, because it is blatantly obvious. Racism. This was a racially motivated terrorist attack, point blank. The kid admitted his goal was to start a race war for fuck sake. Replace "race war" with "jihad" and we'd all be screaming for this fuck to get the chair ASAP. Instead we're debating mental illness and gun control, which will result in more stupid bitching and moaning from both sides with fucking nothing getting done about anything, until another shooting. Then rinse and fucking repeat. We, as a nation, are fucked. We are flat out fucked. We've got this stupidly obstructionist mindset for fucking everything, and thanks to modern media we can all hold up in our little bubbles and never let in any kind of fact or piece of info that might run counter to our world view. Then we'll bitch that "they" are the problem. They being: Liberals Conservatives Blacks Whites Muslims Any fucking group. Our entire society and media is built around the idea of creating enemies to unite a base. It is the basis of our political system; and we act all shocked and fucking appalled when someone takes that "us vs them" mentality to its natural, violent conclusion. Then we don't chnage the culture, we use it as another excuse to blame "them."
I agree, you can't be so general. Boston BOMBERS were indeed terrorists because they were a group of people who went out of their way to blow up many people at a prestigious event. Their actions were the very fucking definition of terrorism. Point me to the individual instances of black shootings and I'll tell you whether or not they were thugs. In this particular case, yes, he is a white shooter and could be considered a thug, or mentally ill, or both. And there's nothing saying that being a terrorist and being mentally ill are mutually exclusive. People shouldn't just generalize shit to feed their particular agenda. None of us can. And the need to distil everything into a single label or sound byte does nobody any good, and, if anything, makes matters worse.
I think it's disingenuous to try to separate this from the race issues our country has. Yes, this guy probably has some mental health issues, but these were most likely exasperated or took advantage of by a group of hateful people. Race has become a very controversial issue recently and it's not surprising to see extremists pop up. This guy may have found another target for his hate if he didn't have race, but to not see this as a symptom of the underlying problem our country has with race seems to me to be disrespectful to the people who have to deal with it. Also, I'm not calling out the south or South Carolina specifically on race. It's a country wide problem and should be addressed as such. The confederate flag issue is going to come up though, because to a lot of people it represents our countries history with race in a very negative way, and even if you disagree I hope you can understand why.
In this particular incident, I think the shooter has a number of issues. I didn't mean to imply that the fact that the shooter is clearly a racist wasn't an issue. In my opinion, his mental imbalance was the bigger issue. Probably? Now that's disingenuous.