(In the case of some of these columnists, they occasionally reprint their drivel elsewhere, where they do allow comments. But not all of them.)
Case in point: Selwyn Duke. I guess he thinks he looks intelligent, gazing off into the distance (in this case, the distant past) stroking his chin; I think he's contemplating adding more fiber in his diet. But he, for some reason, spewed several hundred words extolling the virtues of this commercial for the "Gung Ho Commando Outfit." Every toy gun in the commercial looks (gasp!) realistic; there are no sissified colors, no orange plastic piece at the end of the barrel."(Let's just pretend that the commercial isn't in black and white, OK? That seems like the polite thing to do.)
Yet, in the times that it aired, you never heard of a child being shot after pointing one of these toy weapons at a policeman.I suppose that, if I was to be completely honest, I have no evidence that his cognitive impairment has a genetic source. After all, one can only imagine the psychological damage caused by a lifetime spent with the name "Selwyn."
My mother always told me not to argue with the mentally challenged, but when did I ever listen to her? And these stories aren't particularly difficult to find.
5-year-old with toy gun killed by officerAnd that's another reason the rule was enacted. Frequently, a cop isn't seeing "a kid with a toy gun," but a "shadowy figure holding a gun." He doesn't have time to assess age, height, weight, or fucking eye color. He's faced with a person holding a gun.
(March 5, 1983) A 5-year-old boy locked in his bedroom while his mother was at work was shot to death Thursday night by an Orange County police officer who mistook him for a possible burglary suspect.
The boy, Patrick Andrew Mason, who stood 47 inches tall, was holding a toy gun in his dimly lit bedroom when the officer kicked in the locked door after twice yelling he was a police officer, witnesses said.
The 24-year-old unidentified officer - on the Stanton Police Department 15 months - told investigators he fired his weapon when he saw a "shadowy figure holding a gun" in the room lit only by the flickering light from a television set.
All that, despite Selwyn's assertion that "As for policemen, they could assume that a child wouldn't target them with a real gun." Which is stupid on a number of levels - as a kid, we had a set of brothers living down the street; one of them shot and killed the other, because they were playing with Daddy's gun.
The story I found, by the way, was not, technically, the 1970s (although arguments can be made), when Selwyn claimed he was a boy. But since the rule that toy guns be brightly colored or have an orange plug wasn't enacted until 1992, I'm pretty comfortable with saying he's an idiot.
Sometimes I think that the strength of this right wing movement is in its ability to make idiots feel intelligent by banding together and affirming each other's damn fool ideas.
ReplyDeleteOnly a few months ago, a pair of idiots robbed a local bank with toy guns. Fleeing in a car, they were intercepted by local cops who did a Bonnie and Clyde number on them - one died the other was crippled. Of course we see cops literally riddling innocent, unarmed people with lead too. Remember Amadou Diallo? We see cops breaking down doors at the wrong address and killing the occupants several times a year, but they're never found guilty of anything.
We're just a crazy, ignorant, hate-filled and fear-addled country and getting worse all the time and instead of exporting jobs, we ought to start exporting Selwyn and his ilk. A few years behind a water buffalo, up to his waist in muck and manure should work some sense into him.
I have always lived in the country and so our family members were gun owners. Guns provided a means of protecting our cattle and other livestock. Guns also provided meat. The men going out hunting was an annual rite of passage for boys turning into young men. Guns were taken very seriously where we lived. All children were first taught, upon threat of extreme punishment to NEVER touch a gun unless they were supervised by an adult. Then they were taught how to clear a chamber, ensure a gun was empty and use the safety. Ammo was kept locked up.
ReplyDeleteI have always advocated for gun owners but I find myself deeply at odds with how my family handles guns and the dangerously, irresponsible actions of Duke and his ilk. This year I have modified my stance and would support more extensive rules such as requiring annual gun safety tests and even pysch exams before allowing a gun purchase. Of course, that will do nothing to stem the tide of illegal guns being smuggled into this country and then finding their way into the hands of street thugs but perhaps in bringing some sort responsibility and seriousness into the equation we can begin to change the attitudes in our society.
Rocky,
ReplyDeleteI've never had a problem with guns (the bullets just bounce off my thick khaki hide anyway--you'd have to use an elephant gun even to get my attention), and I don't buy fancy librul interpretations of the Second Amendment as all quaint and militia-y. At the same time, I think the Crazy Right fetishizes and worships weapons in a manner that tends to make them irresponsible in the storing and using of the things. Sensible people have their uses for firearms and have every right to own them. Alas, I suspect many a far-rightie male values guns more as a substitute for his perpetually threatened masculinity than as a practical tool.
Like Prohibition, our idiotic war on weed has changed us profoundly as a nation. Exhibition shooting used to be the number one spectator sport and most Presidents went shooting, not to the golf course. Then came Prohibition and crime and gangs and Tommy guns and the Police/Safety State and culture of submission.
ReplyDeleteI was taught to shoot at a range at the age of 11 with a bb gun and moving to a 22 the next year. I loved it. I still do. I'm told that when my parents were young, they used to improve Sunday afternoons by shooting at bottles near the Navy base dad was stationed at. Women seem to be embarrassingly good shots, by the way, but that's another story.
I've owned firearms, antique and modern, since I was in my teens and yes, we used to have 520 acres and never went out in the woods without one nor did the many trespassers, poachers and inebriated hunters I ran across. Usually it was my Civil War Colt .44 or Flintlock Kentucky Rifle, but hey - I still prefer antiques.
In college I had two rifles, an Ithaca single shot .22 and a Lee Enfield .303 and there was a rifle range for the ROTC and everyone else. We were allowed to keep guns in the dorm rooms. Nobody ever got hurt.
In my day, Boys Life magazine and others used to advertise bb guns and .22's as normal boy toys and it was considered part of growing up and a link with our forefathers the pioneers whose skills and woodcraft we were supposed to appreciate as young citizens. We read Dan Beard, Stewart Edward White and aspired to be Marksmen, woodsmen and scouts.
I got a pocket knife at 8, a long bow at 10 and a sheath knife and hatchet when I joined the boy scouts at 12. I always considered a small caliber firearm to be an essential piece of survival equipment when on my many canoe and camping trips - next to matches and knife of course. I am never, ever without a pocket knife.
Needless to say, my daughter is aghast at the suggestion than her eldest might get a scout knife from me - ever. Kids wear helmets and body armor to play in the driveway and travel with space capsules in air conditioned cars from one sterile place to another for organized events. Their environments are so sterile they have allergies I never heard of as a kid when we all played in the dirt, caught crayfish in the creek, made campfires and climbed trees and rode bikes all day all over with hair blowing in the wind of freedom.
For what it's worth the biggest killer of kids here seems to be swimming pools and hot tubs. Teach your kids to swim! He'll have time for the Bachtrian Oud and tap dancing lessons later.
Man, you are in the belly of the beast with Renew America. Nary a greater pack of vicious, hate-filled liars exists on the internet; and they pride themselves for having a religious bent.
ReplyDeleteWhatever God they are praying to is some kind of wacko.