Firearms. (photo: Getty Images)
26 November 15
Terrorism need not force its way into every discussion—there's enough to be afraid around here already.
ver the weekend, a woman and her daughter were shot to death
in Des Moines.
The chief suspect is the husband and father. One more
domestic dispute gone to gunplay and murder because there was a firearm
handy. I heard about it in the shuttle van on the way to the airport.
The local news reader said that Des Moines police "were confident" that
the murders were not part of any "larger action."
Damn, I thought, has it come to that? Do we really
have to be reassured that this unfortunately too-commonplace scenario in
American life—something that simply is part of the price we have to pay
for our Second Amendment freedoms—has nothing to do with terrorism? Do
journalists, even the ones who simply read copy for a living, feel
obligated to provide that reassurance? Is there room under the bed for
all 320 million of us?
I accept that things changed after 9/11. I take off my
belt and shoes at the airport just like the next guy, unless, of
course, I luck into the blessed TSA Pre-Check line, for which I
regularly thank Big Government Jesus. But I don't accept, and I never
have accepted, the fact that "everything" changed on that awful day, let
alone a week ago in Paris. I don't think "Eeek! Terrorists!" should
invade every institution of daily life in this country the way it has. I
don't think local news stations have any business constantly running
B-roll of Paris while the local "security consultant" waxes on about the
old boogedy-boogedy. And I certainly don't need any more evidence that
America is a gun-addled violent place, and that it became such quite on
its own.
Also this weekend, there was a mass shooting
at the Bunny Friend Playground in the Ninth Ward in New Orleans.
Seventeen people were shot, none of them fatally, thank god. Here's some
of what we know.
Witnesses saw a man with a silver-colored machine gun flee toward Louisa Street. Gunfire continued in the park after he left. It is the largest mass shooting in New Orleans since the Mother's Day second-line of 2013. Between then and now, the shootings that injured the most people took place on Bourbon Street, June 29, 2013, where 10 people were shot, one of whom died; and on Burgundy Street, August 10, 2014, where seven people were shot, two fatally.
A "silver-colored machine gun."
In an American city.
Good thing the guy wasn't Syrian.
Comments
+51
#
2015-11-26 18:12
We're parsing and
obfuscating "terrorism" in a political way, aren't we? Can we deny that
the woman and her daughter who were murdered in Des Moines didn't feel
terror when they were being shot? Can we deny that in our country
domestic crime like this is the norm? I think "We have met the enemy,
and he is us."
+30
#
2015-11-26 19:57
You are absolutely
right. Death by domestic violence IS THE NORM.For one thing, the facts
back it up. For another, I've had several conversations with police
seargants, and that is exactly what they say. The overwhelming majority
of the time, murder has nothing to do with random violence. Maybe all
the yapping about terrorism serves another purpose-- focusing on the
rarest events helps us to deny what violence really means 99% of the
time.
+39
#
2015-11-26 18:47
In this country there
is more than one mass shooting (defined as 4 or more people shot) PER
DAY. If that isn't domestic terrorism, I don't know what is. Yet it's
rarely described as such in the news media. If it were, people would
understand that we're at far greater danger from our fellow citizens
than we are from any foreign terrorists.
Problem is, such a realization could lead to an even greater police state than what we already have. What to do?
Problem is, such a realization could lead to an even greater police state than what we already have. What to do?
