Killed - by a gun, by the court, or by society?
I have never followed any news program faithfully or read anything diligently to keep myself updated on what's going on. Some things, though, you just can't ignore.
Case # 1: Recently, a 16-year old boy in Minnesota killed 10 people including his grandfather and himself, and injured several others. While this is in itself, distressing, I am even more distressed at the lack of distress over this in public and in the media. Sure, they cover it, but not with the shock that say, the Columbine killings commanded. Has it become such a routine part of this culture to have young kids thinking morbid thoughts and killing people? Is it acceptable for kids to have guns? (okay, 'teenagers', but heck, a widely publicized study shows that your brain's frontal lobes aren't fully developed even in your late teens. And fyi, the frontal lobes are the center of planning, impulse control, and all that nifty stuff)
A guy I met recently from rural Nebraska was regaling us with stories about hunting, and how occasionally, a student would forget to remove his gun from the back of his truck or car, and just drive with it to school! While I laughed then, the thought now chills me. Imagine being a kid that has a long series of stressful events in his short life, coming to school and something pisses him off - with his under-developed frontal cortex and a gun he happened to have in his trunk handy, heck, why not go make some noise?!
Case #2: Terri Shiavo...okay, this is getting much more publicity that the high school killings, and we all are probably tired of hearing about it, but it just goes with the theme. (The theme being of course, where is society heading and what should we care about and why are we being manipulated by politicians and the media.)
Because I have a sneaky suspicion that the Shiavo case is not about denying this woman life-support or not, it's about politics. It's about getting the religious conservative replublican stronghold on America tighter. It's NOT about saving someone's life, if it was, Bush would have pulled out of the war and saved hundreds and thousands of lives. If it was truly people's lives he was concerned about, Bush wouldn't mind cutting short his many vacations to Crawford, or waking up to sign a bill at 1:11 a.m, or anything of that nature like he did in this case. I think this was seen and seized as a great political opportunity to send out a message to a certain target group.
Maybe I am just a liberal pinko-commie beeyotch, but I find it very difficult to wrap my head around a philosophy that simultaneously is pro-life, pro-war, but against gay rights, against gun control. If someone can explain this one to me, it'd be great!
Case # 1: Recently, a 16-year old boy in Minnesota killed 10 people including his grandfather and himself, and injured several others. While this is in itself, distressing, I am even more distressed at the lack of distress over this in public and in the media. Sure, they cover it, but not with the shock that say, the Columbine killings commanded. Has it become such a routine part of this culture to have young kids thinking morbid thoughts and killing people? Is it acceptable for kids to have guns? (okay, 'teenagers', but heck, a widely publicized study shows that your brain's frontal lobes aren't fully developed even in your late teens. And fyi, the frontal lobes are the center of planning, impulse control, and all that nifty stuff)
A guy I met recently from rural Nebraska was regaling us with stories about hunting, and how occasionally, a student would forget to remove his gun from the back of his truck or car, and just drive with it to school! While I laughed then, the thought now chills me. Imagine being a kid that has a long series of stressful events in his short life, coming to school and something pisses him off - with his under-developed frontal cortex and a gun he happened to have in his trunk handy, heck, why not go make some noise?!
Case #2: Terri Shiavo...okay, this is getting much more publicity that the high school killings, and we all are probably tired of hearing about it, but it just goes with the theme. (The theme being of course, where is society heading and what should we care about and why are we being manipulated by politicians and the media.)
Because I have a sneaky suspicion that the Shiavo case is not about denying this woman life-support or not, it's about politics. It's about getting the religious conservative replublican stronghold on America tighter. It's NOT about saving someone's life, if it was, Bush would have pulled out of the war and saved hundreds and thousands of lives. If it was truly people's lives he was concerned about, Bush wouldn't mind cutting short his many vacations to Crawford, or waking up to sign a bill at 1:11 a.m, or anything of that nature like he did in this case. I think this was seen and seized as a great political opportunity to send out a message to a certain target group.
Maybe I am just a liberal pinko-commie beeyotch, but I find it very difficult to wrap my head around a philosophy that simultaneously is pro-life, pro-war, but against gay rights, against gun control. If someone can explain this one to me, it'd be great!
posted by RTD2 at 9:59 PM
5 Comments:
You hit the nail on the head as far as the Schiavo case is concerned. It was political opportunism at its worst. These are bad bad times in this country, and unfortunately, for people like you and me, there is no guarantee that things will get better.
Yes - It appears that the shooting incident did not grab enough attention. Two things:
1. Some how I feel its a bit like killings in Kashmir (I remember being fairly numb to those - we unfortunately read about them too often).
2. There was an editorial in our School's newspaper which spoke about how all the killings are done by boys and not by girls ...and some more analytical BS. Probably the most insensitive piece of writing considering the human tradegy involved and the fact that it was commited by a child. But it again basically told this...( as you mention).. this kind of crime is getting to accepted as "something that happens"
...sad...
It's amazing, but the conservatives can stay pro-war and pro-life at the same time and not think twice about the quality of life of Terry Shiavo. Seems all to self-centered if you ask me.
I think these bad times, Parth, are just a sign of things to come."Beware..Kaliyug is upon us!!"
I agree,SD, being desensitized is worse than being insensitive.
Hello Jadewomen! Yup..politicians (not necessarily only the conservatives) are self-centered, self-serving, and sneaky enough to get away with it.
As parth said, these are bad times for this country. But I am not ready to give up hope just yet.
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