A Florida teen was killed more than a month ago and no arrest has been made. Taking of human life without penalty cheapens life, laughs at our laws. Many people are steamed about this. We should have pillars of steam rising over our heads, too -- clouds of moisture running away as fast as it can from our great source of heat, we should be scorching, burning up mad over such things.
These killing events are tragic and keep repeating. We plop bad laws onto the books, imbue them with pet names to make them seem housebroken, like humans are still in control. These pet peeves, these pests answer to the name of "stand your ground," although "paranoid shooting gallery" would do just as well.
It's a dream come true for the NRA, celebrating Florida law, pushing hard for the same insanity in all 50 states. They are doing quite well with their bloody goals, you should see their amazing progress! No, really -- take a look, the map is very revealing. "The Miami Herald" has a word on the odds of these ugly laws getting any revision, and that word is, "slight." (Three links are below.)
We should not be amazed at the progress of such things, negative progress at that. We're in a war-zone of a country where the courts say it's fine to lie like hell on the news, where hate speech is lovely, racism is kicking, and sexism -- hell, women should be demeaned and shoved barefoot, back into the kitchen, baking something in the oven.
The country's been cut to ribbons for years by Fox and Rush, turning everyone's minds to meat slush, and the low-information-voters among us slurp this stuff right up. Spend ten minutes with either and the agenda's clear as crystal: Hate, don't stop hating, and never, ever look back!
We now call hate speech and racism and sexism entertainment here, and we wonder why hate groups keep skyrocketing in number, why the President's death threats have shot up 400 percent over those of even Dubya's numbers? But, then -- we are really big on murder as entertainment here, too. Just check any entertainment listing on teevee, for the movies. We traffic big-time in death, are in fact death cultists, but prefer to tell ourselves it's only teevee, it's just the movies. We, ourselves, are fine -- we are OK. Sure we are.
Well, there you go, a perfect rendezvous, an American crossroads with no crosses to bear: The death of Trayvon Martin, racism meets death meets entertainment, step right into the maw of our new national psyche, where the law can be whatever you most imagine it to be. Logic does not matter, nor do other people -- all that matters is your belief!
So goes the hallucinogenic mantra of the brain-dead, propaganda-fed mental dwarves representing Christianity and the GOP: These groups are not asking you to consider what you can do for your country, they're telling you to go and grab all you can, no matter the cost to others! It's not "What would Jesus do?" but the eager anticipation of lunacy sprung from asylum, "Jesus -- what can I get away with now!"
Talk about your radio-controlled drones: Rush alone has 15 million of them, probably all armed to the teeth, ready with banana clips, Jesus for damn sure on their side. They are filled to the brim with toxic talk, circular logic eating its own tail, and producing a form of electricity only found in pockets of megawatt ignorance: Merry Fascism, and A Happy New Cult to you!
Even now, their radio and teevee heroes are filling them full with the racist filth at which they excel, lapped up by shoot-first-ask-questions-later types, these ground-standing grand-standers. To a person, each would say, damn right, I'd unload a clip into 'em again, it's a goddammed great law we finally got us on the books.
This beggars an intriguing, although rancidly foul question: Just how much does it take, exactly, technically speaking, hypothetically, of course -- before anyone can open up on another with small arms fire, start drawing fields-of-fire diagrams, next to that line in the sand?
Ratty, ragged, and awful as is the internal logic of these bozo laws and the clowns astride them, it dredges up more terrible scenarios we could experience very soon:
Scenario A: Zimmerman, now having shot and killed, and for no reason a rational person can see, is now clearly a threat to all life-forms, at the least to any and all human persons. As such, would not any shooter have firm legal ground to stand on, if someone blew Zimmerman away, later arguing he was recognized as a recent, no-reason-killer, and, was as such, a clear threat -- Well, officer, I thought he was reaching for something on him, he had a bulge in his coat...
Scenario B: Given that any person can likely testify at a later date, no doubt convincingly, that almost any clothing or movement can be suspicious -- especially as Homeland Security is currently afraid of yawns? So, um, given the levels of imaginary and superstitious non-thinking occurring on simultaneous tracks, what's to prevent some right-wing nut-job from whipping out his piece without warning, cranking off a few rounds into someone, anyone, anytime, anywhere, for any reason?
Scenario C: Given the level of fear instilled in the population at large -- consider it an added benefit, no charge, by the stand-your-ground laws -- we should now consider every person we encounter is ready to open fire at any whim, split-second notice, hair-trigger-fingered, and kill us mid-step, just blow us right away. And, as such, by the power vested in you as a member of a stand-your-ground state, you are hereby authorized to let the lead fly, at any perceptible motion or facial tic from your opponent. Later on, it can all be described as suspicious -- how auspicious! The body count could really get up there -- you know how these racially-motivated cold wars can heat up and escalate!
Unless, of course, we all want to wear white gloves, glow-in-the-dark stuff, every second we are out in public, ready to keep our hands in plain sight -- every second while we walk, work, shop, and stroll, never forgetting... Freeze! No sudden movements!
Otherwise, well -- let the shooting range open, let the hellfire begin!
By the way: Anyone up for Scenarios C-through-quadrillion-Z or so?
Standing ground in all 50: http://motherjones.com/mojo/2012/03/nra-trayvon-martin
NRA "progress": http://redensign.wordpress.com/2010/05/27/castle-law-stand-your-ground-2/
Florida's chances: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/03/25/2713656/nra-ready-to-stand-its-ground.html
