Rec

Great insight!

he did not agree entirely but that is how I see it too.

All the bad things have been bad but once your government either sends you into danger or refuses you protection from that danger it changes. When you can see no good reason for it except their benefit at your expense, perhaps your life, the dialog changes.

I think your husband is exactly correct with this and because of it I think we have a real movement.

Between the idiot Trumplicans, 2nd Amendment nutters and their God NRA, 58,000 killed is a reachable number.

13,000 gun homicides per year, and closing fast.

And it is relatively straightforward to avoid most of that risk by not joining a gang, not frequenting bad neighborhoods, and by not being out late at night.

What's the ONE thing that ties these lines of thought together? I wonder...WHATEVER could it be?

There are stories of good, promising kids who did everything right, being killed on the streets they live on in places like Chicago.

in those places likely can not afford to live in a better place.

By not being in a Florida gay nightclub? Or walking across a college campus?

"Less than 4,000" and your other comments make it sound as though you find the death rate somehow acceptable -- as tho there are mitigating factors, and you are trying to find those mitigating factors by blaming people who are stuck in poor neighborhoods or have reasons for being out "late at night." Have you mentioned driving while black yet? Walking while black? Walking while female? (oh wait, walking while female is what gets you raped, not shot)

Do explain further.

Oh wait. That murder doesn't "count".

More dog whistles in that post than a boarding kennel.

values guns over human lives. See: England, Canada, Australia, Japan, etc.

Did you really just tell 18-24 year old (most who have, at best, limited upward mobility) to move from their neighborhoods if they're a little rough?! What nonsense.

using only social media & news reports. it was like 2000+.

Last edited Wed Feb 28, 2018, 06:52 PM - Edit history (1)

...under the gun in their own country.

Of every school. The physical deaths are reinforcements of that fear.

were ON the battlefield. A very real battlefield. So the total number of deaths is immaterial to their determination and resolve to fix this. The fact that it could happen any time, anywhere injects a sense of danger where there otherwise wouldn't be.

The useless deaths in Vietnam, the useless deaths now,while Politicians sit on their hands,collect their NRA campaign funds.

What does it matter how many died? These kids do not remember Vietnam! They only know they are dying today!

And millions more will join them in the voting booths.

That was a great meeting today. Let us see if they follow through. That old Dianne Feinstein some are complaining about being too old had a list of the deaths when we had a decent control bill compared to after Congress let it run down! Too old,yeah,right!

Where is my sarcasm smilie?

and other youth movements because of their tremendous command of the discussion and influencing the way people think about and talk about these issues. They are inspiring people everywhere through their excellent tactics and persistence and difficult questions/demands of the people in power.

I'm extremely impressed. This is the generation that will finally defeat the NRA and get some sensible reforms passed.

We must help them every way we can.

And yet for those of us old enough for Vietnam, here we are in Afghanistan 17 years and many sons and daughters of both sides later paying the ultimate price. It is my hope that my generation helps them more than my parents helped mine... They are right of course and I stand and act with them.

...versus the so-called all-volunteer military. My high school boyfriend (class of 1965) used to say sarcastically of military recruiters coming to our school: "You can be the first on your block to step on a punji stick." The most outstanding singer in my high school died there. The brother of a college friend, who had just earned his Master's degree died there. We were ALL within one or two degrees of separation.

Nowadays it's pretty much a poverty-draft, nobody I know, and weeks can go by without my thinking of Afghanistan. I know -- but in a much more abstract way. Something like 1% of the population is serving in uniform.

But mass murders right here in the godforsaken "homeland"? Every week and escalating. I was shocked when someone pointed out that all these kids had been born after Columbine. It is life (and death) as they know it. Old men are willing to let them be bloodily sacrificed for a lie -- and I am so glad to see that young woman standing up and yelling: "I call BS!"

Old soldiers never die; only the young ones do.

Instead of raising the age to purchase weapons of mass-murder, let's lower the age and send all non-privileged youth to some shithole country so they can learn foreign affairs and teach those infidels about their Right Way. Just as hormones and feelings of alienation are setting in, they can show the world how the US works.

Naturally children of privilege and of old men/baubles will be able to stay home so Harvard and other schools don't have empty classrooms.

for Christ."

actionable offense.

In my part of the country, there were boys getting out of high school who didn't have a gig lined up, they weren't college bound, their family didn't have money, they kinda felt like it might be their duty to go to war like the generation before. They felt like they needed to serve in some way. This narrative is based on the life of my dear cousin who enlisted in 1968 and who went to war, who did his duty to his country, who came back home and married his high school sweetheart, and who (thank dog) is still alive. He has had some terrible bouts with PTSD, has severe hearing loss, and has an addiction to the King James version of the bible, but is still the same, sweet cousin that I have always known and loved.

>sigh< So many tough choices.
My brother had a double hernia, and waited to get it fixed until after he flunked the physical. I think his piss-poor eyesight would have disqualified him anyway, but you never know. Our dad did not understand why his son did not want to go to this war, and they had harsh words, some of them unforgivable.

One of our cousins served in Vietnam after being drafted; was exposed to Agent Orange, chose to never have kids. Another one of our cousins decided to skip to Canada -- he had already "served" overseas as an Air Force brat with an autocratic blustering father, scarcely knew the US as such, and decided the hell with it.

Every man I know was shaped by that war.

And while I wasn't looking, every kid in this country in the youngest generation was being shaped by a bloody war against them on our own soil.

for the phrase "bring the war home."

is it, we are killing our children" (paraphrased). The war must end. They had supported it up until then.

In DC that weekend and mostly kids for it to make a real difference and they can’t let up like we didn’t in the 60’s.

The kids have the Internet but it has to go beyond that because of all the misinformation and how its so easy to ignore.

Millions of kids in DC you can’t ignore that.

Its the first event like it that he personally wanted to go to but we can’t afford it. He also said we shouldn’t plan local ones until the DC one is full.

I told him I am going to local one.

Activists from the Vietnam era ended the draft, and I hope these young activists can effect changes to gun laws.

While tragic as any loss of life is the flu kills more people across all demographics and is more dangerous than guns.

If we are going to get into a numbers game with the far right we need to be able to accurately account for our data.

Here is one site that has a lot of data on it that I believe evolved out of Slate (I don't know if it's a left or right leaning site now)


http://www.gunviolencearchive.org

Oops! Was that my out-loud voice?

Yes data, rosy ass and all included.

Data shows more people died in concentration camps in WW II.

Sad.

My point exactly on data

He nailed it.