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Pulse
I count myself lucky that I mostly don't find news stories emotionally overwhelming, no matter how upsetting they are.
Yesterday was no exception to that rule. I am incredibly sad, very angry, and also a little frightened. I'm not surprised, except maybe at just how much destruction one man was able to wreak.
For those of you who've been away from every single form of media out there for the past two days: the night before last, a man went into a gay night club (Pulse) in Orlando, Florida, and shot 50 people, wounding 53 more. It's being called the largest mass shooting in U.S. history (not technically accurate, since Wounded Knee had more victims, but apparently that somehow doesn't count?), and may well be the largest-scale massacre of LGBT people since the Holocaust.
The gunman allegedly called 911 before the attack and claimed allegiance to ISIS (who have since gleefully claimed responsibility for it all), but what's come out is that he was an outspoken homophobe, as well as a domestic abuser. He got upset about seeing two men kiss in public a few weeks ago, and somehow that translated, over time, into the decision to take up a weapon and go into a space that was supposedly meant to be safe for the queer community, and turned it into a death trap.
It's a complex issue. It's not a radical Islam problem, but rather a problem of toxic masculinity, of homophobia, of a culture that promotes violence as the ultimate solution to solving your issues. Don't like gay people? Kill 'em. Before you say that this man is an outlier, let me remind you that in the U.S. there are dozens, if not hundreds, of existing and proposed anti-LGBT legislation, ranging from laws saying where we are allowed and not allowed to relieve ourselves, to laws allowing people to fire us without repercussions, to outright killing us (thankfully the Sodomite Suppression Act was blocked, but the fact that it existed at all is pretty telling). All of American culture seems to be hell-bent on eradicating anything or anyone that's not heterosexual, cisgender, and white (let's not forget that this happened during "Latin Night," when most of the club-goers would have been of Latin and Black extraction), and its politicians are the goad, driving that culture inexorably further. (I'm talking about the U.S. because that's where this is taking place, but I know Canada isn't exactly blameless either)
This is also a gun regulation issue. I know that some of my friends are perfectly responsible gun owners who enjoy a wide variety of activities: hunting, target shooting, etc. Guns don't kill people, people with guns kill people. I will not get into the nitty-gritty of gun control in this entry, especially as it's not my particular specialty, and I know people who are passionate about this issue who are much better at debate than I (not difficult, I suck at it) will doubtless come up with ways to argue this point. What I will say is that some of the usual pro-gun arguments got pretty thoroughly debunked here. There were several "good guys with a gun" in that night club, and none of them were able to take down the gunman before he killed 50 people and wounded 53 others. Arming the entire population will not increase their safety.
Mostly, we need to start teaching our boys and our men a different path. One of kindness, of compassion, one that doesn't equate being a man with suppressing all emotions except anger. I am particularly blessed to be surrounded by men who do know better, but the more I look at the larger world, the more I realise that I live in a sheltered bubble of good people. I am safe only because my friends were raised to not use violence as a solution to their problems. My personal safety when I go outside my home is dependent entirely on the kindness of strangers, so what happens when those strangers haven't been taught to be kind? When they've been taught it's okay to hate someone because of how they look, or who they love, or what they worship? That the natural expression of hatred is to kill?
I don't have a neat solution to propose. If I did, I'm sure someone cleverer than I would have come up with it already, and I wouldn't be making this post in the aftermath of a massacre. I do know that I'm trying to lead by example, but since I'm a woman, my voice counts for less in the circles where we need to make the most difference. I am happy and proud that my male friends also lead by example, and I can only hope that each pebble they throw in the pond has a large ripple effect.
*Note: I'm probably not going to engage anyone in debate in the comments. Like I said, I'm bad at it, and it's not something I find enjoyable. That being said, discussion amongst yourselves is welcomed and encouraged. For the new people to my LJ: keep it civilised, keep it polite. No ad hominem attacks, no insinuating that people are stupid for not sharing your worldview, keep the profanity to generalisations and not directed at people. Please follow Wheaton's Law of the Internet: don't be a dick.
Yesterday was no exception to that rule. I am incredibly sad, very angry, and also a little frightened. I'm not surprised, except maybe at just how much destruction one man was able to wreak.
For those of you who've been away from every single form of media out there for the past two days: the night before last, a man went into a gay night club (Pulse) in Orlando, Florida, and shot 50 people, wounding 53 more. It's being called the largest mass shooting in U.S. history (not technically accurate, since Wounded Knee had more victims, but apparently that somehow doesn't count?), and may well be the largest-scale massacre of LGBT people since the Holocaust.
The gunman allegedly called 911 before the attack and claimed allegiance to ISIS (who have since gleefully claimed responsibility for it all), but what's come out is that he was an outspoken homophobe, as well as a domestic abuser. He got upset about seeing two men kiss in public a few weeks ago, and somehow that translated, over time, into the decision to take up a weapon and go into a space that was supposedly meant to be safe for the queer community, and turned it into a death trap.
It's a complex issue. It's not a radical Islam problem, but rather a problem of toxic masculinity, of homophobia, of a culture that promotes violence as the ultimate solution to solving your issues. Don't like gay people? Kill 'em. Before you say that this man is an outlier, let me remind you that in the U.S. there are dozens, if not hundreds, of existing and proposed anti-LGBT legislation, ranging from laws saying where we are allowed and not allowed to relieve ourselves, to laws allowing people to fire us without repercussions, to outright killing us (thankfully the Sodomite Suppression Act was blocked, but the fact that it existed at all is pretty telling). All of American culture seems to be hell-bent on eradicating anything or anyone that's not heterosexual, cisgender, and white (let's not forget that this happened during "Latin Night," when most of the club-goers would have been of Latin and Black extraction), and its politicians are the goad, driving that culture inexorably further. (I'm talking about the U.S. because that's where this is taking place, but I know Canada isn't exactly blameless either)
This is also a gun regulation issue. I know that some of my friends are perfectly responsible gun owners who enjoy a wide variety of activities: hunting, target shooting, etc. Guns don't kill people, people with guns kill people. I will not get into the nitty-gritty of gun control in this entry, especially as it's not my particular specialty, and I know people who are passionate about this issue who are much better at debate than I (not difficult, I suck at it) will doubtless come up with ways to argue this point. What I will say is that some of the usual pro-gun arguments got pretty thoroughly debunked here. There were several "good guys with a gun" in that night club, and none of them were able to take down the gunman before he killed 50 people and wounded 53 others. Arming the entire population will not increase their safety.
Mostly, we need to start teaching our boys and our men a different path. One of kindness, of compassion, one that doesn't equate being a man with suppressing all emotions except anger. I am particularly blessed to be surrounded by men who do know better, but the more I look at the larger world, the more I realise that I live in a sheltered bubble of good people. I am safe only because my friends were raised to not use violence as a solution to their problems. My personal safety when I go outside my home is dependent entirely on the kindness of strangers, so what happens when those strangers haven't been taught to be kind? When they've been taught it's okay to hate someone because of how they look, or who they love, or what they worship? That the natural expression of hatred is to kill?
I don't have a neat solution to propose. If I did, I'm sure someone cleverer than I would have come up with it already, and I wouldn't be making this post in the aftermath of a massacre. I do know that I'm trying to lead by example, but since I'm a woman, my voice counts for less in the circles where we need to make the most difference. I am happy and proud that my male friends also lead by example, and I can only hope that each pebble they throw in the pond has a large ripple effect.
*Note: I'm probably not going to engage anyone in debate in the comments. Like I said, I'm bad at it, and it's not something I find enjoyable. That being said, discussion amongst yourselves is welcomed and encouraged. For the new people to my LJ: keep it civilised, keep it polite. No ad hominem attacks, no insinuating that people are stupid for not sharing your worldview, keep the profanity to generalisations and not directed at people. Please follow Wheaton's Law of the Internet: don't be a dick.
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That all said, I do find American gun laws to be pretty batshit crazy. Canadian laws are a little too restrictive and punitive, but not as far off the mark as the American laws are. But mass shootings actually are a poor time to discuss gun policy, because as sensational as they are, their aggregate body count is basically statistical noise when compared to suicide, gang violence, and domestic violence.
Of course, I'd be inclined to connect these smaller scale shootings to the pervasive winner-take-all mentality too. I know I'm not alone in identifying this particular social malaise (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBwAxmrE194).
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(It's probably also worth noting that in the case of American culture "fucked up" doesn't mean it's all bad; there are a lot of really amazing things about American culture too, and it strikes me as a genuinely tricky problem how to essentially remove the really terrible bits without wrecking the really amazing bits.)
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...and then I excused myself from facebook for at least a few months, to go and do things that I actually enjoy, rather than wandering through a minefield of triggers, hoping to find something nice or interesting that a friend of mine may have posted :P