Mass shootings tend to lift gun sales

Figures for the first few weeks of this month are not yet available, but anecdotal evidence from nearly a dozen gun shops nationwide suggests a similar response after the deadly shooting of 20 children and six adults at the Sandy Hook school in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14.

Tripe. (Speaking of the writing.)

davidk on December 22, 2012 at 5:08 PM

“The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun” – Wayne LaPierre (NRA)

“Society is safer when criminals don’t know who’s armed.” (CRPA)

Pork-Chop on December 22, 2012 at 5:07 PM

The LaPierre comment should make it to bumper sticker status. It has become my favorite pro-gun quip. Previous holder was Heinlein’s “An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.”

davidk on December 22, 2012 at 5:12 PM

http://twitchy.com/2012/12/22/aww-poor-widdle-piers-morgan-has-a-case-of-the-sads-over-petition-to-deport-him/

davidk on December 22, 2012 at 6:23 PM

I was struck by the persistent lack of commentary and analysis discussing the fact that mass shooters are almost all angry, male and white.

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There is, sadly, nothing unique about men with guns in this country killing people every day. In the case of mass murders, the extreme symptom of this disaster, the question is, “Why did another angry, young, white man act this way and kill these people?”

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Young, white men are overwhelmingly the perpetrators of mass shootings.

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White boys and men are not biologically or genetically predisposed to be homicidal mass murders or domestic abusers. However, violence is part of how American masculinity is defined. And guns are part of that violence.

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Young white men have entitlements and privileges that, when combined with disappointment, illness, loss and soul-strippingly unhealthy and common glorification of violence, can lead to tragedy.

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Salon’s David Sirota pointed out that white men are really the only group in America that is “not allowed to be profiled.” We need more white men like David Sirota and Chris Hayes, who disproportionately make up our media experts and political leaders, to step up and talk openly about exactly this. About how ideas about whiteness and maleness are not only our unquestioned norms, but are imbued with an innocence and authority that makes it almost impossible to critically talk about them in terms of a pattern of horrific events like Sandy Hook.

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For young men, especially white men, anger and violence are privileges which others cannot lay claim to and are definitively punished for exercising.

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It’s not racist or sexist to suggest that white men are struggling with a loss of power in this country.

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I’m not demonizing white men, many if not most of whom probably don’t feel powerful and in control.

http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2012/12/17/why-wont-we-talk-about-violence-and-masculinity-in-america/

davidk on December 22, 2012 at 6:49 PM