Gay Nightclub shooting in Florida

[larkin]

If this has happened, of course i am grieved at this terrible senseless loss. But, i no longer trust the media at it's word. i believe that it bears a closer look on our parts. Pity and sympathy are not constructive for the gay movement.

Two issues cross my mind.. (notacutandpastepiece)

The first issue is the public's tendency to believe reality TV as if it was actually real. Programs like Real Housewives, The Apprentice, Pawnshop Wars and even Judge Judy. These shows blur the line between contrived production and reality. Americans seem to take it all in without question.
Conversely, it amazed me that at the moment the tragedy was happening, just how much 9-11 mimicked an extravagant disaster film right out of Hollywood.
People immersed into TV can be made to believe anything...
Then there is the constant media voice-over explaining to us what is happening.

“The facts are meaningless. The only thing that matters is the perception of things.


The second issue is the need for basic detective work by individuals on the ground. Stay away from speculation and go after hard irrefutable facts. Document everything. Visit local hospitals, visit local morgues. Accumulate information. Acquire a list and visit the families of victims. If the news media is not going to do their job, then we have to...

What happened?
Who did that?
When did it take place?
Where did it take place?
Why did that happen?

If you cannot establish something as fact, it is unsubstantiated speculation.
One does not need a college degree or credentials to follow these basic rules of information gathering and reporting.

Speculation are clues to be sure, but they are not true until tied together with facts.

I expect to get into trouble for this post but please consider, I have ventured no speculation or theory as to what happened in Orlando, I would just like to hear from non-media.people on the ground..

[Addym Kehris]

What happened?

Who did that?

When did it take place?

Where did it take place?

Why did that happen?

If you cannot establish something as fact, it is unsubstantiated speculation.

One does not need a college degree or credentials to follow these basic rules of information gathering and reporting.

Here, here.

Or should that be hear, hear?

Anyway, I agree with Larkin.

[FreeThinker]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jun/16/baptist-preacher-roger-jimenez-orlando-massacre-california-protest

This Baptist preacher said all homosexuals should be lined up before a firing squad and killed and that the tragedy is more weren't killed.

Another in Texas said the same thing. These people make Westboro look tolerant.

Of course the same passage they quote from the Bible also says to sell disobedient daughters into slavery and stone adulterers. Oh, and not to eat shellfish.

[ChrisR]

FreeThinker - Who is the Texas pastor you cite as promoting firing squads for gays? The one doing so in the video is in, of all places, California.

[dude]

Despite California's 'liberal image' the Sacramento area is a hotbed of right-wing bigotry as well as a center for Russian and other eastern European immigrants and crime.

[FreeThinker]

The second preacher is Steven Anderson of Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe, Arizona, not Texas.

[ChrisR]

Thanks for the update, FT. And to you as well, dude. For some strange reason I just find this a rather unusual forum for people to accept preconceived notions and, well, prejudices. (Yes, I'm a proud Texan.) This group should know better. Is it suddenly okay because the shoe is on the other foot?

A horrible crime has been committed in Florida - a state likely with as many New York Democrats as New York has itself - and there are bound to be idiots out there who take advantage of their opportunity to "shine". Whether it's ISIS taking claim, or bigots saying 'they had it coming', or weepy wailers who suddenly appear on scene in 'solidarity' with the victims, there are plenty of folks to garner their share of the spotlight.

Fact is that there's enough horrible stuff to go around. Not far from The Pulse a two-year-old boy on vacation with his family was killed by an alligator. Three high school kids died in a car wreck last weekend in Maryland, a few hours before graduation. And if Syria is having a typical day, about 250 people died in the violence they call a "civil" war. That's the world. No need to embellish.

[FreeThinker]

I wasn't attacking Texas. I merely mentioned where I thought he was from. Actually, I used to live in Texas-- Ft Worth and Austin, back when Austin was still delightfully weird, before it turned into Dallas.

[Joe]

I firmly believe that some or much of the violence that comes from within the ranks of that religion is an outgrowth of the despair many of its followers feel. Their followers often come from countries where there are not enough jobs for their young people, where living condition are poor to atrocious, and where the populous as a whole has little hope. Often there is little for them to live for, and life itself isn't something they hold dear.

There is a solution. Not an easy, quick one, but a solution. That is to bring these people, these cultures, out of the dark ages. Take all the oil money that flows into these regions and turn it into vibrant economies. Create jobs. Mandate education. Create opportunity. Free women to equal status with men. Give young people an avenue to success.

This would take leadership that seems absent in those parts of the world today. It would take leadership that would turn away from the violent elements of their religion. It wouldn't be a simple task. But places with strong economies, strong traditions of education and hope for the future are not the spawning grounds of terrorism.

Perhaps if Trump would look as using some of these billions of dollars he claims to have to support economic growth and job creation for the masses who are being led astray, perhaps if he'd promote something along those lines, using his money as an economic engine, he'd be part of a solution to the terrorism problem. Instead, he promotes building walls, throwing peace-loving, hard working people out of this country and restricting more of that kind from coming in. In that regard, he looks more like part of the problem instead of part of the solution.

C

Christopher Hitchens questioned the issue of "despair" and pointed out that the jihadist screeds left by many of the suicide bombers did not reflect anything remotely resembling "despair". Certainly, I do not think that we could list "despair" as a motivation for the kamikaze bombers of the Second World War. I have yet to hear anyone suggest "despair" as among the motivators for Orlando.

I think the answer is more complex, and more evil, and more religious, than that.

I like the solution, and would point out that there was a Golden Age for Islam that was rather ruthlessly stamped out by fundamentalists. That is a good solution, but how would we even consider implementing it and, are "we" even capable of implementing it. Sounds rather imperial to me.

[JamesSavik]

The Preachers had better watch what they say because karma is a real bitch.

If we really have a Muslim insurgency, one of their next targets will be Christian Churches.

Just this past Easter a suicide bomber killed 70 at a church in Pakistan.

[Cole Parker]

I like the solution, and would point out that there was a Golden Age for Islam that was rather ruthlessly stamped out by fundamentalists. That is a good solution, but how would we even consider implementing it and, are "we" even capable of implementing it. Sounds rather imperial to me.

I wasn't suggesting 'we' implement anything. It's up to the leaders of those nations, those regions, to do this. It's up the the people living there to demand this. We've shown time and time again that when we try to decide for other nations what's best for them, we fudge it up royally. No, they have to do this themselves.

And the despair I was talking about was in the people of those regions. It's what makes them susceptible to being indoctrinated with the hatred that leads to the terrorist acts. I agree that once they've been turned, once they truly believe violence and terrorism are somehow noble, they no longer feel despair.

C

[ChrisR]

Cole - Your suggestion is quite accurate, but it reminds me of the classic cartoon in which the mathematician has written a complex problem on the left side of the board, an equally complex solution on the right, and a box in the middle that says simply, "Then a miracle happens."

Many Islamic countries number in the highest per-capita GDP in the world. Six of the top twenty-five countries are oil-rich Arab countries, including the #1 country, Qatar. Its $132,099 per capita GDA stands well above all other players. (In comparison, the US stands 10th with $55,805 and the UK is 25th with $41,159.) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP%29_per_capita]

Qatar, of course, is best known for its questionable award of the 2022 World Cup. And those World Cup facilities are being built not by local residents, but by imported labor treated, according to multiple reports, as slaves. In fact, the average monthly wage in Qatar is a measly $1680.
[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/24/un-gives-qatar-year-end-forced-labour-migrant-workers]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_per_capita_personal_income]

I appreciate your optimism, but how do you propose the world, or the individual countries therein, get control of things and offer the improvements you suggest? Do you predict an erupting leadership more willing to share power and wealth of its own accord? Or do you suggest that disheartened but perhaps altruistic suicide attack individuals and teams will try to force change from without?

And does either image fit the Pulse attack which seems so far to be an individual action performed by an individual who might even have been confused about his own sexuality and sought a suicidal end to atone for his sins? That one is always going to be a challenge.

[Cole Parker]

Yes, for real change in the parts of the world where terrorism is spawned, it's the people themselves who have to say, "ENOUGH!" just as has been done through time immemorial. I doubt any revolution, seen logically before it happened, would have been thought to have sapling's chance in a forest fire. Yet look at the ones that succeeded. Who'd have ever believed the citizenry of France could overthrow the established monarchy?

Anyway, I didn't say this would happen. I projected it as the way change needed to happen in those countries.

As for mass shootings by a disgruntled individual, that's a different issue. Anyone willing to die to wreck havoc has a pretty good chance of succeeding in a country where the citizens are free. However, there is something that can be done to make it more difficult for them. We can stop making it so easy for them to acquire automatic and semiautomatic rifles and pistols. And we can even do it without changing our Constitution by a single word.

C

[bi_janus]

I commend to you Eric Hoffer's book, The True Believer, first published in 1951. His analysis of the roots of fanaticism is instructive, even in the age of social media.

[Joe]

Cole,

Thanks for the clarification and apologies for misconstruing your comments. I'm afraid I see no interest among the nations of that region to move in the direction you prescribe so I leapt to a typically imperial notion that we'd better do it for them and I don't think that's possible, even assuming it's a good idea.

A hundred years or more ago, the Taliban was alive and well in Afghanistan, though they called them "Ghazis" then. Doesn't seem like there's been much progress. Oh well, festina lente I guess.

Cheers,

[Cole Parker]

Ain't it true. One thing this nation can be very proud of is we're problem-solvers, See solve our problems, and as a society we moved forward. Our society changes, and almost always for the better. For many societies, the way of life never changes much. Old ideas and cultures remain fixed. They don't seem to move on.

C

[Merkin]

... Our society changes, and almost always for the better.

C

It's really hard to let you get away with that statement, Cole.

[Cole Parker]

Guess it depends on your outlook. Which decade since the 1940's were better than our current one for the majority of American lives?

C

[ChrisR]

Arguably, Cole, all of them. Or none of them. Depends on how you categorize "better".

The 40s weren't all that great when you factor in the million or so US casualties from WW2. Not many in comparison to some places, of course, but it wasn't nothin' either.

The 50s had Korea and the US polio epidemic. The latter ended, thanks to Drs. Salk and Sabin, but the former is technically n a timeout. Which brings us to the Sixties with their assassinations, the Vietnam War, Bay of Pigs, Cuban Missile Crisis and the first lunar landing. Sort of mixed bags for both decades.

The 70s had gas crises, price freezes, the Mayaguez, and "444 Days in Iran". Those 444 days ended literally while Reagan was taking his oath of office to begin the 1980s. A convoluted time of the bombing of a Berlin discotheque and retribution against Libya and Lockerbie retaliation followed. Not to mention Mr. Reagan's "We begin bombing in 5 minutes" open mike gaffe. And not to forget, by the way, Able Archer '83, the closest the US and Soviets have ever come to nuclear war. (And you thought it was Cuba?!) Oops.

By the 90s people were ready for any sort of upgrade. Of course it never seems to come. Though the decade started off with freeing Nelson Mandela, the end of the USSR and Lech Walesa becoming first president of an independent Poland, the rest of the decade saw regrowth of US-Russian distrust. Sarin gas was released in the Tokyo subways, India and Pakistan both joined The Nuclear Club, Princess Diana died and Harry Potter was born. One again, a mixed review.

Now we're in the New Millennium, for whatever it's worth. Of course 9/11 in the US and 7/7 in London took the wind right out of our sails. And entirely new "security" enterprise has grown up around those events, but hasn't really seemed to offer much in the way of security. We've fought more wars, of course, which seems to be the American first response. We declared victory in one, but it seems we're still fighting that one along with untold others. And from the incident last week in Orlando it sure seems that every step taken forward has a fairly steep cost.

The only thing to show up along the way in this decade has been a candidate whose mantra was Hope and Change. Personally I'm still looking for both. So I can't say your challenge to find a better decade than the 40s is a loser. But in at least some respects it's because we've had a string of bad decades.

CR

[Cole Parker]

I think you misinterpreted what I was asking, Chris. My point was our current decade is better for more people that any of the others since and including the 40s. Thanks for proving my point! I agree. Your examples were right on, and it would be easy to double the number of troubles in each decade.

[larkin]

Over the last decade, our cable news has become the consolidated corporate media that specializes in narrowing the focus on many news stories in an effort channel the debate. The spectrum between FOXNews and NPR just isn't that broad. The difference is more about nuance and tone than about content.

The article I am linking you to is from Glenn Greenwald's Intercept. It does not speculate on conspiracy but gives us more information than we are getting from cable news.

FBI Still Concealing Almost All of What the Orlando Gunman Said.

https://theintercept.com/2016/06/20/fbi-releases-partial-redacted-transcript-orlando-gunmans-911-calls-attack/