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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Rude Pundit: Jordan Davis Killer Michael Dunn Was Just Another White Coward with a Gun
Over coffee, safely esconced in the corner of an East Village joint, the Rude Pundit talked to an old friend - let's call him "Ben" because that name'll probably piss him off - from the South who has lived up in these sinful Yankee parts for a good long time. We used to drink whiskey together, but you reach a point where too much of it makes you tell either too many lies or too many truths for your own good. So he had stopped pounding the Jack for the time being. He had recently been home in Tennessee, visiting family. He told a tale that you would have to hear him tell, but, at one point, it involved an alcoholic, racist hillbilly who always had his AR-15 with him in his pick-up because "you never know."
"What might happen that he needs his gun?" the Rude Pundit asked.
Ben waved his hands in a gesture of "Who the fuck knows." But he did say, a few minutes later, "I don't think I can ever go back down south. I can't take all the ignorant shit down there." He was talking about a number of dingleberries of stupidity, like the VW workers in Chattanooga preferring indentured servitude to those Communistic union benefits or the homophobia that takes up more time of the politicians than actually helping people. But high on his list was the unending racism of so very many white people. Sure, sure, there's racism up here, but its so open and proudly displayed down South. "It's never going away. It's not gonna change. They will be fucking racists forever," Ben said.
Of course, the conversation veered to the verdict in the Michael Dunn trial. Convicted of attempted second degree murder, hung jury on the charge of the first degree murder of Jordan Davis, as we know by now, the white Dunn shot into an SUV where he felt threatened for his life by the black teenagers in there who had been playing loud rap music. He'll go to jail for a long damn time, but there is something deeply disturbing about, essentially, so far, Dunn getting away with murder.
Much of the focus post-verdict has been on the racism involved - in how Dunn perceived a threat that required self-defense because of he viewed the teens as coming from a "thug culture" that wants to kill whitey - as well as on the Stand Your Ground law that, whether or not it was invoked in this trial, has to have an influence on how people approach potential conflicts.
But let's accept what Ben said (and every time the Rude Pundit goes to the South, he finds no reason to argue): the racism is just there. It exists. It ain't going anywhere any time for at least a few generations, if ever. That's a sad thought, pathetic really, but, c'mon, let's not be naive utopian assholes about it.
And let's accept the reality of Stand Your Ground, which, in Florida, says, "A person is justified in the use of deadly force and does not have a duty to retreat if: He or she reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself." It's a bullshit law that exists almost entirely because the National Rifle Association wants to "protect" those who shoot the fuck out of "threatening" people. Apparently, before 2005, when Florida passed the first Stand Your Ground legislation, law-abiding, innocent gun owners were rounded up and put in concentration camps for defending themselves against the Hottentot hordes.
Instead, the Rude Pundit wants to focus on the gun part of the whole thing. By the end of 2012, Florida issued its one-millionth concealed-carry permit. That's about 5% of the population. At least one of every twenty people in Florida has the right to carry a concealed gun, and you can bet a good many of them do, on their person or in their cars because "you never know." That phrase, "you never know," is the motto of cowards, people who live in fear, expecting, maybe even hoping, that their fears will be confirmed and it'll be go time.
Florida's the land of cowards because so many gun-fellaters want permits that the NRA is pushing a bill that would allow people to apply for licenses to carry at tax collection offices. Why? Because there's a six-month backup for processing permits and because sometimes people have to drive up to two hours to go to the gun permit office.
The guns are the problem. Take the gun out of the hands of Michael Dunn, and he backs the fuck up and drives away. See, if you have time to reach in your glove compartment and get your semi-automatic pistol out, you have time to shift into "reverse." If the semi-automatic pistol ain't there, all you got is a car that moves in various directions. Without his gun, George Zimmerman sits in his fuckin' car and waits for the cops. Without his gun, Curtis Reeves goes back to his fucking seat and watches a shitty movie. Because these men, and so many others, are pussies who would never push things to a confrontation without having the gun readily available.
You should be able to defend yourself when you're being attacked. But you should also have the balls to fucking suck it up and walk away or call a cop. Instead, we have states that are filthy with racists who have been told they don't have to back down for anyone, least of all that scary-looking nigger. Well, that racist is gonna think, what the fuck is the gun for anyway?
http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2014/02/jordan-davis-killer-michael-dunn-was.html
rustydog
(9,186 posts)But for the presence of the firearms (temporary ball sac enhancement tool), none of these bastards would have had the balls to say one damn thing and, more than likely, the victims would be alive today.
onehandle
(51,122 posts)Gun culture told him so.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)But gun fanciers love the Stand Your Ground BS.
AtheistCrusader
(33,982 posts)Lawful defensive gun uses that produce a fatality number less than 1,000 per year.
So uh...
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)Sorry, almost all gunz used in a crime came from a legal purchase, and deaths aren't the only bad outcome of gunz in public. And the Zmans and Dunns won't even be counted in your number.
AtheistCrusader
(33,982 posts)Davis's murder likely will not be.
USDoJ has an opinion on the legal DGU's that do NOT produce a fatality, that number is in the 60,00-100,000 per year range, and varies greatly by year.
FBI has hard data on those intimidations/wounds that are criminal acts. But there is no correlation with the number of people who have CPL's. Some states, like Florida publish the number of license revocations per year. Most states don't.
I do wish there was better, uniform data reporting to public sources that you and I can easily access. Difficult to assess policy when we all have our favored data sources, and they all tell different stories, and do not lend themselves to direct apples-apples comparisons nationwide.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)gun fanciers walking around in society with a gun, accumulating numerous gunz at home, etc. You guys can justify your bad obsession by awaiting better data 50 years from now. By then, there will be be several more hundred million gunz to deal with when we finally bite the bullet like Australia in 1996.
AtheistCrusader
(33,982 posts)If we don't come up with some constructive solutions soon, instead of maintaining the status quo, the Australia solution becomes a very real possibility.
That's why I engage on issues like Registration. I think it will help. And if we don't do something to help, well... there are consequences for stonewalling on serious issues. Maybe not immediate, but when those consequences manifest, they are dramatic.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)The Magistrate
(95,247 posts)Once again The Rude One nails it.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Cha
(297,323 posts)Skittles
(153,169 posts)russspeakeasy
(6,539 posts)Aristus
(66,388 posts)But, boy, the gun-humpers aren't going to like being called cowards! A gun makes every soft, fat, white, bearded, beer-bellied, racist, bigoted cowardly mama's-boy in a Rambo. That's what they've been taught...
calimary
(81,322 posts)"an attitude-adjustment device."
THIS:
The guns are the problem. Take the gun out of the hands of Michael Dunn, and he backs the fuck up and drives away. See, if you have time to reach in your glove compartment and get your semi-automatic pistol out, you have time to shift into "reverse." If the semi-automatic pistol ain't there, all you got is a car that moves in various directions. Without his gun, George Zimmerman sits in his fuckin' car and waits for the cops. Without his gun, Curtis Reeves goes back to his fucking seat and watches a shitty movie. Because these men, and so many others, are pussies who would never push things to a confrontation without having the gun readily available.
You should be able to defend yourself when you're being attacked. But you should also have the balls to fucking suck it up and walk away or call a cop. Instead, we have states that are filthy with racists who have been told they don't have to back down for anyone, least of all that scary-looking nigger. Well, that racist is gonna think, what the fuck is the gun for anyway?
jwirr
(39,215 posts)even occurred to him that he might actually be sent to jail. The look on his face at the verdict said it all.
AtheistCrusader
(33,982 posts)When I got off a plane in Tennessee, on a business trip to fix some servers, I got a really weird vibe. Like, an other-worldly visiting an alien planet vibe. Like I should have been wearing an environmental suit.
Get out of the airport, grab the rental car, hit the freeway, I'm not on the freeway 30 minutes, and I see AT LEAST 4 civil war era statutes of various generals or whoever. Get to the building, first floor, half the lobby is this life-sized diorama of a wounded confederate soldier crawling away from 2 union soldiers, bayonets at low ready, faces twisted with anger.
WTF.
How is the civil war such a huge part of the daily landscape, as far north as TN? Why?
I mean, I get cultural shock, right. Anyone from the south that drops out of a plane up here in Seattle is going to wonder why there are so damn many coffee shops everywhere. Why we don't use turn signals. They'll choke on our iced tea. (I choked on their (syrup) iced tea too) I get that.
But why THAT subject? Still.
That can't be healthy.
jsr
(7,712 posts)Take the gun out of the hands of Michael Dunn, and he backs the fuck up and drives away. See, if you have time to reach in your glove compartment and get your semi-automatic pistol out, you have time to shift into "reverse." If the semi-automatic pistol ain't there, all you got is a car that moves in various directions. Without his gun, George Zimmerman sits in his fuckin' car and waits for the cops. Without his gun, Curtis Reeves goes back to his fucking seat and watches a shitty movie. Because these men, and so many others, are pussies who would never push things to a confrontation without having the gun readily available.