'Bosom Buddies' Sought in Alabama Church Arsons

[varun]

http://articles.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20060211183509990003

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (Feb. 13) - Investigators believe a pair of men in their 20s or 30s, likely "bosom buddies," are responsible for a string of church fires in rural Alabama, as authorities confirmed the latest blaze at a Baptist church was the 10th case of arson...

..."They're not youths or teens. It's probably someone in their 20s or 30s. We believe they're pretty much inseparable. They're something like bosom buddies," said Eric Kehn, a spokesman for the federal Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agency.

Evidence from one of the earlier fires indicates the perpetrators may have been briefly trapped inside the building and may have been hurt, said Jim Cavanaugh, ATF regional director.

Investigators have said they don't know a motive, but there is no racial pattern. Five of the churches had white congregations and five black. All were Baptist, the dominant faith in the region, and mostly in isolated country settings...

[Freddie Stubbs]

1. Have you seen these 'men?'

[aquart]

14. are these churches against gay marriage

because, yeah, that wording is weird.

[mom cat]

32. It is an old Southern expression. No word of any tie in to homophobia

or to the crimes being gay related in any way.

[alcibiades_mystery]

20. Bwahahahahahaha

Perfect.

The two men are also thought by profilers to be of the lower middle class, and may work pink collar jobs. One profiler suggested that they may live in an women's only apartment complex because they can't afford the rent in regular apartments. Another suggested that they may have a fondness for Billy Joel songs.

[pinniped]

31. LOL!...I knew these two dudes would be in this thread.

APB Hanks and that other dude, dudette.

[bullimiami]

2. damnit too slow....

[xchrom]

3. bosom buddies?

what an odd description -- and i certainly appreciate the pictures, btw.

[ret5hd]

4. odd yes...

likely a psychological ploy of some sort. maybe make them feel ridiculed, they get pissed, then make a mistake.

or maybe i watch way too many tv cop shows.

[sui generis]

5. yeah they're all looking in all the wrong places

my guess is it's somebody the babtist church has done some harm to. Not advocating burning churches in retaliation for spreading messages of hatred and intolerance about anyone who is different or non-babtist, but I'm not all broken up over it either.

If I were an investigator I'd be looking for motive a little more realistic than just "satanists" and "christian haters".

[xchrom]

13. yeah -- you're singin my song.

that's what i was thinking --

it's a spin of some sort.

[Ian David]

19. Prevalence of Baptist churches could be behind pattern in fires

Prevalence of Baptist churches could be behind pattern in fires
(5 Black congregations, 4 White Congregations burned)
2/9/2006, 3:38 p.m. CT
By JAY REEVES
The Associated Press

BRIERFIELD, Ala. (AP) — It's hard to drive far on the two-lane roads that crisscross Alabama's backwoods without passing a small Baptist church.

That very prevalence could be a reason why only Baptist congregations have been hit in a string of suspected arson fires in four rural counties since last week: Across broad regions of Alabama, there aren't many congregations that aren't Baptist.

<snip>

A popular Internet directory lists 5,078 Baptist churches in the state, and that doesn't include the ones that are so small they don't have a telephone. Methodist congregations are second-most common, with 1,026 in the directory.

Alabama has one Baptist church for every 875 of its 4.4 million residents, and there's at least one for every 534 persons in rural Bibb County, where the first five church arsons occurred last Friday.

More:
http://www.al.com/newsflash/regional/index.ssf?/base/news-19/113952145517660.xml&storylist=alabamanews


Maybe if they'd torch a Pentacostal church just to make their point then?

[redqueen]

6. Very much so.

What's up with that? "bosom buddies"?

:wtf:

[Kagemusha]

7. That means gays, right?

Gays burn churches down now?

[YOY]

8. "Flaming Queens" obviously

Sorry...it was just too easy

[redqueen]

9. Does it?

I thought it just meant best friends... :shrug:

[Igel]

26. It does.

But that doesn't stop people that want to misunderstand the expression from doing so.

[iverglas]

27. sheesh

we agree.

[Igel]

30. Bound to happen sometimes.

(Typed while examining ceiling for imminent collapse and floor for signs of fissure. :-)

[ThomCat]

10. They need a scapegoat

And we're convenient scapegoats. After all, we're all going to hell anyway, dontcha know.

[BR_Parkway]

17. That's sure the way it sounds.

[Ben Ceremos]

33. They would be sued if they called

it a "Brokeback Mountain" friendship...roll-eyes

[CornField]

11. Ugh... I hate profilers.

White men are serial killers.

Women are poisoners.

Abused grow up to be abusers.

And anytime someone comes forth who blows the snot out of their theories, that instance is just labeled an 'exception' and they continue the same as they always have.

[iverglas]

12. for heaven's sake

I suspect the person who used the expression "bosom buddies" is a little older than many here, or just had more aunties or something. There's nothing at all odd about the expression, except to the ear of someone who hasn't grown up hearing it. It simply means very close friends, particularly of the sort that confide in each other, have no secrets, that sort of thing -- a bosom buddy is someone one would "take to one's bosom", embrace, in a non-physical way. No "gay" implications at all.

Some people have bosom buddies because they share problematic traits with them, perhaps especially inadequacies or unpleasant attitudes. No one else understands them. Their bosom buddy does. Unfortunately, they can provide each other with mutual reinforcement of the problematic traits rather than the incentive to change them that they might feel if they had to relate to other people more.

I'd bet that the profile developed is relatively accurate. I suspect that the church burnings have far more to do with the arsonists' feelings of resentment and hostility to the broader population, and in particular to those who band together to proclaim the virtues that they themselves lack, or have chosen to reject and look down on from their self-appointed position as critics of lesser mortals chained by conventional morality, than with having been bitten by a Baptist in their youth.

They're not likely quite smart enough to articulate any of that, and more likely are just common or garden lumpen sociopaths who have had the good fortune to find their soulmates in each other.

[sui generis]

15. "lumpen"

a biseleh yiddish, iverglass, you sprinkle into the words! Azoy gait es!

[iverglas]

22. uh oh

I thought I was speaking Karl Marxish. ;)

Never did speak Yiddish, although many years ago I still had enough German to translate roughly what the rabbi at the synagogue in Havana was saying in Yiddish to several of the Jewish friends I was travelling with, for the one of them who didn't speak Yiddish at all.

Gehts gut - ? Or something like that.

[sui generis]

23. close enough

a lot of yiddish is just like some of the harshest german dialects, or any german dialect after a few liters of real pilsner, hearing, or speaking.

Probably should be called "slangish".

[0rganism]

29. Thanks for clarifying; mistook it for codespeak for 'BF-buddies' at first

It would be most unfortunate if Mr. Kehn's words were, shall we say, "misinterpreted" by some enterprising hatemongers, and I'm sure Mr. Kehn, as a responsible sort of elderly BATF spokesman, had nothing of the sort in mind. You should definitely contact the editors with your analysis.

[name not needed]

16. Why would Tom Hanks and Peter Scolari burn down a bunch of churces?

:shrug:

[Coexist]

18. thats was my thought.

hee hee

[Rockholm]

28. Mine too. Where were they last night, anyway?

[alcibiades_mystery]

21. From Billy Joel's "My Life" to...errr..."We Didn't Start the Fire"

Do I notice a theme?

[Jane Austin]

24. Liquor license? Adult store permit?

Seems like somebody whose livelihood had been threatened by Baptist opposition might have an axe to grind.

Inexcusable, but maybe that's a line of inquiry they might want to pursue.

[Der Blaue Engel]

25. Do any of Fred Phelps's sons live in the area?

I wouldn't put it past him to start burning down "God's house" because the U.S. doesn't lynch gays.