Bring on the meteor. Thanks.
ORLANDO, Fla. — An unidentified entrepreneur admits he is trying to profit off Trayvon Martin’s death by selling gun range targets featuring the teen who’s death has sparked a nationwide controversy.
Although Martin’s face does not appear on the paper targets, they feature a hoodie with crosshairs aimed at the chest. A bag of Skittles is tucked in the pocket and a hand is holding a can resembling iced tea.
The wall of fire resulting from impact will be nifty.
“This is the highest level of disgust and the lowest level of civility,” said Zimmerman’s attorney Mark O’Mara.
O’Mara said he is worried about how Martin’s parents will react to the image of their son on a target intended to be used for shooting practice.
The attorney is also concerned the targets will further inflame the community.
“It’s this type of hatred — that’s what this is, it’s hate-mongering — that’s going to make it more difficult to try this case,” said O’Mara.
Local 6 has been unable to determine the identity of the seller, who had also set up a website to sell the gun range targets.
In an email exchange with reporter Mike DeForest, the seller wrote, “My main motivation was to make money off the controversy.”
It can’t come soon enough, I figure. Going to print this story off and place it in a bowl of delicious Purina Meteor Chow and see what comes ’round.
chopper
i got nuthin’. that’s just…guh.
Mark S.
Once this idiot’s identity is determined, I hope he regrets the day he was ever born.
And on a pedantic note:
I know the idea of editors who correct such mistakes is quaint, but geez.
Martin
Behold our job creators. Is there another tax cut we can get you, good sir?
Linda Featheringill
Zimmerman’s lawyer is doing the intelligent thing by railing against that atrocity.
WereBear
Not to mention the people who would buy the product.
Betty Cracker
Nothing racist about that, nosireebob. Nothing racist at all. Didn’t you hear about the line of Natalee Holloway anchors and Caylee Anthony garden mulch? Oh wait…
jl
Here is very calm and even handed analysis of an asteroid impact, so we can compare and contrast the options.
The nutcases take over or asteroid impact, which is to be preferred?
Looks like with the nutcases, the agony will last longer.
What would happen if Asteroid 2005 YU55 Hit Earth?
http://youtu.be/pXzyzyGzAN4
I’m not sure which to hope for. Have to think it over.
EconWatcher
@Mark S.:
I’m afraid grammar is one of the victims of the decline and fall of the print media. Say what you will about the old inky broadsheets–they used to have sticklers for grammar on staff.
BGK
Not to go all Friedman-cab-driver, but I have a non-political forum I frequent, the off-topic forum of which provides me with anthropological-grade insight into Real America’s mushy middle.
There were multiple threads in the wake of the Martin killing. For the most part, people expressed genuine horror and sadness, but there were the unhinged. One of the more colorful used the fact that Martin’s parents sought copyright/trademark protection on their son’s image, et cetera, as lead-pipe-cinch evidence that they were low-grade grifters, and also too that Zimmerman was justified. I, as politely as I could, pointed out that it was just this type of disgusting profiteering that the Martin family was trying to preempt. As the late Brother Theodore once said, “I should know better than to try to sell roses in a fish market.”
Thunderbird
This story just hurts my soul. And people wonder why I’m not interested in having kids.
JCT
Look, given that Zimmerman’s web site was able to net him $200,000 , I’ll be this poor-excuse-for-slime-mold makes big bucks.
Breathtaking.
jl
The part of the post where the seller describes his motivations:
“My main motivation was to make money off the controversy.”
Well then, it’s all good, then, right? Free enterprise teabaggers should approve.
Amir Khalid
Trayvon’s face isn’t on this vile object, Gott sei dank, but the skittles and the can of tea are an unmistakable reference to him. Can his parents sue to discover the seller’s identity and make him hand over any sales income?
Also, I was intrigued by this unattributed quote from the story.
This seems to be the opinion of the target seller. Do a lot of people share this belief?
Some Loser
Post-Racial America everybody. I’m pretty sure Clime Acts
wouldwill approve.RossInDetroit
Man, the moral bar for making a buck is WAY lower than I thought.
lacp
Hey, the guy wants a paycheck, not a welfare check! USA, FUCK YEAH!
jl
@Mark S.:
” the teen who’s death ”
Maybe the writer meant what he said. I heard a news radio report driving to work where some slimeballs are portraying Martin as a dangerous gangster.
The incident itself is disturbing, but I withhold judgment on exactly what kind of mess Zimmerman is until more facts come out. I think he was at least an excitable bigot with very poor judgment and worse impulse control, whose history should have made him obviously unqualified from participating in any kind of neighborhood watch program, or whatever that arrangement was.
But the reaction to the case among certain segments of the population, and the media (Edit, hi there Faux News), is worse. Truly frightening.
Edit: meaning, whatever Zimmerman turns out to be, we are seeing far worse in the reaction to the case among many segments of the population, and the media (hi again, Faux).
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Hey Mark, think any of these folks also contributed to the defense fund that’s going to be paying your bills?
quannlace
Wow, I’m surprised there being that generous.
SatanicPanic
It’s all about commerce in the USA, it’s just funny that someone who’s not a rapper would come out and admit it so unashamedly.
Lavocat
Shorter version:
“I’m a fucking douchebag, SO PAY ME!”
At least, he is a self-aware fucking douchbag, ya hafta give him that.
jl
@SatanicPanic: I am sure there will be a big official public fuss, with hearings and talking heads on TV, about the social problems created by a callous reactionary gun nut culture, backed by the big money industry front groups like ALEC and the NRA.
But, maybe not. If not, I wonder what difference could explain a different reaction, other than corrupt influence of big money and racism?
Egg Berry
He could have put out a unabomber target and the stupids would have probably bought it instead.
Lavocat
@Betty Cracker: THAT is spot on, sir, spot on.
And you made me spit iced tea all over myself.
Damn you.
Some Loser
@quannlace: Don’t be. They are trying to fool themselves. Try to grab at some sense of humanity every time they indulge their evil, bigoted feelings. It happens a lot.
Bob2
See, this is the thing about getting scalps. People get away with it because of the both sides do it nonsense as if it makes sketchy behavior okay.
It needs to be public shaming and they have to be hurt monetarily if you want to change unethical behavior.
The right wing changed this so neither was happening with wingnut welfare or just outright ignoring it.
More scalps please. National Review got rid of Derbyshire finally.
NSR is gone from The Chronicle.
And Clarence Thomas needs to recuse himself out of some cases.
The more often this happens, the more often it signals to people that the behavior is wrong instead of a half-assed non-apology.
I hope Rush is next to lose his shit from lack of advertisers.
Also, if Sully ever reads this, stop telling people that Democrats are pansies and can’t persuade anyone…and when they do fight back, you then tell them they’re being uncivil. Good fucking god.
Brachiator
I wonder whether Martin’s parents can file an injunction blocking this?
Otherwise, it will be a test to see who might be willing to buy, and wear, something so pointlessly insulting and incendiary.
BTW, I had mentioned this in another thread, but it is amazing how wearing a hoodie can make some people totally lose their shit.
Zuckerberg’s Hoodie a ‘Mark of Immaturity,’ Analyst Says
On the other hand, Zuckerberg doesn’t have to worry that wearing a hoodie will get him killed.
Geraldo has yet to weigh in on whether white hipsters put themselves in danger by wearing hoodies.
RossInDetroit
I sincerely hope that this target business is a troll, a stunt or a prank. It would still be sickening but I could understand the motivation.
Forum Transmitted Disease
Another boulder on top of the mountain that Zimmerman’s attorney’s already having to deal with. Anything else aside, that man is going to have a hell of a time keeping this trial from becoming an utter disaster for him.
Oh yeah, also, I shoot routinely. I can’t imagine any responsible/sane gun range – which is most of them – carrying such a target.
SatanicPanic
@jl: To quote Nelly Hey must be the monay
psycholinguist
REmember when people got panties wadded over Travon’s parents copywriting his name? Remember when those people said his parents were trying to make money on this tragedy, and his parents said, no we are trying to protect his name and reputation, and people said “from what?”
Well, now they know.
LanceThruster
Just like the Jim Crow museum, I’d like to see an exhibit collection of this sort monumental indifference (the celebration of it actually) to suffering.
You could put the “Hillary Clinton Hunting Permits” and the Sarah Palin campaign map cross hairs, and even (from the Jim Crow museum) the lynching photo postcards where happy families in a picnic atmosphere pose around the tortured, desecrated, mutilated, castrated, brutalized bodies of the lynched victims for amusement and entertainment.
If concrete examples of such sociopathy are not recorded for posterity, some might not believe they existed.
The Other Bob
Liberal Gun Nuts LLC is planning to offer a new line of targets that include:
“The Shock Jock”
-A very fat, bald man with a cigar in his teeth and a bottle of Via***gr**a in his hand.
“The Pedophile”
-Target includes the outline of man with a priest’s collar. Target shooters will have to avoid hitting the adjacent boy being fondled by the intended target.
“The Abortion”
-A target of a fetus.
Steve
@BGK:
We have a frequent commenter here who feels the same way. I agree, it’s creepy.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
I wonder how much they can ramp up production just in time to sell them at the RNC convention in Tampa?
Egg Berry
I know this is off-topic, but it seems the Catholic Bishops are investigating the Girl Scouts.
I suppose it’s good they’re not investigating the Boy Scouts.
Bob2
@Betty Cracker:
How about Jeffrey Dahmer brand frozen dinners?
lacp
@Egg Berry: I’m sure they’ve already probed quite deeply there. If you know what I mean, and I think that you do.
trollhattan
Wow, that puts a new perpective on vileness. I didn’t know I could become more disappointed in society than I already am. I suppose this means Rush has a new BFF.
OTOH, I support this message:
MariedeGournay
I was more hoping for a Gamma ray burst.
Suffern ACE
@Brachiator:
Probably not since they aren’t using his “face.” At the same time, were the makers of Skittles to review the target, they might decide that they don’t particularly want their product on the item.
The Other Bob
Liberal Gun Nuts LLC is planning to offer a new line of targets that include:
“The Shock Jock”
-A very fat, bald man with a cigar in his teeth and a bottle of blue pills* in his hand.
“The Pedophile”
-Target includes the outline of man with a priest’s collar. Target shooters will have to avoid hitting the adjacent boy being fondled by the intended target.
“The Abortion”
-A target of a fetus.
*amended to get out of moderation.
LanceThruster
@The Other Bob:
“The Pedophile” target now in “Ultra-Orthodox!”
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/05/nyt-child-abuse-story-is-latest-episode-in-a-great-awakening.html
jl
@Egg Berry: thanks, I guess. I read the link and it made me ill. The extract below was decisive for me, that this is a very aggressive witch hunt by reactionaries:
‘ One of the long-running concerns is the Girl Scouts’ membership in the 145-nation World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts.
The association, known as WAGGGS, is on record as saying girls and young women “need an environment where they can freely and openly discuss issues of sex and sexuality.” It also has called for increased access to condoms to protect against sexually transmitted diseases.
Some critics want the Girl Scouts of the USA to pull out of the world group; the scouts aren’t budging.
…the Girl Scouts’ CEO, Anna Maria Chavez [said] “But simply being a member does not mean that we will always take the same positions or endorse the same programs as WAGGGS.”
To the Girl Scouts, some of the attacks seem to be a form of guilt by association. Critics contend that Girl Scouts materials shouldn’t contain links to groups such as Doctors without Borders, the Sierra Club and Oxfam because they support family planning or emergency contraception.
One repeated complaint, revived in February by the Catholic broadcasting network EWTN, involves an International Planned Parenthood brochure made available to girls attending a Girl Scout workshop at a 2010 United Nations event. The brochure — “Healthy, Happy and Hot” — advised young people with HIV on how to safely lead active sex lives.
The Girl Scouts say they had had no advance knowledge of the brochure and played no role in distributing it. ‘
The reactionary bigot patriarchy (Edit: and their deluded codependents) knows they are losing, and there is nothing they can do about it. So they are attempting to destroy anything good in our society that does not conform to their ignorant, and often hateful, prejudices.
They will lose, only question is how much damage they will do until they lose, and if they take everything down with them in their loss.
Anyway, note to self: make big donation to Girl Scouts.
If the wingnuts win, that might get me on some kind of suspicious persons list, but I must start making a stand (/semi self snark tag here)
Edit: unbelievable, old corrupt religious pooh bahs are going after a group because they are associated with an umbrella organization that thinks it is OK for groups of pubescent and teenage girls to maybe share thoughts about sex. How asinine can people be? Old corrupt farts can be very asinine indeed, only problem is that they have the power to wreck up things very badly.
Tony J
@MariedeGournay:
Sadly, that’s not quite enough to make us all mean and green and whatnot. Without the initial ingestion of vita-ray treated chemicals the average person just gets very dead, for which shoddy planning you can blame the Celestials and their prehistoric genetic meddling.
Geek Mode Off –
Sawgrass Stan
Anybody want to start a pool for when this dog turd declares that he’s “not a racist?”
Also, why doesn’t anybody ask these jerks who IS a racist, then. And not Jesse, Al, or anyone black– do they know of ANYONE who is a racist, and also white?
(yeah, I know, they’ll just reel off their list of libberil boogypeople.)
Forum Transmitted Disease
@jl: Treat a bunch of rednecks from Appalachia for free and you’re a saint.
Treat one black person in Africa for free and you’re off the list, apparently.
jl
@Tony J: OK, then lets hope for the Mayan Apocalypse Nibiru (sp?) event. I saw a youtube clip on that. The north and south poles are collapsing in some kind of big cylander and the earth will turn inside out, releasing ultimate badness. Or something. I didn’t bother to click.
But, sounds cool compared to senile old men destrying the girl scouts and being plinked off gradually by lunatic gun nuts for the profit of rich corporate ALEC and NRA funders.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@jl:
__
First they came for the Girl Scout Cookies, and I said nothing becaus…WTF?
JCT
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
And I’m in Arizona and wouldn’t expect to see something like this sold at a range either — but given some of the horrific conversations I have heard when the range is cold and the ear protection is off, I could easily imagine some of these hateful idiots buying them off the web,…..
Legalize
@Linda Featheringill:
And the decent thing.
Davis X. Machina
@RossInDetroit: Good luck It can be hard to determine and distinguish.
anonymous
Alas, my keyboard won’t show the mathematical symbols, but anyway, the following theorum requires no proof:
Handgun Owner = Asshole squared
Tony J
Slightly OT, but since it’s come up, I recall someone mentioning in an earlier thread that the (hockey?) team from an ultra-fundie Catholic college that refused to play a game because the opposition had a female in the team wasn’t actually ‘Catholic’, as it was run by the ultra-fundie Society of Saint Pius X, which has been in a sort of schism with the mainstream Catholic Church ever since Vatican II.
Well, guess what?
How long until Benny the Rat invites Mel Gibson for a theological meeting of minds? They could call it the Magic Wine Summit.
kindness
The reichtwingnutz laugh at death threats and actual deaths of others. They do this more and more. The meme has already been expanded and it will now happen again.
If another Gabriella Giffords tragedy does happen….what is it going to take before revenge attacks follow? There are plenty of crazy libs out there who would do it. (just read the comments here).
I pray it doesn’t happen. I don’t have a bunch of faith in the fulfillment of that prayer however.
jl
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
Doctors Without Borders has operations in Southern and Eastern Europe countries and Russia, so they help out white people too.
I been giving to that group for a long time, and get their reports.
Remote Area Medical does a lot of work in the US, as well as around the world. I wonder whether they provide reproductive health services? Their staff is pretty mainline health professionals, so hard to see how they would not.
Will corrupt fundy preachermen and bishops put RAMS on a naughty organization list too? Immoral for Girl Scouts to help out with a RAMS event in Los Angeles or Kentucky?
http://www.ramusa.org/
FlipYrWhig
Ya know, if people don’t like the Girl Scouts, they could always, like, not join. I think the Boy Scouts is a heinous, awful organization, and express that by not supporting it or joining it. Done and done.
pragmatism
it’s all race to the bottom these days. thanks epistemic closure! when your tribe will support you no matter what, there is no incentive to act like a farging decent human being. ever.
gogol's wife
@BGK:
Love Brother Theodore. My favorite line of his was on the Merv Griffin show, when after his routine he came to the chair to talk to Merv and said, “I’m sweating like a chunk of rancid pork.” You have to hear it with his intonation and elegant Mitteleuropa accent, though.
And to try to make this on topic, all these events make me feel the way Brother Theodore does in this clip. This is epic anger:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGt08GUUz1g
Egg Berry
@FlipYrWhig:
I may be wrong about this, but I don’t think the Bishops could join anyway.
Seriously, however, since when has not being able to do something stopped the Bishops from sticking their noses in other peoples’ business?
Davis X. Machina
@jl: I’m surprised no one’s gone after RAM-USA. Their real sin isn’t whether they provide basic reproductive-health services, it’s that their mere existence exposes all the rah-rah about actually-existing health care delivery in the US.
Steve in DC
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/mitt-romney-bully-8732543#ixzz1ua2Y78Ii
Read this today, holy shit
Egg Berry
@Steve in DC:
So he’s a libertarian, now?
Ben Cisco
Totally OT, Washington Examiner muckety muck Timothy Carney apparently thought he could do his regular shoutdown shutdown in response to a question he didn’t like – din’t want to talk about the Mittster’s barbershop fetish. Well, Tamron don’t play that: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=VwfdJl-mBUU
liberal
@FlipYrWhig:
IIRC the Boy Scouts are similar to the RCC: homophobic plus protective of child molestors.
liberal
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
Well, that’s yet another problem. Apparently anyone in FL can do target practice on their own property. Even if it’s inside a densely populated area.
Steve in DC
@liberal
It’s pretty damn well established in most places what you do on your property is your own business. Take dog and cat owners, they inflict pain and suffering on asthmatic and allergic people when they bring their animals into apartments. But we don’t ban dogs and cats now do we?
Guns are just ONE thing you don’t need that can suck for those around you. If you want to ban one, you must agree with banning them all.
Forum Transmitted Disease
@anonymous: I don’t have the math symbols either. I own three. I think this is how it’s done:
ASSHOLE^8
Somebody please check my work, I want to make sure I got my asshole quotient right.
Culture of Truth
If Skittles could sue every blog would go out of existence.
arguingwithsignposts
@Steve in DC:
The fuck are you talking about. People don’t *own* their apartments, they *rent* them. And in some apartments, pets are banned.
Culture of Truth
What do these critics want? Should I mail them unused sperm for safekeeping?
Tony J
@jl:
I can’t help but agree. When the – actual – slow-motion Apocalypse is comfortably chugging along down a track greased with tribal ideology and profit-driven reportage you do kind of get the feeling that a great big smack of WTF would be just the tonic for our ills.
Personally, I’d go for a good old alien invasion. You know where you are when the opposition has scales or fur or six legs and the face of a penguin, in addition to big ass spaceships. It would be a ‘together moment’ that we, as a species, would never forget as long as we exist.
So, very short, but sweet.
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Steve in DC: Hey, it’s my favorite Republican come here to bait us into saying shit that he can run back to his masters with…fresh fuel for the outrage machine, amirite? How’s work today, Stevie my boy?
Please prove this assertion and show your work.
Also, more stupid courtesy of you:
This must be why I can’t build structures on property without permits. Also, as I don’t live in Florida, if I open fire on a stump in my backyard, I guarantee you I’ll be cuffed or shot dead inside of three minutes.
Probably shot dead, knowing my local police.
Culture of Truth
If there was an advertised Magic Wine summit I would be there
Culture of Truth
What people want to do on their own blog is their own business
Arclite
Well, now that Osama Bin Laden is dead, I guess they needed someone.
Seriously, this has got to be the worst display of poor judgement I’ve seen this year. And there has been a lot to choose from.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Culture of Truth: better get there before Althouse, or the Magic will be gone.
Some Loser
Steve in DC: Is there a more loathsome creature?
MariedeGournay
@Tony J: Thank you for making my day that much brighter.
MariedeGournay
@Tony J: Thank you for making my day that much brighter.
trollhattan
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
I’m making money hand over fist with my backyard lead smelter-livestock rendering plant. Coal-fired, of course, because I support ‘murkan, not foreign energy.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Tony J:
__
The right wingers would be tripping over themselves to make a sell-out deal with the aliens so they could get some help purging the world of us pesky liberals. See for example, Vichy France.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@trollhattan:
__
Maoist!
Forum Transmitted Disease
@trollhattan: You can make your own bullets and bore lube! That is some kind of smarts you’ve got there.
Mnemosyne
@Steve in DC:
I would get down on my knees and weep in gratitude if gun owners had to conform to even 1/3rd of the regulations that pet owners have to follow regarding licensing, maintenance, care, number allowed, etc.
But apparently even a sensible licensing and registration system for guns like the one pet owners have to follow is infringing on your FREEEEEEDDUUUMMMMMM!!
trollhattan
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
It’s my Great Shamble Forward.
SpotWeld
Well regulated militia, my @ss
VividBlueDotty
@Steve in DC:
The absurdity of this statement is ALMOST beyond mocking. A course in elementary logic would teach you the flaw in this “argument” but I think there is a prerequisite of HOW THINGS WORK IN THE REAL WORLD. Please look into it.
TenguPhule
Republicans would be gutting the war efforts with complaints about taxes and calls for privatizing the military even as the alien biomass harvasters pick them up for processing into soylent red.
TenguPhule
A National Organization that teaches girls their proper place in the Man’s World.
On their back or on their knees.
TenguPhule
What, you thought that mass of severe food poisoning of Republican scum shortly after was coincidence?
TenguPhule
So butchering you or any other rightwing idiot on my property is okay?
Nice to know.
Chuck Butcher
Where there is garbage you’re likely to find rats
russell
you know, maybe some people should go to hell.
Fort Geek
@Egg Berry: Apparently, the Mormons “investigate” Boy Scouts.
DPirate
Who’s? Who’s?!?!
…………