I’m sure Adam will have a more thorough take, but the latest on last night’s shootings at Asian massage parlors in Atlanta last night is that the shooter claims he had a sexual addiction and was a client of those establishments. His solution was to buy a gun on Tuesday to kill sex workers and possibly at least one patron at those establishments. (I’m guessing that a patron was killed because one name released by police is a non-Asian middle-aged man named Paul.)
Of course, the shooter’s claim does not a real reason make. He was apprehended about 150 miles from Atlanta, with the help of his parents, apparently on the way to Florida to kill more sex workers.
The good news is that the precious freedom of Georgians to buy a gun almost immediately is still intact. The rest is just blood spilled to water the tree of liberty.
Starboard Tack
Hammer. Problem. Nail.
Elizabelle
He bought the gun hours before the shooting. Of course he did.
scav
I wonder how that justification will fly when it’s gambling addicts and alcoholics shooting up casinos and bars. Just more really bad days?
Elizabelle
Cherokee County sheriff can dance around the shooter’s background and profile all he wants, but it is quite apparent that this is another white male serial killer, that it’s mass murder via gun, the victims are predominantly women, and this time the majority of them are Asian heritage women. To no one’s particular surprise after all the ugly anti-Asian rhetoric of recent months. Emanating from one political/media sphere.
We are going to be having a full on discussion of this, and we have a few new sheriffs in Washington who are going to be looking at this very, very closely.
lofgren
“Democrats were all calling this attack a product of gun culture and racism, but actually it was a product of gun culture and misogyny. Now the twitter mob even wants to cancel fine Christian men who are just trying avoid temptation.”
Barbara
@scav: Or police officers met at the door with a gunslinger as they try to serve a warrant for someone’s arrest? “I was addicted to crime. My only choice was to kill law enforcement personnel!” Oops, that only flies when the victim is a judge.
gwangung
What they’re saying is that having an Asian fetish isn’t racial/racist.
Give me a FUCKING break.
JanieM
I was poking around on YouTube yesterday looking for something or other and stumbled across some clips from a Western that was on TV when I was a kid. I had forgotten all about it, but I hadn’t forgotten about all the other shows we watched, like the Lone Ranger, Maverick, The Cisco Kid, Have Gun Will Travel, Gunsmoke, Davy Crockett, Bronco Lane, Annie Oakley, Kit Carson, Jim Bowie, Wyatt Earp, Gene Autry, Death Valley Days, the Rifleman, Rin Tin Tin, Kit Carson, Bonanza, Bat Masterson….As I ramble through the list, it’s a wonder we had time for anything else, even including other genres like My Three Sons etc.
I know there have been a gazillion cop shows and even more westerns on TV, not to mention movies, since I was a kid in the 1950s. But with guns this deeply embedded in our collective psyche, I don’t know what it’s going to take to break the spell.
Then again, I grew up awash in the mythology of guns and have barely ever touched one, much less shot one.
Between that and the Pope’s announcement the other day, I’ve fallen into about the deepest pit I’ve been in since January 20
ETA: The Western I had forgotten about was The Lawman.
TaMara (HFG)
rikyrah
He’s a phucking DOMESTIC TERRORIST
and should be treated as such.
Anoniminous
The surprising thing is the cops aren’t claiming the women jumped in front of the bullets thereby killing themselves.
Starboard Tack
@TaMara (HFG):
He’s really a GOOD boy.
JPL
I’m about sixteen miles from both shootings, but am much closer to the church they attended. That’s under five miles, and very close to an early voting site that I use. Although I feel for the murderer’s family, whether or not the motive is racial, misogynistic, or radical religious beliefs, they must have known. One has to wonder, if those beliefs are acceptable.
The sheriff mentioned that the murderer had a bad day, and I hope that he clarifies it to mention that the victims’ families had a horrendous day.
scav
@Anoniminous: They didn’t die of the bullets in their bodies — they had comorbidies already, surely.
feebog
Sex addiction my ass. If this terrorist has a social media presence it will reveal that he is a racist asshole. Full stop.
germy
Brachiator
@lofgren:
but actually it was a product of gun culture…
Gun nuts can always attach a perceived wrong to their desire to kill someone.
Percysowner
But, but HE had a bad day, unlike the victims who had a GREAT time being terrified and dying. And the police don’t want to “victim shame” any of the victims, just in case you hadn’t cottoned to the fact that they were women of disrepute. Sheriff should resign post haste, bet he won’t because he’s a good old white boy, just like the shooter.
Death Panel Truck
@Starboard Tack: “He was always such a good boy.” — Louise Bundy
The Moar You Know
Whew! Glad that’s settled.
In seriousness, glad I live 2000+ miles from Georgia and won’t have this credulous rube investigating any crime I might be the victim of. How do people like this get jobs?
Also, can’t help but notice that the incel – who had a very bad day, poor fucker – has a grown-out Proud Boy cut. Sure that’s a coincidence.
L85NJGT
I’m gonna put my chip on that sheriff’s framing is on account of freebies for the boys in blue.
Tickraw
@gwangung: 100% agree. This scumbag just so happened to have an Asian fetish and is also sporting a Richard Spencer haircut. But sure, there was no racial motivation behind it…
Death Panel Truck
@JanieM: You also forgot “Wanted: Dead or Alive” starring Steve McQueen. He hated that show, but I think it wasn’t half bad for a Western.
MisterForkbeard
Oh, I can completely buy that a racist gun nut having a particularly bad day might be what causes them to snap and murder a bunch of people. It’s not like it hasn’t happened before.
But, uh, it doesn’t make them sympathetic. It makes them murderous racists. Also, in what universe does “we asked him why he did it and he said it totally wasn’t racism” constitute something remotely substantive?
Soprano2
As I said in another thread, it’s time for the White Terrorist Bingo Card again. This shit is getting old. One benefit of the pandemic is that it seemed to cut down on crap like this.
Soprano2
Well, no need to look at his social media presence, the question is settled. /s/s/s/s How the fuck do these people ever solve any crimes? We all know they wouldn’t be so quick to jump to conclusions if the shooter was anything other than a white male.
germy
I think police are more sympathetic to people who look like them, or look like their sons and nephews.
MFA
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants & school children & wives & girlfriends & sex workers & Blacks & Hispanics & Jews & trick-or-treaters & lost people & concert-goers & worshippers & people who cannot comply with simultaneous, conflicting orders barked from a crowd of shouting armed men & little children who get in the way & people who don’t drive the way I like &–I dunno, liberals.”
JPL
@Soprano2: yup There are no winners though.
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: Poor little white boy was having a bad day and killed 8 people. Oopsie, bad day, he gets a mulligan.
germy
trollhattan
He’s 1.0 neck beards removed from Dylann Roof; who likewise was apprehended quite a distance from his massacre scene intending on doing who-knows-what else?
MagdaInBlack
My dear friend in Sheridan, Illinois just called to tell me her son’s in laws were killed last night by an ex-son in law. Shot them both in their home then went to the ex-wifes home and shot out the windows. She called her parents, no answer. Neighbor went to the home and found them. Shooter now in custody.
I’m processing this. I knew them
Eta: I supposed this shooter was ” having a bad day” too.
Jay
@Soprano2:
There are no shortage of “sex work” storefronts in Atlanta.
You really have to go out of your way to ensure that the only ones you are attacking are Asian.
Served
Atlanta has the most “adult” clubs per 100,000 people in the country, and yet this garbage targeted ONLY these specific locations, and was driving to Florida to target more, and the police are going to amplify his absurd claim that he isn’t racist or that this wasn’t racially motivated?
Betty Cracker
@MagdaInBlack: JFC, how horrible!
Kent
Since when have racism and misogyny been mutually exclusive?
citizen dave
@JanieM: I think I’m a little bit behind most of these shows, but watched enough Gunsmoke and Ponderosa in my day. The Daniel Boone theme song has stuck with me (guess we used to sing it ad nauseum), but can’t recall how gun-y that show was.
Anyway, like you, I did not grow up to be a gun person.
All that to say my wife’s nephew (in-law) was at our house yesterday and we learned he has guns, but it’s hard to target practice because of the ammo shortage, and the price, it’s over a dollar a round for his type of gun. My wife asked if gun owners are afraid of Biden. He said they are afraid of any “restrictions”, but personally he was not afraid someone was going to knock on his door to take his guns, what with 53/63 million gun owners (didn’t catch which number). I stayed out of it; did not want to engage. I did remark on how the covid had apparently cut down on mass shootings. ‘Course that was before I heard about the Georgia shooting.
patrick II
@Served:
I believe him when he says he isn’t racist. I also believe Tucker Carlson, Donald Trump, and the leader of the Oath Takers when they say they aren’t racist. I am thinking of joining the Houston Police force.
citizen dave
@MagdaInBlack: That is terrible–thoughts with you
Starboard Tack
@MagdaInBlack:
Emotionally Inadequate People + Guns = Mass Murder
Anoniminous
“Asian sex workers” tripped my nasty suspicious mind because of
Unseen and Unforgiving: Massage Brothels and the Sex Trafficking of Chinese Women
and led me to ….
“The Atlanta airport is full of women and girls being trafficked back and forth from other countries,” said Hakes. “It’s a terrible problem.”
Experts say because of the airport, Atlanta has become a hub for sex trafficking.”
Special Report: South Georgia Sex Slaves
patrick II
@patrick II:
It’s not Houston police force of course, but Crisp County.
Jay
@MagdaInBlack:
❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️{{{{{{}}}}}}
I am so sorry.
trollhattan
@MagdaInBlack:
Terrible. My inlaws (more of a family forest than a tree) had a similar circumstance and the only good part was authorities were alerted and waiting for him to arrive at the next victim’s home.
Guns are the problem. Full stop. New Zealand just marked the mosque massacre anniversary; committed there by an Australian who did not try it in Australia because he could not obtain the desired weapons there, weapons banned after their own massacre.
JPL
@MagdaInBlack: That is horrifying, and I’m so sorry for your friend. I can’t imagine the pain she must be going through. f.k.
Old School
Two people were shot at a Roundy’s distribution center in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin last night. Details are still a bit vague at the moment.
I guess shootings have come back with a vengeance.
Kathleen
@Starboard Tack: “He has his whole life ahead of him”
MagdaInBlack
@trollhattan: I hesitated to post, because I didn’t want it to be about me. It’s about wtf is going on with the gun insanity. But it does come and find us, doesnt it.
Kathleen
@MagdaInBlack: I’m so sorry.
Dan B
It feels like this guy was shamed by his church into believing he was an unworthy sinner – a flawed and corrupt soul. How this is called religion or Christianity escapes me. I know many religious leaders who are progressive who will keep their opinions about these so-called Christians to themselves. I may know some racists as well but we live in a 10% white neighborhood. They will be very quiet. In the meanwhile we feel sickened by the eruption of violence that is fueled by prejudice and preserved by ignorance and a refusal to see the truth.
Keith P.
I’ve heard that the per capita champ is Tampa or Portland maybe. I had a Houston stripper told me that Houston has 85 or so strip clubs….I dunno if that’s the most overall, but it’s a lot.
I’ve got one of those massage parlors at the entrance to my subdivision. It opened a few years ago, and the paper even ran an article about how pissed the neighbors were, but it’s still there and has never been busted AFAIK. I’ve also never seen people coming in or out, so they seem to be pretty discrete. (I’m in Houston, which has a TON of these places)
CAM-WA
Don’t encourage him! Adam is quite capable of being inspired to write a long disquisition without any prompting!
Baud
Wasn’t QAnon supposed to be on the sex trafficking beat?
Also, are we taking the shooter’s word that these massage places were sex shops?
Ceci n est pas mon nym
Hey, you forgot Rawhide, Clint Eastwood’s show!
As kind of a spinoff of the popularity of westerns, cap guns were really popular in our neighborhood (early 60s) and I remember loving mine and spending a fair bit of allowance on rolls of caps.
The guns only lost their interest when one of the kids figured out that you could make even bigger pops by setting off multiple caps with rocks.
I don’t even know if caps exist any more. They were rolls of paper with a little bit of gunpowder embedded every inch or so, which made a little pop when impacted.
Dorothy A. Winsor
I’ve had trouble accessing the site today. Is that just me? I was on a distance class thing and my sound was blippy
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Keith P.:
I remember one of our “On The Road: Paris” articles had a picture of the front door of their apartment building, with a massage parlor located right next door, advertising “men and women available”.
Old School
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Apparently not. See two threads down.
raven
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
Wanted, Dead or Alive
The Rebel
Yancy Derringe
and yes, there are caps
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: Of course, he’s a good Christian White Man, he wouldn’t lie. Wonder if he had a chance to chat with his attorney prior to chatting with the cops and he explained the concept of Federal hate crime law.
Jay
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
cap guns still exist, both the plastic revolver clip and the paper roll, along with potato guns, ( spud guns) which fire a tiny chunk of potato a few feet.
They have mostly been replaced by Nerf guns, Super Soakers and AirSoft guns as kids toys.
Booger
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Oh boy, I can still recall the ringing in my ears from smashing whole rolls of caps with a hammer. Inside. And that smell…
The Thin Black Duke
@MagdaInBlack: I’m so sorry.
Jim Appleton
@Elizabelle: One of my first reactions was, “Holy shit, this guy’s hung up on something.”
Booger
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Oh boy, I can still recall the ringing in my ears from smashing whole rolls of caps with a hammer. Inside. And that smell…
raven
@Booger: and if you laid the roll flat you could run a coin along them and raise a Ruckus!
geg6
@JanieM:
We never watched TV westerns at our house. My parents abhorred them and their glorification of machismo and violence. My dad especially hated them. This was the 60s, mind you. But my dad said he’d had enough of that bullshit in the war (WWII) and wasn’t having it in his house. He also believed 95% of all police were crooked and didn’t watch any cop shows either. The only ones he really liked were Hill Street Blues and NYPD Blue, mainly because they showed that cops were just like all the rest of us, totally flawed humans. And those were 80s shows, when we kids were already grown and the cops weren’t quite so glorified. My dad was a man totally ahead of his times. He hunted and owned guns and taught us to use them, but he wasn’t much into them at all.
Jim Appleton
@Booger: At eleven years old, I did that with a firecracker about ten inches from my face.
My ears have both rung unceasingly since then, about the frequency of old Volkswagen brakes.
SC54HI
The shooter is a product of white Christian nationalism, nurtured along by his SBC churches and their doctrines. The misogynistic and white racist core of his religion taught him that women are lesser beings and that women of color have no value. His church and its leaders also taught him to ultimately blame women for his own sexual thoughts or actions.
For more information on evangelical Christianity in the US and its toxic culture follow Crissy Stroop on Twitter (@C_Stroop), and read Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation by Kristin Kobes Du Mez and White Evangelical Racism: The Politics of Morality in America by Anthea Butler.
Sloane Ranger
@Jay: This was exactly what I was thinking. Are the only sex workers in Atlanta Asian?
Geminid
@Death Panel Truck: McQueen did not have to do the Wanted show very long. In 1960, he upstaged Yul Brynner in The Magnificent Seven; by 1968 he was Bullit. Those movies bookended the transition from Westerns to detective shows on television. But the heroes in each carried guns, and usually they resolved the episode with gunfire. So guns were part of popular culture.
I think what has changed since is the normalization of gun ownership among men. This was driven partly by the industry, with the help of the NRA, which changed from a gun marksmanship, gun safety outfit to a political champion of the industry in the 70’s.* In my state of Virginia, NRA backed politicians were expanding gun rights up until 2014. But the pendulum here swung the other way, and in 2017 and 2019 Democrats ran and won on gun-safety platforms, and last year put through six gun safety laws. Polling showed 70-80% support for them.
I’m hoping that the General Assembly will next pass a license-to-purchase law. While it seems like setting up a first qualifying step would have little effect on violence, the outcomes in Connecticut, which adopted a permit-to-purchase law, and Missouri, which abolished theirs, showed a real difference. And such a requirement can be tightened as to qualification rules. Would this have kept a gun out of Georgia shooter’s hands? Possibly, but probably not.
* In the 1970’s, a faction in the NRA wanted to move the headquarters to Colorado and keep a low political profile, but Wayne LaPierre’s side won that fight.
Faithful Lurker
Me too. We used bricks to make that louder bang. I loved my cap gun and got sent home from first grade because I wore my cap guns in a holster to school. I was 5. My father was a hunter and he gave me a .22 rifle when I was 12.
raven
@Sloane Ranger: Hell no
Cameron
I am truly having a for-shit day. I’m sure the sheriff will understand when I get strapped and go over to mow down the Publix cashiers. Seriously, WTF? He has a bad day, cops buy Dylann Roof a sammich, this is out loud/out proud racist shit that’s a repeat of stuff from the 50’s and 60’s. Fucking country’s going backwards.
Sloane Ranger
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
I remember them. There was a wheel in the gun. You looped the roll of paper around that then fed the end up through a hole under the hammer.
raven
@Sloane Ranger: With perforations in the caps and studs on the gear to catch the caps and move it forward. In fact they were called perforated caps.
Ruckus
@raven:
I don’t think I’ve ever made that much noise.
raven
@Ruckus: But I raised you!
Mike in NC
Heard there are a bunch of undocumented sex workers at a place called Mar-a-Lago in Florida.
Another Scott
@Faithful Lurker: I took my father’s Navy dress sword to show and tell once. Didn’t seem to cause an issue – fortunately!
Cheers,
Scott.
Jay
@Sloane Ranger:
the job of sex worker is one of the few jobs in the US that does not discriminate, however, “Shops” are usually organized around fetishizes and kinks, and as a result, are staffed by a particular “type” of employee/independent contractor/trafficked Person.
Ruckus
@raven:
Naw, just at work, and it’s lunch time.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@JanieM: I think for me (a little girl), the guns were part of the Western time period (1865 – 1900) and had no place in my 1950s suburb. Obviously, it was different for others (i.e. little boys) playing Cowboys and Indians. Also racist AF (sigh)
ETA: plus there were several movies with a theme of the lone gunslinger who saved the town and then had to move on since the town was grateful but didn’t want gunfighters in town permanently (see The Magnificent Seven)
ETA2: So sorry you are depressed :-(
Betty Cracker
The Post has a story up about the ATL shooter and the Southern Baptist angle. It’s not bad as far as it goes. The story quotes a black Christian leader who says, “Young white men are being brainwashed by the politics of racial resentment by the droves” and others. But the article misses one super-relevant piece of the puzzle: The Former Guy, beloved of white evangelicals, champion misogynist and avid purveyor of anti-Asian slurs. Astounding that a story about white evangelicals, misogyny and anti-Asian racism would not at least mention TFG in passing. Seems pretty fucking relevant, if we’re speculating, as the story does.
raven
@Another Scott: I took a box of my dad’s WW2 stuff including a round from a Japanese plane that hit right above his head on the bulkhead and spun on the deck. I lost it.
Starboard Tack
@raven:
Did someone say “The RIFLEMAN”?
Poe Larity
@JanieM:
I remember all the hunting magazines going full auto after Rambo. It’s always been interesting how Hollywood is attacked as or is “pro-left” but it’s been as great a gun/violence lobby as the NRA.
Kent
Not Portland. There aren’t that many out here. Maybe Anchorage, there are a ton up there servicing all the oil rig workers and commercial fishermen passing through town on the way to and from remote job sites.
raven
@Starboard Tack: Oh yea
gvg
@MagdaInBlack: Oh my god………that is stunning.
rikyrah
@MagdaInBlack:
Prayers for the woman who just lost her parents. I can’t even imagine.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Tickraw: I don’t want to stereotype this asshat, but he looks just about exactly how I would have expected. This shit is getting REALLY old.
Kent
I’m not sure what you mean by “does not discriminate” but I’m willing to bet a lot of money that thin and pretty blonde and Asian sex workers make a LOT more money than Black or Hispanic sex workers. And are MUCH more likely to get high-end hotel hooker type gigs.
Starboard Tack
@A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan):
Those tropes are really off the mark. One of the first things towns in the west did once there were enough people for “civilization” was to institute gun control. Another thing they get wrong is that during that period many settlers were veterans of the civil war, knew guns, had guns, and weren’t afraid to use them.
Jay
@Kent:
keeping track of the “sex trade” numbers isn’t easy, because it ranges from strip clubs, to massage parlours, underground clubs, to individuals.
and rules vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Here, there is “no touching the strippers, no lap dance”, but the rules are way different in Quebec.
RobertB
@Jay: I bought an airsoft gun to shoot in my basement, because I thought it was a good way to punch holes in paper. How fast do those airsoft pellets go? Mine would punch a hole through both sides of a pop can – about 350 ft/sec. It’s like a bb gun – you can draw blood or put an eye out with it.
RobertB
@Keith P.: I worked in Houston for a few months way back when, in the Marathon Oil Building. In that neighborhood there were more strip clubs than gas stations.
Jay
@RobertB:
which is why both Paintball and Airsoft require helmets, face shields, goggles, glove, chest plates and other body armour.
Geminid
@Starboard Tack: Have Gun, Will Travel…. Head writer Gene Roddenberry went on to bigger and better things, but he wrote a good western.
Steve in the ATL
Ask and ye shall receive!
@Dorothy A. Winsor: your subscription payment was returned NSF. You know Cole doesn’t doesn’t do this for free!
Starboard Tack
@Geminid:
The biggest change, prompted by gun makers, was the shift from gun safety to personal defense. And there’s other organizations worse than the NRA, like Gun Owners of America. They don’t have as much clout as the NRA, yet, but they’re eager to fill any vacuum if the NRA collapses.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Starboard Tack: Yeah, they really were fairy tales, weren’t they? Shane! Shane!
Still, I love The Magnificent Seven. Yul Brenner and Steve McQueen, yum.
Chief Oshkosh
@raven: Yeah, we kids took all my dad’s stuff to show-and-tells and managed to lose it all over the years. He didn’t give a crap — he never talked about the combat, thought all the medals and other paraphernalia were just so much flotsam, though he did talk about his experiences in the service quite a bit.
The Moar You Know
@Geminid: It was always normal for men to own guns in this country. What got changed was what they were used for, and the intended use for which they were bought.
Most households would have a .22 with some of those little shotshells to shoot snakes with, and some regular .22lr rounds for taking out the occasional problem racoon, skunk, possum, etc. If the guy was a hunter maybe a Remington deer rifle or a shotgun for ducks. Nobody owned handguns unless they were a cop.
That changed with the NRA’s change in rulership (well documented everywhere) and Nixon’s “Law And Order” campaign, into “gun ownership for self-defense” (against certain ethnic groups never named, wink wink nod nod) and gasoline being poured on the fire by some REALLY ill-timed movies. Rambo gets the blame but he was a Johnny-come-lately – the real culprit was that sack of crap John Milinus and his “Dirty Harry” films, which cemented just who those ethnic groups were (blacks, more blacks, also blacks, and some perverts) where they lived (the inner city, protected by PC Democrat cops, natch) and why we should shoot them all (‘Murica).
Handgun sales soared. As soon as easy-to-shoot civilian versions of military weapons (AR-15s and later the AK-47) came on the market, sales of those promptly exploded as well.
Starboard Tack
@Geminid:
One of my favorites back then. Noirish with Bondian overtones. Complete rubbish, of course.
OGLiberal
@Starboard Tack: RE: Old West towns…yeah, didn’t these people see Tombstone? I know there was a lot of other stuff going on between the Earps and the Clantons but the original reason – perhaps pretense – for the confrontation that lead to the shootout was that the Clanton crew was going around town with their guns, in violation of the law. In Tombstone the law was “no guns in town”. A Western, lawless boomtown had stricter gun laws than most US states today. (and pretty sure stricter than Tombstone today) I’ve read that places like the OK Corral gave you a place to not only leave your horse but also a place to hang your gun while you were in town.
raven
@Chief Oshkosh: If it hadn’t been “the one with my name on it” he probably wouldn’t have cared. I do have the field glasses he put over his neck as he rendered first aid to a wounded paratrooper on the beach at Corregidor. He wasn’t able to hang on to the folding stock carbine!
Steve in the ATL
@Kent: I have always heard that Portland has the highest number per capita, but (1) that may just be what people in Houston and Atlanta say to feel better about themselves, and (2) having spent a fair bit of time in Portland in the last few years, I don’t see how those clubs could keep staffed (implied Zing!).
RobertB
@Jay: Yeah, just saying it isn’t a toy. It just looks like one, unless it doesn’t look like one.
JanieM
@A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan):
Thanks. Spring is coming, Biden is president, people are getting vaccinated, I need to keep reminding myself of the flip side.
Starboard Tack
@A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan):
Agreed, it’s a great adaptation of Seven Samurai.
Steve in the ATL
The Sonics’ counterpoint to have gun, will travel
Geminid
@Starboard Tack: I think the gun rights organizations the may supplant the NRA will never have the power that organization had twenty or even ten years ago. The gun safety vote now outnumbers the gun rights vote in more and more places. But all the guns the NRA encouraged and enabled people to buy are still out there.
Kent
@Steve in the ATL: Well, google says it is Portland but I have a hard time believing that today. Maybe in the 1980s and 1990s when the city was a lot seedier. But a lot of old strip clubs that were in SE Portland when I was in college are now upscale condos, Thai restaurants, and that sort of thing. Maybe they all moved out to 82nd Ave and other seedier parts of the city.
Tickraw
@A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan): Same here. I don’t like pigeonholing someone based on their haircut. But when you see white nationalist rallies, Proud Boy meetings, etc, on the news and most of them have the white nationalist mullet, it’s hard not to.
wenchacha
@MagdaInBlack: I’m so sorry! The shock and horror of it all is hard to deal with. My condolences to your son and his partner.
My son’s best friend was murdered several years ago. I spent many days going over it all in my head, trying to go back in time to make it all un-happen. It’s probably something people do when confronted with the unimaginable. I share this just to say I hope you have support, and that you and your family have a way to talk about this, to grieve our national epidemic of domestic violence.