stupid piled on stupid

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Honest, I do NOT want to keep writing about this ‘stand your ground’ stuff. But I declare, it seems like every twenty minutes something completely predictable and completely stupid happens–and what’s the point of having a blog if you can’t take a moment out of the day to point out the effect stupidity has on the world around us?

You might have heard about the series of shootings in Tulsa Oklahoma over the weekend. A couple of white guys drove through a predominantly black neighborhood the night before Easter and shot five random black guys, killing three of them. Two men–Alvin Watts and Jake England–have been arrested and charged with the crimes. The motive appears to be generally racist and generically vengeful. The shootings took place on the second anniversary of the killing of England’s father. The man who shot and killed England’s father was black; he wasn’t charged with murder because Oklahoma is another ‘stand your ground’ state and he claimed self-defense.

It seems fairly certain that the earlier ‘justified’ killing, fueled in part by some non-specific racism, has led to these recent ‘unjustified’ killings. This is stupid piled on top of stupid.

But stupid appears to be in unlimited supply. There are people who see all these unrelated shootings as engagements in some undeclared race war being implemented by President Obama. I’m not kidding–there are folks actually claiming that. Here are four examples taken directly from four different members of freerepublic.com:

“Much like the ‘War on Terror’, there won’t be any actual declaration that the race war has begun. Just a series of incidents like this. The number of incidents will grow and then a spark will set off a riot in a city or a number of cities.”

“This race riot that Obama and Holder started is sickening. I feel so sorry for all my friends in America that remember what our country used to be.”

“It’s just what Obama wanted too. Another way to divide the country, and this is all part of his grand re-election scheme. Think about it, if he loses he’ll blame all the racist whites and spark the final wave of a giant race war in this country.”

“It’s a been a small scale guerrilla war for now. The shootings in Tulsa show that the whites have begun to engage. Look out this summer. A hot summer, high gas and food prices, possible government shutdown over the debt ceiling, war in the mid east, financial meltdown in Europe. Throw in a presidential campaign where the incumbent seems perfectly comfortable orchestrating a racial Götterdämmerung. They’ll be lucky to keep the trucks rolling and the interstates open.”

These folks are as unhinged as the people who keep declaring the world is going to end on a specific date. They’ve been predicting race wars and religious wars and communist invasions across the Mexican border and other lunatic apocalyptic crises for half a century. It’s always on the verge of happening–and even though it never does happen, these folks are waiting for it. They’re armed and prepared and waiting.

And the really truly stupid thing about all this–the stupid conspiracy theories, the stupid laws, the stupid shootings–is that they’re all grounded in nothing but free-floating fear. It’s a volatile feedback loop: stupidity leads to fear, fear leads to a desire for protection, that desire leads to stupid laws based on fear and the stupid belief that guns are a solution, easy access to guns makes lethal violence more likely, lethal violence leads to more fear, and the green grass grows all around, all around.

Stupid. Stupid piled on stupid, piled on still more stupid. Stupid is George Zimmerman following Trayvon Martin because he ‘looks suspicious.’ Stupid is a law that allows Zimmerman to legally shoot that young man. Stupid is a pair of guys ‘avenging’ a death by randomly shooting people who are the same general color of a person who committed an earlier stupid act of violence.

It’s so easy to be stupid. And stupid is so hard to root out.

the law is a ass

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An online friend made an interesting comment yesterday. Patrick is an intelligent guy–he’s no wide-eyed innocent, he’s been alive long enough to know how the world works and he’s traveled widely enough to see it works differently in different places. His comment about the Trayvon Martin case is astute and it would have made perfect sense, except for one thing: this took place in Florida. Here’s what Patrick said

I really don’t understand how this isn’t so clearly seen as what it is… a failure to investigate.

What also is striking about this is that Zimmerman was simply taken at his word. Had the dead boy been a white kid, Zimmerman probably would have been held until all evidence was in. But, of course, had the boy been white, it’s likely this never would have happened.

As I said, Patrick is an intelligent guy, but he’s making a mistake that a LOT of intelligent people are making. He’s assuming the police either fucked up or didn’t care enough to investigate.

The problem as I see it is less about the Sanford Police Department and more about the law. The police must have probable cause to believe a crime has been committed before they’re allowed to conduct an actual investigation. In the U.S., citizens have always had the right to use lethal force to defend themselves and their homes. If the police arrived at your home and found a dead body on your lawn, they’d be legally allowed (even required) to ask you questions–but they can’t truly investigate you in a serious, methodical, intensive way without some sort of cause to believe the shooting wasn’t justified. They have to have a positive reason to believe the shooting was against the law.

And that, believe it or not, is a good thing. We don’t want to give the police the authority to initiate an investigation of a citizen based on anything other than probable cause to believe a crime has been committed. The police have too much investigative power as it is.

The problem is the so-called Stand Your Ground laws have extended that right of self-defense in the home to–well, to everywhere. So while the police were able to temporarily detain and question George Zimmerman, they had no power or authority to begin an actual investigation into the matter. That step was precluded the moment Zimmerman said he believed his life was in danger and that he acted in self-defense. Without some obvious indication that Zimmerman was lying, the police response was necessarily limited.

It’s easy to blame George Zimmerman for killing an unarmed and completely innocent Trayvon Martin–because that’s exactly what he did. But it’s pointless to blame Zimmerman without looking at the social context that shaped the killing. Florida has very loose gun laws, which makes it possible for people like Zimmerman (who was arrested in the past for assaulting a police officer) to legally obtain a handgun. Florida’s laws also allowed him to obtain a permit to legally carry that weapon. Florida’s laws also allowed him to legally use that weapon in a situation that, until 2005, would have been considered criminal on the face of it. And finally, Florida’s laws limited the police response to the shooting.

There’s no doubt George Zimmerman is guilty of homicide–the killing of another person. But the law in Florida is such that he may not be guilty of murder–which is an illegal killing.

In Oliver Twist, the character Mr. Bumble is informed “the law supposes that your wife acts under your direction”. Mr. Bumble’s response: “If the law supposes that…the law is a ass—a idiot. If that’s the eye of the law, the law is a bachelor; and the worst I wish the law is that his eye may be opened by experience—by experience.”

The law in Florida (and some two dozen other states) is “a ass.” It’s to be hoped that the law may have its eyes opened by this experience. It’s to be hoped, but not to be expected.

one fact we know for certain

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A couple weeks ago I wrote a brief piece reminding folks about the presumption of innocence, and how it has to be applied to everybody–including George Zimmerman, the man who shot and killed Trayvon Martin. I also noted that the way the Florida law is written, it probably doesn’t matter legally that Zimmerman almost certainly provoked the incident that allowed him to shoot and kill Martin. The sad fact is that the law in Florida is almost designed to create situations in which lethal force can be legally used.

(photograph by PressTV)

A few hundred people read that. Not a lot by internet standards, but enough to spark a bit of a fuss–including a comment by somebody named Jonathan Ledlester (his complete comment can be seen in the original post). Ledlester begins his comment with this:

Crayon Martin caused his own death.

You almost don’t have to read any farther to know what direction the comment will take. It’s all right there–the sneering, the dismissiveness, the need to justify, the need to find a way to interpret or invent facts to fit a worldview. The simple refusal to use the dead boy’s name–to give him even the least bit of respect–is telling.

Ledlester goes on to make this observation:

Crayon Martin COULD’VE CALLED THE COPS to report Zimmerman was following him. But Crayon Martin CHOOSE TO NOT CALL THE COPS.

At first glance, this seems to be a rational point. And it is–if you’re white. Ledlester doesn’t seem to be aware that black kids in general may not have the same faith in the impartiality and reliability of the police as do white kids. You can debate whether or not that lack of faith is justified, but it doesn’t change the reality that a lot of black folks don’t believe they can trust the police.

Ledlester then asserts a number of facts not in evidence, describing a scenario in which Martin assaults Zimmerman. That may be true; we don’t know. And that’s just it. We don’t know. But Ledlester omits one fact that we DO know. In his comment, Ledlester states: “Zimmerman told the police dispatcher that he’d lost sight of Martin.” What the recording actually notes is Zimmerman says “He’s running,” and a moment or two later, “He ran.” The reason Zimmerman lost sight of Martin is because Martin was running away. The police dispatcher told Zimmerman “We don’t need you to [follow Martin].”

That should have been the end of the situation. It wasn’t. Zimmerman claims he was returning to his vehicle when he was confronted and assaulted by Martin. Is that likely? Considering Martin was running away moments earlier, probably not. Considering the fact that the shooting occurred only 70 yards away from the townhouse where Martin was staying, it seems improbable that he’d stop, turn around, confront and assault the man he was running away from moments earlier. Is it possible? Sure, anything is possible.

Ledlester ends his comment with this:

Crayon Martin killed himself.

George Zimmerman killed Trayvon Martin. The law might be written in such a way that it allowed him to do so with impunity, but if there’s only one fact we know for certain, it’s this: George Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin, who was unarmed, who’d done nothing wrong, and was simply walking back from a convenience store.

much fuss, no point

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There’s a bit of fuss about this photograph. Some of it’s deserved; most of it isn’t. First posted on the Wipeout Homophobia wall on Facebook, the photo is said to depict a gay pride flag being raised at a U.S. Marine compound in Afghanistan.

The fuss seems to take two approaches, one that disputes the authenticity of the photograph and one that objects to the message of the photograph. The former is almost certainly an extension of the latter. I suspect the people who call the authenticity of the photograph into question are also opposed to gay folks serving openly in the military (or serving at all, for that matter).

The authenticity arguments are pretty…well, stupid. For example, this guy: “No American commander in Afghanistan would allow that to happen. The American flag and guidons approved by the Institute of Heraldry are the only banners displayed in a war zone. It’s a great photoshop though.”

Since there are also photos of the Marine climbing up onto the Hesco bastion with the flag in his hand, it’s highly unlikely the images are photoshopped. But the guy is right about the commander and the heraldry issues. It’s highly improbable that any commander would authorize that flag and the flag doesn’t conform to military guidelines. Of course, nobody has claimed this was an authorized act*, or that the rainbow flag remained there for any length of time. It’s almost certainly just some Marine making a personal statement in support of gay rights.

Should he be punished for it? I have to say yes, though I agree with what he did. I’d certainly expect him to receive some punishment if he’d raised a white power flag or a Nazi flag. I can’t condone the behavior just because I agree with it.

Still, I’m glad this guy did it, regardless of how long the flag was up and regardless if he gets punished for it. Sometimes making a point is more important than following the rules. If you break the rules, you have to be willing to accept your punishment, of course. But there are times when it’s worth it. There are times, in fact, when it’s necessary.

The fact is, being gay is no more a matter of pride than being, say, right-handed. Being gay isn’t an achievement; it’s not something people strive for. It’s just what some folks are. The pride comes from announcing you’re gay or that you support gay rights at a time when gay folks are being marginalized, discriminated against, killed. The pride comes from making a big deal out of something that shouldn’t be a big deal at all, and continuing to make a big deal out of it until it’s actually NOT a big deal anymore.

There’ll come a day when the grandkids of gay folks will look at photos like this and wonder what all the fuss was about. They won’t think that because they’re innocent; they’ll think that because they’ll be right–there’s nothing here to make a fuss about.

* That’s not entirely correct; some conservatives have claimed that raising the gay pride flag in that military compound was part of the “Obama agenda” of “salut[ing] the colors of the homosexual lobby by flying a rainbow flag in place of Old Glory.” Note that ‘in place of.’ Lawdy, these people are phenomenally stupid.

joel stein is a dick

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The only thing more embarrassing than catching a guy on the plane looking at pornography on his computer is seeing a guy on the plane reading “The Hunger Games.”

Yeah. That’s Joel Stein in a short (but not short enough) rant called Adults Should Read Adult Books written for the New York Times. Stein says, “I have no idea what “The Hunger Games” is like… I don’t know because it’s a book for kids. I’ll read ‘The Hunger Games’ when I finish the previous 3,000 years of fiction written for adults.”

It can’t be easy to be such a pompous dick. It must take a great deal of practice, so I’m willing to give Stein some credit for his dedication. And I wouldn’t want to deny him the right to object to any genre of literature; after all, I’ve been known to make the occasional disparaging comment about Romance fiction. But I’d never suggest there’s anything wrong with somebody who chose to read Romance novels. Stein’s absolute rejection of the value of Young Adult fiction isn’t what makes him a dick. That just makes him ignorant.

No, what makes Joel Stein an Olympic caliber dick is that he sets himself up as an arbiter of what is appropriate for adults to read when he has written a soon-to-be-released nonfiction book called (and I’m not making this up) Man Made: A Stupid Quest for Masculinity. The book is apparently about Stein’s panic at learning he is about to become the father of a son, and trying to discover what it means to be a ‘man’ by (and really, I’m not making this up at all) briefly engaging in testosterone-driven tasks. He spends three days (3!) in some form of military basic training, he spends a 24 hour shift with the fire department, he goes camping (with…and lawdy, I wish I was making this up…the Boy Scouts), he does some home repairs. In other words, he pays a fleeting visit to what he believes is the world of manhood in the hope that he’ll learn something profound about masculinity.

Then, in this wee little rant, he writes “You can’t take an adult seriously when he’s debating you over why Twilight vampires are O.K. with sunlight.” And that is what makes Joel Stein a dick.

Joel, bunkie, this is where you make your mistake. Men read Young Adult fiction and aren’t embarrassed by it.

find of the day

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If you judged only by the number of morels plucked from the soil, then my first morel hunt of the season was an absolute bust. I saw one small grey morel, no larger than the first knuckle of my thumb. I found three times that many ticks on my clothes–so if this was a tick hunt, then it would have been slightly more successful.

However, if you just count it as a walk in the woods, it was an unqualified triumph. I went with my brother Roger Lee, who may be a tad too impatient to be a good mushroom hunter but has a nicely cavalier attitude about being in the woods. Some people hover around you when you’re in the woods–afraid to get too far away from you, afraid you’ll get lost or they’ll get lost. Roger Lee just wanders off with the casual assumption that somehow you’ll manage to meet up again somewhere. I like that.

It was Roger Lee who made the Find of the Day. A tipi frame, almost camouflaged by being as bare as the trees around it. Centered below the frame was a small circle of rocks to serve as a fire-pit. Clearly somebody had camped there in the not-too-distant past; the need for a fire suggests last autumn or possibly even during the winter. The tipi was in a good spot–protected from the wind, a few yards away a small brook, isolated from view, far enough from the road to be inconvenient to find but close enough that fifteen minutes of steady walking would get you there.

But the tipi frame wasn’t the Find of the Day; that was just an interesting object. The woods are full of interesting objects–things that are thought-provoking but not particularly surprising. That’s one of the many reasons to walk in the woods.

No, the Find of the Day was lurking a short distance away–maybe fifteen yards–hidden inside the hollow trunk of a dying tree.

The tree itself was an interesting object. It was bent and broken–maybe the result of an old lightning strike, maybe from some sort of rot, maybe ice damage, maybe an infestation of beetles–who can say? But it was bent and broken open, and the interior of the trunk was hollow.

The natural thing to do with a bent, broken, hollow tree trunk, of course, is to look inside. Which is exactly what Roger Lee did. You’d have done the same thing your ownself, you know it. What he saw inside, that was the Find of the Day.

I’ve written elsewhere about my fascination with a chunk of curbing wrapped in a length of red PVC wire. That object must have struck a chord with people, because since then I’ve received a number of emails from people describing similar found-objects, sometimes with cameraphone photos showing bits of concrete bundled in ribbon or stones tied up in wire like some sort of primitive holiday package. I find them all strangely fascinating.

This is what was tucked away in the hollow of that bent tree:

I’ve no idea what this bluish stone is, although it appears to have been shaped at some point in the past. I’ve no idea why a length of twine is so tidily coiled around it, although the condition of the twine suggests it was done fairly recently. And I’ve no idea why it was stashed n the hollow of a dead tree trunk, although it clearly was stashed; it didn’t just wind up there by accident.

Somebody did this purposefully. Somebody deliberately placed the stone in the hollow of the tree, and just as deliberately encircled it with a length of twine. Most likely it was placed there by whoever was camping in the nearby tipi–but that’s just an assumption.

All I know is that this is strange and lovely and it moves me in some peculiar way. The Irish have a saying: Níl sa saol seo ach ceo is ní bheimíd beo ach seal beag gearr. It’s a misty old world and we’re only in it for a short, sharp while. It’s stuff like this that keeps it sharp.

an innocent man

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This is going to be an unpopular thing to say, but it has to be said at some point. George Zimmerman–the man who unquestionably shot and killed Trayvon Martin–is innocent.

This is a fundamental aspect of the U.S. Constitution. Every citizen who stands accused of a crime must be presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law. This isn’t some legal nicety we can overlook simply because it’s unpopular. If the presumption of innocence has any value at all, it has to apply to everybody–even George Zimmerman. It’s true that standard only applies to juries, but when you hear somebody say Zimmerman ought to be tried and punished, they’re basically saying the Constitution shouldn’t apply to people they don’t like. And that’s fucked up.

So there it is, George Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin and wherever he is right now, he’s an innocent man. I hate to say it, but he’s probably innocent in two ways. He’s presumptively innocent and may, in fact, be not guilty under the law. According to Florida’s statute 776.013 (3) – Justifiable Use of Force, Zimmerman may never have his innocence challenged. It’s very possible he’ll never be charged with a crime. The law clearly states “A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself.” The way the law is written, it’s very nearly a license to kill–and indeed, ‘justifiable’ homicides in Florida have increased threefold since the law was enacted.

We can’t know with any certainty what took place in the final few moments before George Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin. But we can make some educated guesses based on what we do know. We know what Zimmerman told the police during his 911 call. We know, for example, he was unreasonably suspicious of Martin. We know he was following the young man, and continued to do so even after the police told him he shouldn’t. We also know Trayvon Martin knew he was being followed and was nervous about it. We know Zimmerman prejudged Martin (“These assholes, they always get off”), and we know he felt antagonistic toward Martin (he called Martin either a “fucking coon” or a “fucking goon”).

That’s what we know. We can surmise Martin felt threatened by the man following him and decided to confront Zimmerman. We can surmise Zimmerman felt threatened by the confrontation and so pulled his weapon. We can surmise Martin felt threatened by the weapon and may have struck Zimmerman in self-defense. And we can surmise Zimmerman felt threatened by the assault and shot Martin in self-defense.

The way the Florida law is written, the last person to survive feeling threatened is innocent.

Trayvon Martin was innocent in reality. George Zimmerman is innocent under the law. The people who aren’t innocent are the members of the Florida legislature who enacted this stupid fucking law.

There won’t be any real justice for Trayvon Martin. There won’t be any justice for George Zimmerman. The only possible justice that could come out of this tragedy is if the good people of Florida rise up and force their legislature to repeal the law, and maybe vote out the idiots who thought the law was a good idea to begin with.

But this is Florida, where guns don’t kill people–people kill people. And in Florida, you can get away with it.

a pathetic, fearful little man

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Rush Limbaugh is a coward. He hides behind the title ‘entertainer,’ which he believes gives him cover for making the most reprehensible and offensive remarks. That title also gives timid Republican politicians cover; they can dismiss the things Limbaugh says as outrageous while claiming it’s just entertainment.

It’s a convenient lie that nobody believes—including the people who speak it.

Rush Limbaugh is a coward, and like so many cowards he’s a bully when given the opportunity. He sits in a small sound studio, protected from the outside world, insulated from reality, and from that safe vantage point he mocks and jeers at people who disagree with him. He surrounds himself with sycophants and toadies, people who adore him because he’s found a safe way to say the ugly things they think.

Rush Limbaugh is a coward and a bully, a contemptible and despicable person. But behind all the bluster and bloviating, Limbaugh is also a pathetic and fearful little man, deeply inadequate—and he must be painfully aware of that. He must be terrified that others may recognize his fear and inadequacy. It would be horrible, I think, to be so afraid of so many things.

This isn’t to suggest Limbaugh is deserving of our empathy or compassion. He’s not. But one difference between us and Rush Limbaugh (one of the many differences) is we don’t reserve our compassion and consideration just for those we think are deserving. That would be a cheap sort of compassion.

Rush Limbaugh is a coward and a bully, and as much as I despise the man and the many horrible things he says, I can’t help feeling a grudging sort of sadness for him. In the words of the poet Mr. T., I pity the fool*. But I can’t pity him very much.

 

* To be more accurate, the phrase “I pity the fool” originally came from James Merle, an Autobiograph, which is a novel written in 1864 by William Black. He wrote: I pity the fool who marries and yet imagines he may be a great man. That seems to apply to Rush Limbaugh, who has married four times and so must want to believe he’s four times a great man. In fact, he’s merely four times a fool.