Friday, June 12, 2009

The Lone Gunman

In the last two weeks, we have seen three soulless bastards strike, murdering individuals, the Tiller killer, the dirty Islamic terrorist convert at the recruiting office, and now the senile JEW-hater (more on the capitalization in a minute) and his attack on the Holocaust Museum. Now in listening to coverage of two of these events (the Islamic terrorist didn't rate a lot of coverage *glare toward the Obamedia*), the usual suspects have been using it to score political points for their "side" and to attack their opposition.

However, what most everyone has failed to comprehend, and properly recognize is that this is not uncommon, and all three of these pieces of shit have something in common with other names in the past, like James Earl Ray, Timothy McVeigh, (the redundant) Sirhan Sirhan and John Wilkes Booth.

"Fear is the path to the Dark Side. Fear leads to anger; anger leads to hate; hate leads to suffering." - Yoda, Episode I, speaking to the 8-year-old future Darth Vader (who would go on to slice and dice 8-year-olds and younger).

To begin, let's take a look at James W. von Brunn, the Holocaust Museum shooter (who thankfully took a shot to the face (and I hope he dies from it)). I heard about this initially just as I was going into work Wednesday. Before I got to the details (as I do sometimes actually work at work), Satyavati showed up and gave me a link to a book written by this piece of human debris (the links to this appear disabled for now, but I saved the garbage (I can forward you the PDF if you just have to read it)). It reads like a manual for a piece of shit WHITE supremacist, taking a few facts, twisting them to his delusional vision, and blaming the JEWS and their CONSPIRACY to corrupt the WHITE RACE and destroy WESTERN CIVILIZATION, using the "alleged 'HOLOCAUST'" as a tool to spread LIES (and the overuse of capital letters).

In essence, it's codified hate. And hate is what drives most of the lone gunmen.

Anger is a perfectly natural reaction in many cases (wait until my next government bailout or uber-spending post). However, too often we let it fester and become hate (which was a point I came near in my last AOTW post). However, I wouldn't blame most of the bloggers for the actions of these nutcases. Nor would I blame some of the people the purport to represent. Because the leap from being angry about something (which can motivate people to positive action) to true hate (where the actions become destructive) involves taking that which may be factual and/or good and turning it to evil purposes.

The majority of people in the country, and maybe even the world, believe in the rule of law to some degree, even when they disagree. A small portion let their anger about something (Jews, abortion, civil rights, the Civil War, etc) become a wellspring of hatred. This hatred, and the visible anger, continues corroding the soul. However, most of them would not advocate murder to achieve their ends, even if they are sympathetic to those who would (because if they did, there's be lots of bodies on the deck). Within the core of haters are a small number who WILL take such action.

"As strong as you think you are, the one thing you can't stop is the lone gunman determined to kill you, even if he gets killed in the process. I'm that man...." assassin, Babylon 5, Season 5, No Compromises

The problem with the lone gunman, or even the small cell of maniacs, is that they are nearly impossible to stop until they move to strike their target. While these kooks will talk a lot of their shit to others, years can lapse before they decide to strike. And short of the government becoming a repressive regime of thought police, there's little that can be done to detect them, other than joining their group and making lists.

The blessings of a free society are also a curse in the sense that we will always have these festering pockets of human pus, waiting to burst and give us corpses to sift through. So all we can do is remember civility in our discourse. Save the personal insults and deprecation for our friends. And ourselves.

And since this is my weekend of work (without the kids), I'll leave you all to savage me while I drink and spank myself (with tweezers) into a stupor all weekend all alone.

9 comments:

Name: Soapboxgod said...

Dude. I thought this was going to be a post about those guys from the X-Files.

Patrick M said...

I'd have had to watch the X-Files. I'll have to check Hulu for whatever eps they're in.

rockync said...

It is these pustulant boils on the ass of society which allows me to continue to support the death penalty.
They are not human beings; they are truly monsters.
When a young person meets a violent, sensless death in NC, I usually do a post at the Swash Zone in their memory - my rule is to honor them by never saying the name of their killer so the monster will go to their death in obscurity.
I grieve for the loss of Pvt. William Long, Dr Tiller and Stephen Johns.
May the names of the scumbags that took the life of each of these outstanding human beings be quickly forgotten.
Sometimes, I don't know if my soul can bear the news of another tragic death.

Anonymous said...

I love the title because it truly makes the case. I spent a little while at Swash Zone and found myself a little upset with the list found there. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. Anyway, these men that you speak of aren't an organization that nominated someone to go out and murder someone else. They are monsters that took it upon themselves filled with hatred, to take anothers life. The blame should be placed on their shoulder's alone. Even the Islamic scumbag (which I agree the murder didn't receive the media coverage it deserved, surprise, surprise) was acting alone. To blame groups for individuals actions is wrong and can lead to a lot of misconceived perceptions.

rockync said...

Yeah, some nuts just act on their own (I'm thinking about someone like John Lennon's killer). But sometimes it's not as simple as that.
Consider the last three atrocities:
Pvt Long was murdered by some creep in the name Islam or whatever. Think he would have gotten to that point without some sort of indoctrination?
Dr Tiller's killer somehow connected dots that led him to kill in the name of pro-life. You never know what unbalanced people might do with inflamed rhetoric.
And Stephen John's murderer was a long time member of various white supremist/hate groups that fed his particular sickness.
These killers are all responsible for their own actions, yes, but what to say about the groups that fed their rage?
Many Muslims, many anti-abortionists and probably even many white supremists would not consider this type of extreme behavior but do they bear any responsibility?
The right of free speech is fiercely protected in this country, by me as fiercely as anyone, but with that right comes a huge responsibility - we are the sum total of our words.
What we think or what we meant means little next to what we say and what others hear.

Patrick M said...

Jennifer: I read that post on Swash. But since you and others had set the record straight (defining the difference between beliefs and hate), I let it stand.

Rocky: I'm actually leaning against the death penalty more and more, provided we can come up with a worse punishment.

The problem is that sometimes rhetoric has to be harsh (I use the phrase "sucking babies into the sink" when talking about abortion, for example) to get the point of objection across. But having strong words get turned into hatred (idiots screaming "baby killer" at abortion docs) is, unfortunately, the price of having fee speech. That's why it's incumbent on people to weigh their words, and be clear on their objectives. The only alternative is thought police. And none of us are up for that.

As for forgetting the names of killers, it would be nice if they were forgotten in name, but we tend to remember people who make headlines, good, bad, or indifferent. Two words that prove that people can get famous for doing nothing at all: Paris Hilton.

rockync said...

Patrick - part of the weave of this thread revolves around if the groups that spawn these nut jobs have any responsibility for the actions of said nut jobs.
We walk a fine line between free speech and irrational screed. Some of these loonies may never have acted at all without the additional catalyst provided by that "harsh rehtoric."
Isn't it funny how the people and the messages we remember most are those who originated from a core of peace, love and understanding?
(Jesus, Ghandi, Martin Luther King). And yet, most people prefer the screaming and beating over the head with their placards.
The human race has learned very little over the centuries - quite depressing really...

Patrick M said...

The human race has learned very little over the centuries - quite depressing really...

We're pretty good at forgetting the past, you know...

Thus that whole doomed to repeating thing.

dmarks said...

"Two words that prove that people can get famous for doing nothing at all: Paris Hilton."

Or stay famous for doing nothing at all: Elizabeth Taylor, whose main accomplishment of the past 25 years has been playing the mother-in-law in the "Flintstones" movie.