(no subject)

[hummingwolf]

From Slacktivist: "Only a crazy person would take what we say seriously."

Every few years, tragically, some poor confused bastard fails to realize that it's all a big game, a pretense, a lie. He takes them seriously and he takes their words seriously and he behaves as someone who believes what they say. So Paul Hill murders a doctor in Florida. Eric Rudolph bombs the Atlanta Olympics. Scott Roeder guns down a doctor in church.

And each time this happens all of the people who have, for years, been suggesting that such violent resistance is obligatory recoil in horror at the sight of someone treating their words as anything other than the disingenuous lies they were always meant to be.

You know, I was thinking when I woke up this morning that with all the news coverage about Saturday's shooting, Julian Assange must be feeling terribly left out. So when the first thing I heard after turning on the news radio station was that Julian Assange had compared himself to Gabrielle Giffords, I greeted the news with a certain lack of surprise. Then again, given what Sarah Palin and other rightwing superstars have said about the Wikileaks crew, the statement may have a point. It's a point hidden underneath a gigantic, bloated ego, but that doesn't mean it isn't there.

Comments

[kitten-goddess.livejournal.com]

Thank you for your post. I have contributed to our current climate of rudeness by ranting about the Tea Party/Palin on and off LJ, but I can say I am not guilty of calling for violence. The worst I have said is that we should give Texas back to Mexico, but they have to take all the Tea Partiers with them.

[hummingwolf.livejournal.com]

Well, sometimes it's hard not to rant! But avoiding violent talk about one's merely political opponents is a good start.