Author: R J Adams

Congratulations are in order tonight. Surely Brian Williams and the NBC Nightly News team deserve a medal for their performance as “Best American News Program Broadcasting the Least News” in a half hour segment.

After wringing yet another drip of emotion out of the Virginia Tech massacre, the stalwart Brian went on to recount how “Schoolyard Jitters” after Virginia Tech have hit hard around the nation – though no incidents to justify those jitters have actually been recorded.

For a brief moment, under thirty seconds, there was a pause to announce a shooter had killed a hostage and himself at a NASA establishment – covered in much greater detail half an hour earlier on BBC World News – before the program hurriedly moved on to more important matters, an in-depth interview with some unknown guy who had just published yet another book about Albert Einstein.

Albert Einstein? Has NBC strayed onto the History Channel?

In fairness, Brian pointed out that other news items this week had been pushed out by NBC’s obsessive, blanket coverage of “the massacre”. The one minute and fifty second long segment immediately following this announcement, covered other news NBC had been unable to broadcast in the last few days, including – John Edwards spending eight hundred dollars on two haircuts (two?), Tommy Thompson telling a Jewish group, “Earning money is part of the Jewish tradition” (Ah vey, that’s news?), Sanjaya’s latest hairstyle (San – who?) and the most important news of the week, that should perhaps have even eclipsed “the massacre”, the season’s first “no-hitter” (apparently, this means something to Americans). Well, it wasn’t quite one minute fifty seconds, given that twenty-two seconds of the segment covered – yes, you’ve guessed it – the Virginia Tech massacre.

Nothing daunted, the final two minutes and fifteen seconds of the program covered – yes, you’ve guessed it – the Virginia Tech massacre. In particular, a state trooper happily ensconced at his desk hoping to clear a paperwork backlog, till the call came to high-tail it to Virginia Tech and drag out the dead and wounded. This was NBC’s “Making a Difference” segment. The cop was hailed as a “hero”, rather than a guy just doing his job, and the program finished on its usual ultra-emotional high.

Oh, wait! I do NBC a dis-service. Another riveting segment I almost forgot concerned the town of…..ehhhhm……somewhere in…….I think…..was it South Dakota?…….that was almost destroyed by flood and fire, but has been rebuilt.

It happened ten years ago.

Maybe I did tune to the History Channel by mistake?

Filed under: American comedy

Mathew Owens wrote a comment on Sparrow Chat recently, relating to the previous post (Guns Save Lives – 7 Update). He, like anyone else refraining from worthless obscenities, is welcome to comment. What he had to say I find disturbing, so rather than respond in the “comments” section, I have decided to do so as a separate post.

Here is what Mathew had to say:

“Hello, i would like to say… yes that yes guns were created to kill and most likely in due time kill many, but i would also point out that when one uses a gun as a defense weapon to protect oneself or others then they have just easily saved lives that could have been lost. People allowed to carry weapons to protect themselves is a great idea, maybe not the best but everyone is so quick to point fingers at others and say “Hey why dont you do something to fix this?!” well i’ll tell you as i say to most.. SHUT UP! accept the fact that if they wherent killed with a gun they coulda been killed by a bomb.. or maybe a knife.. or my fav a sword! it dont matter the cause the point is that not all weapons are bad and depending on the person who uses it should be judged. i for one accept guns as a means to protect from those who would do harm. if you take away the ability to get a weapon to defend yourself then the ones who use the illegal means to obtain them have no won.. evil wins when good does nothing to help prevent it.”

Mathew, welcome to Sparrow Chat.

You, and millions like you in this country, live in fear. It may surprise you to hear that, and your first reaction will almost certainly be denial, but it is true. You camouflage your fear with the bravado that somehow weapons are “macho”, a sign of strength, almost “romantic”. You even say your favorite weapon is a sword.

Certainly, weaponry has its own social clique, gun-fairs, gun-talk, and of course, the hunting element. Perhaps you consider that aspect worth the lives of thirty-two students?

I truly doubt you do.

In March 1996 Britain suffered its worst school massacre when sixteen young children and one teacher were slaughtered. A lone gunman, toting two 9 mm Browning HP pistols and two Smith and Wesson .357 revolvers, walked into the Dunblane Primary School in Scotland and opened fire. He was also carrying 743 cartridges.

In response to this dreadful event the British Conservative government had the strength to pass legislation banning all handguns, with the exception of .22 caliber single-shot weapons. One year later, these were also banned.

Major objections were raised by gun and shooting clubs, as their activities were seriously curtailed by this legislation. The British Government’s response was, “Too bad. Find some other way to have fun.”

The lives of all human beings, Mathew, are more important than having fun with guns.

In the weeks following the Dunblane massacre, media and public opinion followed much the same course as is happening in America today. The media consensus indicted that a ban was unworkable; criminals will always get guns.

Yet, they were wrong. That ban has worked. There have been no further incidents like Dunblane in the past eleven years. Of course, there are still occasional shooting incidents, mainly between drug gangs or underworld criminals using illegal weapons. Nevertheless, penalties for possession of illegal firearms are severe, and deter many who might otherwise resort to gun violence.

There is another factor, more difficult to measure. Since 1996, Britain feels safer. Knowing that a burglar, or just a violent drunk on the street, is not going to pull out a firearm makes for far less of a threat. Knives – and swords – can still kill, but less impersonally. Of course, in Britain, both are illegal when used as weapons, and would be classed as an “offensive weapon” in law.

Put simply, Mathew, there is a lot less fear in Britain today as a result.

I’d like to reflect, Mathew, on your perceptions of ‘good’ and ‘evil’.

You believe the “good guy”, carrying a gun to defend himself against the “bad guy” is acceptable. You call it a “great idea”. I would respectfully suggest your viewpoint is seriously flawed. It smacks of the the old-time Hollywood Western films, the good guy and the bad guy approaching from opposite ends of town and the good guy always fastest to the draw.

Real life is a little different, Mathew.

Today’s bad guy will likely shoot you in the back. He will give you no chance to shoot him first. If you are one of thousands of Americans who excuse their fear by maintaining the gun cabinet is only there to protect the family from intruders, you are duping yourself. Unless your fear causes you to sleep each night with a loaded pistol under your pillow, it is extremely unlikely an armed night-time intruder would conveniently wait around while you wake-up, walk to the gun-room, unlock the cabinet and seize your trusty firearm ready for the battle. In all likelihood, you’ll be dead before your feet reach your bedroom slippers.

On the other hand, in the event of a full frontal assault on your house by a gang of murdering psychopaths, you probably would have time to fetch your gun and defend yourself through a convenient window. But let’s face it, Mathew, in reality is that situation a likely occurrence – even in America?

The conclusion we must reach is that in real life a gun as a form of self-defense is fairly useless, except as a psychological prop to keep that fear subdued. If that’s so, there’s little point in owning one – or two, or half a dozen. Great for the odd school massacre, but redundant as an instrument for self-preservation.

Having reached that conclusion, Mathew, it surely seems unfair that the bad guy who is likely to shoot you in the back, should be able to legally buy the gun from Wal-Mart with his credit card.

One of the factors to emerge from Britain’s gun ban, was that future shootings tended to be restricted to illegal revenge killings among drug gangs, or the underworld. Ordinary people like you and I, Mathew, are generally not the ones getting shot. The bad guys are shooting each other.

Now that’s got to be a good thing, hasn’t it?

In conclusion, Mathew, I would make one last observation. You state your favorite weapon is a sword. Mine – is a pen.

Which do you believe is the mightier?

“”Go on doing with your pen what in other times was done with the sword.” ~ Thomas Jefferson 1796.

Filed under: Gun law

The death toll has now reached 33 with almost as many injured. For the next few days every news channel in America will saturate coverage of this massacre. The question “Why?” will be debated over and over – until something more interesting replaces it in the headlines.

There is no debate.

Why this, and other similar events, happen is totally obvious to those of us not indoctrinated into believing the crap poured forth by the NRA and their pet poodles in government. It was asked after ‘Columbine’; it was asked after the recent deaths of six Amish children. It keeps getting asked, but never is it answered.

There is no debate.

You, America, are the reason it keeps happening. You saturate your media systems with bloody violence and human hatred; you glorify sadism and revel in the death and horrific suffering of other human beings as entertainment, then – on a plate – you hand the sick, the retarded, or the just plain bloodthirsty, the means to act out these atrocities in real life.

George W Bush neatly avoids his share of responsibility. He has systematically removed the federal statutes that once provided an, albeit meager, measure of firearms control. Today, he had the nerve and effrontery to stand before the nation like some overly-pious bishop, and tell Americans:

“………Laura and I and many across our nation are praying for the victims and all the members of university community that have been devastated by this terrible tragedy……….We hold the victims in our hearts. We lift them up in our prayers and we ask a loving God to comfort those who are suffering today.”

How easy it is to pray.

Championing legislation to put an end to these massacres would be so much more difficult. He’d have to go against the wishes of his mates and financiers in the NRA. Has it occurred to him that, perhaps, this “loving God” he is so fond of mentioning might regard him in a better light if he did more to save the lives and prevent the suffering of the “loving God’s” creations?

I spit on his concept of a “loving God”. It exists only in his warped and twisted imagination.

Eighty human beings die every day from guns in America. Yet you, America, continue to sit pathetically by and do nothing to prevent it. Is effective gun control in the manifesto of the political party you support? Have you bothered to ask the guy who knocks on your door wanting you to vote for him, “What’s your policy on gun control?” Have you?

There is no debate.

Guns are manufactured for one purpose, and one purpose only – to kill, violently and indiscriminately – and easily.

There is no debate. Remove the guns and you stop the massacres. It’s been proven.

Do you care enough?

Or was Charlton Heston speaking for you, America?

“Take my weapon? When you pry it from my cold, dead hands!”

Filed under: Evil breeds evil