GLBTQ community and guns

A place at the table

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It’s the day before Thanksgiving. We are at our cabin for a family Thanksgiving and we will enjoy sliding, hiking in the snow, snowshoeing and just hanging out as a family. It’s long time since the shooting death of my sister. We think of her at holiday times knowing that there will be a place for her in our hearts but not at our table. It has become the new normal for her grown kids and their children to have Thanksgiving without her.

But we are all thankful for our full and happy lives in spite of her being missing from the table.

Many victims and survivors will be having a sad Thanksgiving this year because a loved one was shot and killed. The latest mass shooting ( it’s ridiculous that we even have to mention the latest mass shooting) in Thousand Oaks, CA has left 13 families and many friends without a person who they expected to be at their Thanksgiving table. And to add literal insult to injury, many had to evacuate the area because of the wild fires:

Throughout the day, I drove all over the region talking to the gunman’s neighbors and to survivors, including some who had already survived a previous mass shooting. It was the second mass shooting I had reported on within the span of three weeks. And once again it was a huge story, with around-the-clock television coverage. (…)  Then, just after 3 a.m., I awoke to a voice on a gurgly loudspeaker: “We are under mandatory evacuation orders. Please collect your bags and exit immediately.” (…) It took several minutes for me to realize I had been in the same parking lot earlier that day, looking for loved ones of those who died at the Borderline Bar. Few there wanted to speak with me. As one worker put it, “It really can’t get much worse.”
An hour or so later, it did. As I drove down the 101 Freeway, flames were easily visible from both sides. Thousands of people were evacuated from Thousand Oaks, including those who had survived the shooting the night before. It was even worse in the northern part of the state, where an inferno trapped people trying to escape in their cars, likely killing hundreds.

Should not a mass shooting be enough for one area to experience? The trauma to so many people will cause them pain and suffering for many years. 

And our President has done nothing to help heal the area with his crass and insensitive remarks about the devastation from the fire by trying to blame those affected. The idea that raking the “floor of the forest” would have prevented the fires is both ridiculous and preposterous and has been roundly criticized by Americans and Finns. ( Using the Finnish President as his foil, he claimed that he told him (Trump) that they take care of their forests by raking the floors of the forest- and then called it forestation as if he knew exactly what that meant. There are really no words for this debacle,

The Finns have a sense of humor at least and saw this disturbing behavior for what it was. Take a look at the photos and tweets from some of them.

In addition, along the lines of nonsensical comments from Trump,  I’m sure he would have claimed that if only one of those students had been armed while dancing and enjoying themselves at a local bar this tragedy could have been averted. I’m sure he knew that the first 2 victims were security guards? 

Soon after the Thousand Oaks shooting, a man decided to shoot up a Yoga studio where innocent women were shot and killed:

According to police, Scott Paul Beierle, 40, walked into Hot Yoga Tallahassee on Friday evening and opened fire, killing two people and wounding five others before turning the gun on himself. (…) According to The New York Times, Beierle was sympathetic toward Elliot Rodger, who killed six people and wounded 14 others in 2014 near the University of California, Santa Barbara. Rodger had written a manifesto in which he lamented his virginity, which he blamed on the “cruelness of women.”
Beierle said that as an adolescent he could relate to “this endless wasteland that breeds this longing and this frustration,” The New York Times reported.
He recounted a string of instances in which he was personally rejected.

He shot himself as well. He was able to get a gun easily because that’s the way it is in America. Guns=shootings.

And then after that a domestic dispute ended in a mass shooting at Chicago area hospital killing the intended victim, an Emergency Room physician and others.  

And then after that there were several shootings in Minnesota of a pregnant woman and a Pokemon Go player minding their own business.

And after that 1 was shot dead and 4 injured in downtown Denver.

And then there is a new (Neo-Nazi) video game that allows players to kill GLBTQ people:

As reported by the Angry White Men blog, one of the game’s levels involves shooting people inside a gay club called “LGBTQ+ Agenda HQ.” The action is strongly reminiscent of the Pulse nightclub mass shooting in Orlando, Florida, in June 2016 when 49 people were killed.
Another mission involves killing journalists inside the offices of the “Fake News Network,” a reference to the term Trump uses to attack media organizations such as CNN. The New York offices of CNN were recently sent a pipe bomb as part of an alleged plot targeting Trump critics and key Democrat figures, including former president Barack Obama and former secretary of state Hilary Clinton.

Disgusting and frightening. Is this the America we deserve?

You can’t make these scenarios up.

After the recent mass shooting, and particularly the Thousand Oaks shooting, the CEO of the Toms shoe company decided to have a seat at the table of gun safety reform. In an appearance with Jimmy Fallon he announced that he would be contributing millions to organizations working on gun violence prevention. 

Notice the emotion about the Thousand Oaks shooting shown by Blake Mycoskie when he realized that this latest of our nation’s mass shootings was too close for comfort.

Here’s the thing. Shootings are happening everywhere at anytime. No one is safe. More guns is not the answer. That is clear because the number of victims of gun violence is rising, not decreasing. Americans are waking up to the reality of our gun culture. It’s not a culture. It’s tyranny according to the author (Jack Holmes) of this piece:


This is the America we have made for ourselves. You can survive one mass shooting—an unprecedented atrocity which left 59 dead and 527 wounded—only to find yourself the victim in another one because you chose the wrong bar on the wrong night to go dancing with your friends. If you’re an American, you can be shot anywhere: at school, at the mall, at a concert, at the movie theater. To be an American is to know that when you venture outside, you have a better chance than the citizen of any other country in the developed world of being shot by a complete and total stranger with easy access to incredibly powerful weaponry. (…) That’s why the response from the NRA and their Republican allies after every mass shooting is that no measure that would restrict the number of guns sold will work. Nothing that would deem certain citizens unworthy of gun ownership—a history of violence, worrying signs of mental illness—can be made disqualifying by an act of Congress. The only solution, they tell us, is more guns. We should arm teachers. We should have armed guards. We should all be armed, even in bars. Did you notice all these solutions lead to gun manufacturers selling more guns? The desired outcome is a relentlessly militarized society, where every citizen must be armed at all times to ensure their own safety, and you can shoot someone who scares you in the supermarket parking lot. (…) Should the women at that Tallahassee yoga studio have been strapped while they assumed the Downward Dog? Should the college kids at the Thousand Oaks’ Borderline Bar & Grill have all brought their own weapons, pawing at the safety while they danced to Jason Aldean, waiting for the would-be mass murderer to enter so…everyone could shoot through the packed crowd back at him? After the Texas shooting, gun fanatics held up the case of two men who confronted the shooter outside with AR-15s of their own as evidence that the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. This was held up as a positive scenario, of America’s Gun Culture Working: that a man with a history of violence shot 26 people to death in the pews of a church, but that two other guys with guns stopped him killing even more. (…) No, like all the great American marketing tactics, it’s rooted in breathless deception. The gun is no antidote to the fear. The gun is the fear. Its proponents hold it up as the last line of defense against a tyrannical government. Never mind that even an AR-15 won’t be much use against a dedicated military force equipped with tanks and Predator drones. It is a fantasy peddled by people who spend their whole lives trumpeting their love of freedom, and hold it up as the only legitimate value in a democracy. A world where everyone could be out to get you, and you can’t leave your house unarmed, is not a free world. It is tyranny.

This is what we have become. A country where regular mass shootings shock us into tears and immobility to do anything. But this is not true. We can do something and we will. More and more people are asking for a seat at the table. Corporations, health care providers, students, educators, gun owners, people of color, GLBTQ Americans, religious organizations, faith leaders, victims. We are all in this together. Shootings are #inour lane. 

The name of my blog is commongunsense for a reason. Common sense will prevail. When those who agree that stronger gun laws and changing the conversation about guns and gun violence away from what has been the corporate gun lobby led narrative join the table, we can and will save lives. That is the bottom line. That is what this is all about.

Too many families are missing loved ones at their Thanksgiving tables. They should be at the table but suddenly and violently they were killed. Others will unfortunately join the club of victims and survivors. 

Moving forward, we must demand that our lapdog politicians join the table and the conversation. We must make sure that all have a seat at the table if they truly care about our public health epidemic.

Have a happy Thanksgiving and join us at the table. We know that shootings will not take a holiday but I hope for safety for your families.

A stormy time for the gun lobby

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tree damageWe were without power for 3 days following a terrible and violent summer storm in my city of Duluth. We were awakened at 3:30 a.m. on Thursday morning by hurricane force winds, violent thunder and constant and bright lightning. To say it was scary is an understatement. We heard trees cracking along with all of the other noises and were not sure if we would have to seek shelter. The photo here showing one tree down on a wire is minor compared to the destruction that happened all over in my part of town.

A majority of Duluth residents lost their power during the storm due to trees on wires and twisted power poles. Upon waking on Thursday morning, I checked on my friends to make sure all was well. Many had huge Spruce and other old growth trees down in their yards. A friend and I drove around a bit looking for coffee and were stunned at the awful damage done by this storm. Many streets were impassable because of downed trees and wires and debris was all over. Traffic lights were not working causing long lines of cars on the streets.

The city is recovering though many are still without power as I write. Neighbors are helping neighbors and the city has risen to the occasion. We are not used to these kinds of storms in our area. We have blizzards that cause power outages and sometimes downed wires. But this is something most of us have not seen in our lifetimes. The weather has been generally more tumultuous this summer. With many torrential rain falls and severe storms, I am convinced that climate change is real.

Also what is real is the summer of shootings of young black men and police officers. In Minneapolis, shootings have risen to one of the highest levels of recent years. This Star Tribune article revealed a different law enforcement policy to stop some of the straw purchasing that accounts for many crime guns getting into the wrong hands. From the article:

Amid signs of a rise in illegal firearms trafficking, federal prosecutors in Minnesota have hit on a novel strategy to crack down on gun violence and get shooters off the streets. Instead of prosecuting suspects for murder, where convictions can be difficult to obtain, they charge multiple defendants with conspiracy to buy and possess guns illegally.

The strategy is rooted in the successful prosecution of 11 gang members in 2014, after what authorities called an “all-out shooting gang war” in the Twin Cities. Prosecutors built a conspiracy case that produced 10 guilty pleas and a jury trial conviction of the gang’s leader, Veltrez Black, who was sentenced this spring to 15 years in prison.

Now a Minnesota prosecutor has been asked to share the strategy with Chicago authorities, who are grappling with near nightly volleys of gunfire throughout their city.

Such crimes often go unsolved because witnesses refuse to break a code of silence, prosecutors say, but firearms conspiracy cases can be easier to build.

What we know is that crime guns don’t fall from the sky. Guns start out as legal purchases and get into the hands of those who shouldn’t have them in various ways. It’s easy for anyone to buy guns legally or not, by not undergoing a background check at gun shows, flea markets or on-line sites such as Armslist or Facebook.

Straw purchasing is another way that allows the flow of guns into our streets and neighborhoods. We can do something about this if we have the will and think together about how to stop the guns that get used in shootings. Too many people are dying. There should be no excuses for not doing whatever it takes. More from the article:

The strategy is timely, given the recent surge in local gun violence. Minnesota gun deaths hit a 10-year high in 2015, according to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, and represented a greater share of all homicides (61 percent) than in 1995, when Minneapolis was dubbed “Murderapolis.” (…)

And a new federal report shows that the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) recovered and traced 2,780 firearms in Minnesota last year — up 14 percent from a year before and also a 10-year high. That total doesn’t include all guns recovered by other law enforcement agencies; Minneapolis police inventoried an average of 681 guns as evidence per year from 2013 to 2015.

In the article there was mention of the problem of stolen guns. Some states have passed lost and stolen gun legislation to require people to report a stolen gun(s). We can see why from this: “The office also charged two people with buying up to 10 weapons for others in the group and later reporting the guns as stolen.”

And this, from the article, shows that many gun dealers are doing their jobs well:

At Bill’s Gun Shop & Range, owner John Monson is among the numerous Twin Cities sellers to occasionally find that a straw buyer passed through their doors. Monson said each of his five locations logs suspicious activity from any of the 100,000 customers who visit each year and passes along information to law enforcement agencies when necessary. Investigations can also evolve from mandatory reports to local police and the ATF whenever a customer buys two or more handguns in a week.

“We can’t stop all [straw purchasing],” Monson said. “But we can stop it in conversations in the process that happens before they do buy the gun.”

Prevention is what this is all about. If we can prevent guns from getting into the hands of those who intend harm, we can prevent some of the way too many shootings. Working with gun dealers is an important part of this process.

A new approach to preventing the proliferation of weapons onto our streets is needed given that many of our elected leaders are so beholden to the corporate gun lobby causing inaction in passing new laws or strengthening the ones we have. But we are seeing a new boldness amongst our politicians who are willing to speak out against the gun lobby publicly. One such statement was made by Democratic Vice Presidential candidate Tim Kaine on Saturday at his introductory speech. He spoke out and has spoken out before on the need for passing reasonable gun laws and has won all of his elections anyway.

The gun lobby is going to experience a stormy time now that their hypocrisy and rhetoric of fear are coming back to haunt them. Talk has turned to the nonsensical idea that citizens should openly carry assault rifles at public events and rallies such as the Dallas Black Lives Matter rally that turned violent. Others are wondering about conceal carry policies and how they work to protect people given that Philando Castile was armed with a legal gun when he was shot. There is some confusion over this confirmed by a local police officer at a meeting I attended about community safety. There are some interesting comments in the above linked article:

Thoughts on concealed carry: “If you’re a concealed-carry permit holder and you’re carrying, you assume some risk, you know? Things happen. Whether it’s on accident or intentional—you’re carrying a firearm. You’re assuming some risk in carrying a firearm. You have to assume some risk—it’s just like when you drive a car.”

How the Philando Castile situation will affect his work: “Will we change the way we do the training? No, because we believe we’re teaching it correctly. Will we emphasize this part of the training more? Yes. Will it come up for discussion? Guaranteed.”

It is undeniable that risk is involved when someone chooses to own and carry a gun. Guns are lethal weapons designed to kill others.

 

There is a perfect storm coming. More and more people are getting involved. This latest action to get in the way of Crossfit Reebok giving away Glock pistols to the winner of the  annual Crossfit games worked to call attention to the idea that gun giveaways are just not a good idea and obviously promote gun company profits. After the Orlando shooting, the GLBTQ community is not going to sit back and be silent. From the article:

“It is an outrage that an organization like CrossFit Reebok, who purport to be about health and fitness, are giving away a weapon of death and destruction as a prize,” said New Yorkers Against Gun Violence Executive Director Leah Gunn Barrett.

Why give guns away? Promotion of weapons of death just does not fit with exercising.

A new AP poll shows, again, consistent support from gun owners and non gun owners alike for universal background checks and stronger regulation of assault weapons.

From the above article:

Nearly two-thirds of respondents expressed support for stricter laws, with majorities favoring nationwide bans on the sale of semi-automatic assault weapons such as the AR-15 and on the sale of high-capacity magazines holding 10 or more bullets.

The percentage of Americans who want such laws is the highest since the AP-GfK poll started asking the question in 2013, a survey taken about 10 months after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, that killed 20 children and six educators.

High-profile shootings also appear to have taken a toll on Americans’ sense of safety. Strong majorities of those polled expressed some degree of concern that they or a relative will be a victim of gun violence or a mass shooting.

What I love about this poll is that it reveals that public opinion has not changed regarding support for doing something about the proliferation of guns in America. And when politicians and the public are in no mood for the increase in mass and every day shootings, things are going to change. The gun lobby may experience some stormy times and it would be past time for that to happen.

As my friend and writer, Sam Cook, wrote for the Duluth News Tribune, there is a hole in the sky left by the fallen trees.

But guns are not falling through that hole.

The public has shown over and over again over many years that they want our leaders to act to prevent at least some of the heinous shootings. More guns are clearly not making us safer.

I leave you with the latest mass shooting at another nightclub in Florida where teens were gathered for a pool party.  Two killed and 17 injured.

Teens should be able to attend a pool party without being shot and killed.  Guns make every situation more likely to end badly. They make for the perfect storm.

#Enough. We are better than this.