I have to say up front that I have been over the last few months trying to stay out of controversial subject territory. The reasons for this a many. For the most part they all boil down to the conservation of energy. By that I mean that I just don't have the energy, the desire, or the will to argue about these subjects. In this day and age a 'discussion' about any of them is not going to change anyone's mind.
The truth of the matter is that we have become such a polarized society that there really is not an undecided middle ground anymore. Regardless of the subject the vast majority of people already have their mind made up. Talking about it only makes things worse more often than not. Given the divisive nature of the majority of these subjects today, airing an opinion any opinion can end friendships limit job opportunities, and prevent other good things from happening.
And so I have been keeping the counsel of a wise friend of mine at work named Kraig. He opined once, 'Todd, never miss a chance to keep your pie-hole shut'. And I have been doing my best to keep to that advice until now.
I am absolutely horrified that a reporter and cameraman were gunned down this week in Roanoke, Virginia. Horrified that someone would be this evil. Horrified that someone could plan and perpetrate this act. Horrified that it even took place at all. Let me add, this is the feeling I have every single time a senseless act of wanton violence takes place regardless of the tool used to carry it out.
Do I deplore violence? Absolutely! Do I find that we as a society suffer every single time it happens? Unequivocally! Am I shocked each and every time it happens? Definitely!
I am also sickened by the opportunists that can't let a single tragedy go by without attempting to advance their agenda. The bodies of the dead had not even been released from the morgue yet before the president was decrying the violence in an effort to advance a gun control agenda. The families had not even had a chance to mourn the loss of their father, mother, son, daughter, wife, husband, cousin, aunt, or uncle before our president was calling for the congress to act on his agenda.
I am sickened every single time this cycle of events happens. The pattern is that some acolyte of the cult of evil and death perpetrates a horrendous act. And then the opportunists in the gun control crowd come out from wherever they have been hiding to attempt to advance their ideological perspective. It is ghoulish, parasitic, and downright uncaring.
Especially given that nothing in their agenda would have stopped this event from taking place. Based upon the facts as we know them right now, the offender in this case, did not have a criminal record, and was not in the system as suffering from a condition that would prevent him from understanding the gravity of his actions or grasping the notions of right and wrong. You will have to pardon me if I think that stumping for solutions that would not solve the problem in the most recent tragic event is at best inappropriate and at worst heinously insensitive bordering on evil in and of itself.
The insensitivity to the families and the victims here is awful. They have not been given a chance to grieve at all. They have not been given the grace and the freedom to feel the weight of what's happened. They have been robbed of a chance at private grief and mourning. They have had their loss turned into someone's political football. It is wrong, and it should not be tolerated.
All I would ask from this point forward, is that we all shut the heck up for a period of time to let the families grieve this. There will be an appropriate to discuss this at length. That time is not now. Right now these families need us to pray for them, console them, and comfort them. This tragic event should not be used a fodder for the political sausage press.
Thus endeth the rant.
The truth of the matter is that we have become such a polarized society that there really is not an undecided middle ground anymore. Regardless of the subject the vast majority of people already have their mind made up. Talking about it only makes things worse more often than not. Given the divisive nature of the majority of these subjects today, airing an opinion any opinion can end friendships limit job opportunities, and prevent other good things from happening.
And so I have been keeping the counsel of a wise friend of mine at work named Kraig. He opined once, 'Todd, never miss a chance to keep your pie-hole shut'. And I have been doing my best to keep to that advice until now.
I am absolutely horrified that a reporter and cameraman were gunned down this week in Roanoke, Virginia. Horrified that someone would be this evil. Horrified that someone could plan and perpetrate this act. Horrified that it even took place at all. Let me add, this is the feeling I have every single time a senseless act of wanton violence takes place regardless of the tool used to carry it out.
Do I deplore violence? Absolutely! Do I find that we as a society suffer every single time it happens? Unequivocally! Am I shocked each and every time it happens? Definitely!
I am also sickened by the opportunists that can't let a single tragedy go by without attempting to advance their agenda. The bodies of the dead had not even been released from the morgue yet before the president was decrying the violence in an effort to advance a gun control agenda. The families had not even had a chance to mourn the loss of their father, mother, son, daughter, wife, husband, cousin, aunt, or uncle before our president was calling for the congress to act on his agenda.
I am sickened every single time this cycle of events happens. The pattern is that some acolyte of the cult of evil and death perpetrates a horrendous act. And then the opportunists in the gun control crowd come out from wherever they have been hiding to attempt to advance their ideological perspective. It is ghoulish, parasitic, and downright uncaring.
Especially given that nothing in their agenda would have stopped this event from taking place. Based upon the facts as we know them right now, the offender in this case, did not have a criminal record, and was not in the system as suffering from a condition that would prevent him from understanding the gravity of his actions or grasping the notions of right and wrong. You will have to pardon me if I think that stumping for solutions that would not solve the problem in the most recent tragic event is at best inappropriate and at worst heinously insensitive bordering on evil in and of itself.
The insensitivity to the families and the victims here is awful. They have not been given a chance to grieve at all. They have not been given the grace and the freedom to feel the weight of what's happened. They have been robbed of a chance at private grief and mourning. They have had their loss turned into someone's political football. It is wrong, and it should not be tolerated.
All I would ask from this point forward, is that we all shut the heck up for a period of time to let the families grieve this. There will be an appropriate to discuss this at length. That time is not now. Right now these families need us to pray for them, console them, and comfort them. This tragic event should not be used a fodder for the political sausage press.
Thus endeth the rant.