No one said that Latino is a race, and race is more of a social phenomenon than a genetic one anyway. JJ made it clear that "Latino" in the U.S. refers to people with cultural or ancestral ties to Latin America. We absolutely understand that this is not a genetically homogeneous group.
Frankly I find it offensive that while our country is trying to mourn and address ongoing mass murders by white supremacists, your reflex is to argue an irrelevant semantic point.
^ This is pretty much how I feel about this whole subject. People are just having a knee-jerk reaction, because these things get sensationalized, there is next to no rational discourse to have on the matter, and I think this thread validates this.
I disagree that you can lay blame at the feet of the left in any sense. If you want someone like that you can look to Lee Corkins or the fella who shot up Scalise and other Republicans. But that doesn't matter, because the right isn't going to get into the habit of trying to criminalize thought or paint innocents with false labels like ''murder advocate'' or ''rapist'', at least not with my support. Just because the SPLC inspired a shooter doesn't mean I would claim they are responsible for their deaths, you can not hold others responsible for the actions they take, unless you were advocating for those actions. This is the rule we use whenever it is convenient, how quickly we forget about it when it is not.
However, whenever I see the Blame Game being played so shamelessly and blatantly, against white males, republicans, etc., I am reminded of how the first reaction in this group when anyone else tries to do so is to defend that group, be they illegal immigrants or any of the cases of islamic terrorism. There is clearly only one group here allowed to be demonized, allowed to be stereotyped and pigeonholed without recourse, but we all knew that already.
I do love the outrageous rhetoric though, as if enough flowerly language can mask the stench of rank hypocrisy oozing from every pore.
do we blame liberals who opposed killing minorities for somehow provoking him?
As opposed to Trump or Republicans, who routinely advocate for the killing of minorities? Come on now, this is extremely disingenuous, and this attitude is more or less the motivating force behind me posting at all.
Latino isn't a race, dude. It's an ethnic group. There are Black latinos, white latinos, brown latinos, indigenous latinos. That's why forms in the US specify whether or not you're latino (or hispanic) as well as ask for your race.
HE is right. People often have emotional reactions and blame """"assault"""" rifles(semi auto rifles), despite the fact that other things like handguns kills much more. If gun control works(spoiler > never worked), makes much more sense to restrict pistols/revolvers than rifles. And some restrictions with rifles are ridiculous. Anyone can cut the barrel and make it short barrel to increase concealment, convert to fully automatic isn't hard either.
About "racial groups", i have an very pale skin, was born with blonde hair(now unfortunately is dark after i grew up), have an slave owning baron ancestor and if i was living on US, i would be eligible to affirmative action, only because i was born in a specific region...
do we blame liberals who opposed killing minorities for somehow provoking him?
As opposed to Trump or Republicans, who routinely advocate for the killing of minorities? Come on now, this is extremely disingenuous, and this attitude is more or less the motivating force behind me posting at all.
I think you misunderstood--I did not make the claim that Trump or Republicans advocated the killing of minorities, routinely or no. My argument was that faulting liberals was wrong (we agree on this much at least) and that, if you were to place blame on anyone aside from the murderer himself, it would probably be the opposite--in my words, the non-specific phrase "people who very much opposed the American left." If I had to be a little more specific, I'd just say "alt right."
I wouldn't credit mainstream conservatives with promoting/tolerating/"doing too little to fight" genocidal ideologies like this fellow's. Granted, I'd prefer that American conservatives take racist prejudice as seriously as liberals do (or maybe 80% as serious; whatever), but I don't think it's the responsibility of moderate conservatives to police extreme conservatives any more than I expect moderate Muslims to stamp out jihadism. Moderates aren't responsible for extremists.
I would, however, fault other extremists in his orbit for tolerating and excusing this kind of extremism.
^ This is pretty much how I feel about this whole subject. People are just having a knee-jerk reaction, because these things get sensationalized, there is next to no rational discourse to have on the matter, and I think this thread validates this.
I have sympathy with this. However, while I don't remember discussion about flu, there has been discussion about all the other issues in the thread. Even if there are other factors that result in many more deaths, I don't think it's particularly unreasonable to point out that there is an 'easy win' to be had by banning assault rifles ...
However, whenever I see the Blame Game being played so shamelessly and blatantly, against white males, republicans, etc., I am reminded of how the first reaction in this group when anyone else tries to do so is to defend that group, be they illegal immigrants or any of the cases of islamic terrorism. There is clearly only one group here allowed to be demonized, allowed to be stereotyped and pigeonholed without recourse, but we all knew that already.
Understanding something is not the same as defending it. I can appreciate why there is islamic terrorism, but I'm not going to defend it - just like I'm not going to defend right wing terrorists.
As for illegal immigrants I think it's entirely reasonable to defend them. I can certainly see the argument against open borders, but that's not the same thing at all as attempting to dehumanize people just trying to do the best for themselves and their children. There's no doubt that illegal immigrants are responsible for significantly less crime than the average US citizen, so it is entirely reasonable to defend them against charges that they are an 'infestation', 'plague', 'murderers', 'rapists' or whatever other form of abuse is being used to stir up emotions and justify punitive action against them.
We have traffic laws and car safety standards to prevent automobile accidents. We have a thing called flu shots and, you know, DOCTORS to prevent or treat the flu. These are not things that are being ignored, they are being actively and I would even say AGGRESSIVELY combated. What exactly is it we're doing about assault rifles or guns in general that is remotely comparable??
We have traffic laws and car safety standards to prevent automobile accidents. We have a thing called flu shots and, you know, DOCTORS to prevent or treat the flu. These are not things that are being ignored, they are being actively and I would even say AGGRESSIVELY combated. What exactly is it we're doing about assault rifles or guns in general that is remotely comparable??
Except that owning car in your home and driving on streets are two different things. Guns kills much less than other things...
We have traffic laws and car safety standards to prevent automobile accidents. We have a thing called flu shots and, you know, DOCTORS to prevent or treat the flu. These are not things that are being ignored, they are being actively and I would even say AGGRESSIVELY combated. What exactly is it we're doing about assault rifles or guns in general that is remotely comparable??
Except that owning car in your home and driving on streets are two different things. Guns kills much less than other things...
Guns are designed to do one thing, which is kill. But this is even more true of the guns EVERY one of these shooters use, which are designed as weapons of war for the SOLE purpose of killing as many people as quickly as possible. They don't have a single other intended function. They were designed to kill on a battlefield, and we sell them to any jerk-off who walks into a sporting goods store.
We have traffic laws and car safety standards to prevent automobile accidents. We have a thing called flu shots and, you know, DOCTORS to prevent or treat the flu. These are not things that are being ignored, they are being actively and I would even say AGGRESSIVELY combated. What exactly is it we're doing about assault rifles or guns in general that is remotely comparable??
Except that owning car in your home and driving on streets are two different things. Guns kills much less than other things...
Guns are designed to do one thing, which is kill. But this is even more true of the guns EVERY one of these shooters use, which are designed as weapons of war for the SOLE purpose of killing as many people as quickly as possible. They don't have a single other intended function. They were designed to kill on a battlefield, and we sell them to any jerk-off who walks into a sporting goods store.
Wrong. Guns was firstly designed to penetrate plate armor and as an "force equalizer", allowing an 50kg woman to defend himself from an guy with 100+kg of pure muscle. And a lot of jobs depends upon sports and hunting.
@SorcererV1ct0r: Guns were not designed to let women defend themselves from men. I don't know where that idea came from. Guns were not designed to penetrate plate armor, either; gunpowder first arose outside of Europe, where plate armor was already very uncommon regardless, and crossbows already had the power to pierce plate mail.
Guns were designed to kill, just like every other weapon in human history. They're just much, much deadlier than any of their predecessors.
Guns were not designed to let women defend themselves from men. I don't know where that idea came from. Guns were not designed to penetrate plate armor, either; gunpowder first arose outside of Europe, where plate armor was already very uncommon regardless, and crossbows already had the power to pierce plate mail.
Guns were designed to kill, just like every other weapon in human history. They're just much, much deadlier than any of their predecessors.
So, why should the deadliest institution of human history(government) had an monopoly on who life and who die?
Guns were not designed to let women defend themselves from men. I don't know where that idea came from. Guns were not designed to penetrate plate armor, either; gunpowder first arose outside of Europe, where plate armor was already very uncommon regardless, and crossbows already had the power to pierce plate mail.
Guns were designed to kill, just like every other weapon in human history. They're just much, much deadlier than any of their predecessors.
So, why should the deadliest institution of human history(government) had an monopoly on who life and who die?
We have traffic laws and car safety standards to prevent automobile accidents. We have a thing called flu shots and, you know, DOCTORS to prevent or treat the flu. These are not things that are being ignored, they are being actively and I would even say AGGRESSIVELY combated. What exactly is it we're doing about assault rifles or guns in general that is remotely comparable??
Except that owning car in your home and driving on streets are two different things. Guns kills much less than other things...
Guns are designed to do one thing, which is kill. But this is even more true of the guns EVERY one of these shooters use, which are designed as weapons of war for the SOLE purpose of killing as many people as quickly as possible. They don't have a single other intended function. They were designed to kill on a battlefield, and we sell them to any jerk-off who walks into a sporting goods store.
Wrong. Guns was firstly designed to penetrate plate armor and as an "force equalizer", allowing an 50kg woman to defend himself from an guy with 100+kg of pure muscle. And a lot of jobs depends upon sports and hunting.
If you had read for comprehension, you would have seen that jj was talking about assault rifles specifically ("the guns EVERY one of these shooters use"). Those were designed with one thought in mind: the holiest of holies for modern infantry: Volume of Fire! They're designed to throw the mostest lead, with the fastest practical rate of fire, and the shortest reload times. They're designed to slaughter enemy infantry, no more, no less. A lady defends herself with a petite 380, a hunter uses a bolt-action .30 cal or a double-barrel shotgun. As for your bizarre non-sequitur about plate armor, if the price of a ban on assault rifles was a law allowing open-carry of matchlock arquebuses, I'd be happy.
EDIT: Just after posting this, I saw this quote from the CNN story on the Dayton shooting:
Police killed the gunman, identified as 24-year-old Connor Betts, less than a minute after he opened fire with a .223-caliber high-capacity gun, killing nine and wounding 27, authorities said.
Less than a minute. 36 casualties. Volume of fire indeed.
I have to wonder if the people who actually think they are going to take on the US military with their personal arsenal in the basement really believe that, or if they just think it's something they say that kinda sounds good as a rebuttal. I'd hope most people aren't that far gone.
OK. Stop the presses. All of this debate about blaming liberals or conservatives needs to come to a crashing halt. Our Republican lawmakers have found the true culprits....
I have to wonder if the people who actually think they are going to take on the US military with their personal arsenal in the basement really believe that, or if they just think it's something they say that kinda sounds good as a rebuttal. I'd hope most people aren't that far gone.
Wrong. But the history shows that with more power concentrated the power is on the state, more tyranny, if people can at least fight back instead, instead of only be massacred is much better.
I have to wonder if the people who actually think they are going to take on the US military with their personal arsenal in the basement really believe that, or if they just think it's something they say that kinda sounds good as a rebuttal. I'd hope most people aren't that far gone.
Wrong. But the history shows that with more power concentrated the power is on the state, more tyranny, if people can at least fight back instead, instead of only be massacred is much better.
So, what part of legal ordinance makes it possible for the average citizen to fight back against tanks? Helicopters? Jets? Laser guided missiles? Nukes?
I have to wonder if the people who actually think they are going to take on the US military with their personal arsenal in the basement really believe that, or if they just think it's something they say that kinda sounds good as a rebuttal. I'd hope most people aren't that far gone.
Wrong. But the history shows that with more power concentrated the power is on the state, more tyranny, if people can at least fight back instead, instead of only be massacred is much better.
So, what part of legal ordinance makes it possible for the average citizen to fight back against tanks? Helicopters? Jets? Laser guided missiles? Nukes?
The French resistance with improvised weapons destroyed some Luftwaffe vehicles. But guess what. Armored vehicles aren't alien technology too. Guerrilla warfare still effective and US lose despite much technological advantage on Vietnam.
OK. Stop the presses. All of this debate about blaming liberals or conservatives needs to come to a crashing halt. Our Republican lawmakers have found the true culprits....
We'd should all feel ashamed of ourselves to have caused these tragedies.
Games?? No, that one is as old as Columbine and even D&D before that. But the gamer CULTURE that has sprung up since Gamergate?? Absolutely. That was, in many ways, the gateway drug for all of this. I still am pissed at myself for ignoring/not seeing it for what it was for so long. The games themselves are immaterial. But I'll be damned if I don't see a direct line between the early rants against Zoe Quinn and Anita Sarkesian and the Alt-right. And it's all due to Youtube's algorithms. I'd say if anything we are still underestimating how much it played into the radicalization of an entire generation. It was the self-alienation and aggrievement among those whose identity was so tied in being a "gamer" that was a incredibly fertile ground for recruitment to white nationalist ideologies. And one only needs to read the comment sections about pretty much any video discussing any game whatsoever for the last 5 years to see the paths converge.
There's something profoundly wrong about these perversely disproportionate reactions to murderers based on race and ideology, where one is condemned totally without thinking and one is defended instinctively from all manner of criticism and from all angles. One is worthy of entire changes to laws and the system but the other makes you morally suspect for even bringing it up. But like with most things in modern leftist thought, nonwhite racial supremacy is the overarching value system, so I guess it should come as no surprise that only whites with violent ideologies are treated the way they are. They are- quite literally- the only ones it is acceptable to judge and condemn as a group. This applies to so many more areas of life than this one. The inconsistency and lack of objective standards when crossing identity lines drives me insane, once you notice it, you can't stop.
So many of my posts nowadays have references to earlier conversations. I'm practically the politics board historian.
There's no doubt that illegal immigrants are responsible for significantly less crime than the average US citizen
The sheer irony of this quote. Do you fail to see how this applies exactly to all these white shooters? White shooters are the minority of gun violence by a massive margin and the single most condemned, screamed about, sensationalized, and over-reacted to form of violence in the US today. Even if you want to focus solely on white nationalists, this is still true.
and going by this metric, there's a big elephant in the room that nobody seems to be talking about.
or whatever other form of abuse is being used to stir up emotions and justify punitive action against them.
Again, the irony is just too thick. i still remember when i was having to argue for why I and others like me shouldn't be punched in the street when that was a popular thing due to all the nazi and white supremacist slanders of the past few years. nobody ever cares when it's a certain group of people being slandered though, as we see time and time again.
The difference here, to me, is that people who complain about illegal migrant crime are sincere, they really believe it's a problem. I don't think for one second people in the highest levels of media and politics can't tell the difference between a kid in a hat and a white nationalist. More like they won't.
OK. Stop the presses. All of this debate about blaming liberals or conservatives needs to come to a crashing halt. Our Republican lawmakers have found the true culprits....
We'd should all feel ashamed of ourselves to have caused these tragedies.
Kinda true though. The online and unmoderated culture of online fps do play a role. It is one of the enablers but not the root cause of these incidents.
I also wanted to touch on the flu/medical procedure/suicide/car argument:
The flu is natural. It does kill people with weakened immune systems, but that is a “circle of life” thing.
There is always a risk when having a medical procedure and patients are made aware of that risk before having them.
Suicide is a mental health problem that effects the individual. Yes it needs to be tackled, but there are many places and phone numbers a person can use to seek help.
Cars as stated are regulated with enough laws to keep the death count down. Yes tragic accidents still happen but there are many laws in place to curb them from happening too frequently.
There is nothing natural about being gunned down in a Walmart or a bar. There are no signs or doctors telling you there is a slight chance that you will not survive this shopping trip. There is no number a person can phone to reach out to another person to prevent them from losing their life and sadly there are little laws in place from incidents like these from happening.
None of these are comparable to mass shootings and frankly, you’re just challenging these morons to get their death count up to top “medical procedures.”
Stop deflecting away from this problem and face it straight on.
I have to wonder if the people who actually think they are going to take on the US military with their personal arsenal in the basement really believe that, or if they just think it's something they say that kinda sounds good as a rebuttal. I'd hope most people aren't that far gone.
My Dad bought an SKS for the sole purpose of heading out to battle the Chinese when they land in California. I shit you not!
My arguments that 1) the Chinese don't have a fleet remotely large enough to cross the Pacific and 2) if they did, his SKS would give him about as much chance against a trained military as a krill has against a blue-whale didn't seem to change his mind at all. Seeing as he was about 65 years old at the time, I'm pretty sure he just thought that owning an SKS would be 'cool' and was justifying his purchase in his mind. Still...
I think the gamer culture thing is just a factor of demographics. RPGs, MMOs, and other highly-intensive, time-consuming game genres tend to develop large social followings online, and most of those genres skew male. Puzzle games and other games that don't require countless hours of investment to fully explore tend to have smaller communities, and those genres skew female. The male and female gamer populations are pretty much even, but male gamers tend to collect in larger groups and as a result, most gaming communities skew male. Anonymity corrodes respect, low respect makes it harder for minority viewpoints to feel safe, and gradually a community becomes more like-minded. Sexual harassment and sexist comments from younger, less mature players in male-dominated communities tend to push away women a little further, exacerbating the segregation. It's kind of a spiral.
Since men skew conservative, those male-dominated communities lean to the right. If that spiral continues for long enough, you can see stuff like Gamergate and Trumpism spreading through those communities. It's a weird quirk of demographics and how people join and stay in communities.
The Beamdog forums being left-leaning is a curious anomaly. I've speculated before that it's because of the Mizhena thing. The character alienated right-leaning folks much more often than lefties, and so the furthest-right forumites were a lot less likely to stick around. As the controversy developed, the people who felt most comfortable on the forum were the same people who didn't mind Mizhena.
If you look at the earliest posts on this forum, the atmosphere and political leanings were much different back then. It took several years for the forum to transition to majority-left, and it's been hovering over that area ever since.
The interesting thing is that the political shift on this forum hasn't changed the other demographics much. Like other gaming communities, it's still very much majority male and majority white.
@WarChiefZeke: Minor quibble: White folks might be a minority of gun criminals in general (is that true? they're a majority of the population at large), but they do constitute a majority of mass shooters for whatever reason, and those are the ones that actually capture public attention. One guy who kills 100 people is viewed as more noteworthy than 50 guys who kill 50 people.
Most white dudes ain't evil, yeah. Like half of the ones I know are huge sweetie pies.
The Beamdog forums being left-leaning is a curious anomaly. I've speculated before that it's because of the Mizhena thing. The character alienated right-leaning folks much more often than lefties, and so the furthest-right forumites were a lot less likely to stick around. As the controversy developed, the people who felt most comfortable on the forum were the same people who didn't mind Mizhena.
<..>.
People on RPGCodex still joking with Mizhena until this day. And some guys hate beamdog with passion there. Some things i don't understand too. Trans people exist since ancient times. In a magical world where people can assume dragon form, genre change will not be an problem. Probably even an market around it would develop with people who can cast wish spell and true reincarnation...
Accept an trans character and accept the discourse that if you refuse to date an trans you are a trans phobic are two different things.
The Beamdog forums being left-leaning is a curious anomaly. I've speculated before that it's because of the Mizhena thing. The character alienated right-leaning folks much more often than lefties, and so the furthest-right forumites were a lot less likely to stick around. As the controversy developed, the people who felt most comfortable on the forum were the same people who didn't mind Mizhena.
When I first started talking politics here, I was honestly stunned by how left leaning it was. I still am, in many ways. This is, by far, the politically furthest left place I ever find myself in, whether in real life or on social media. I'm surprised by the huge difference in even our most basic assumptions, more often than not.
And yeah, I always attributed it to the same thing, people on the extremes are usually the ones who want to talk politics and people on the extreme right probably all left long ago.
People on RPGCodex still joking with Mizhena until this day. And some guys hate beamdog with passion there.
I love RPGCodex but yeah, they have a hatred for Beamdog. I've always liked Beamdog personally, their content and the company as a whole for reviving my childhood favorites.
No joke, this is the politically furthest right place I ever find myself in. I should probably work on that...
I think it was left-leaning even before Siege, though. For one thing, Dee was pretty openly leftist compared to Julius. Also, it wasn't entirely a matter of comfort that so many conservatives exited right after Siege; a lot of them got themselves banned.
Comments
Frankly I find it offensive that while our country is trying to mourn and address ongoing mass murders by white supremacists, your reflex is to argue an irrelevant semantic point.
^ This is pretty much how I feel about this whole subject. People are just having a knee-jerk reaction, because these things get sensationalized, there is next to no rational discourse to have on the matter, and I think this thread validates this.
I disagree that you can lay blame at the feet of the left in any sense. If you want someone like that you can look to Lee Corkins or the fella who shot up Scalise and other Republicans. But that doesn't matter, because the right isn't going to get into the habit of trying to criminalize thought or paint innocents with false labels like ''murder advocate'' or ''rapist'', at least not with my support. Just because the SPLC inspired a shooter doesn't mean I would claim they are responsible for their deaths, you can not hold others responsible for the actions they take, unless you were advocating for those actions. This is the rule we use whenever it is convenient, how quickly we forget about it when it is not.
However, whenever I see the Blame Game being played so shamelessly and blatantly, against white males, republicans, etc., I am reminded of how the first reaction in this group when anyone else tries to do so is to defend that group, be they illegal immigrants or any of the cases of islamic terrorism. There is clearly only one group here allowed to be demonized, allowed to be stereotyped and pigeonholed without recourse, but we all knew that already.
I do love the outrageous rhetoric though, as if enough flowerly language can mask the stench of rank hypocrisy oozing from every pore.
As opposed to Trump or Republicans, who routinely advocate for the killing of minorities? Come on now, this is extremely disingenuous, and this attitude is more or less the motivating force behind me posting at all.
About "racial groups", i have an very pale skin, was born with blonde hair(now unfortunately is dark after i grew up), have an slave owning baron ancestor and if i was living on US, i would be eligible to affirmative action, only because i was born in a specific region...
I wouldn't credit mainstream conservatives with promoting/tolerating/"doing too little to fight" genocidal ideologies like this fellow's. Granted, I'd prefer that American conservatives take racist prejudice as seriously as liberals do (or maybe 80% as serious; whatever), but I don't think it's the responsibility of moderate conservatives to police extreme conservatives any more than I expect moderate Muslims to stamp out jihadism. Moderates aren't responsible for extremists.
I would, however, fault other extremists in his orbit for tolerating and excusing this kind of extremism.
Understanding something is not the same as defending it. I can appreciate why there is islamic terrorism, but I'm not going to defend it - just like I'm not going to defend right wing terrorists.
As for illegal immigrants I think it's entirely reasonable to defend them. I can certainly see the argument against open borders, but that's not the same thing at all as attempting to dehumanize people just trying to do the best for themselves and their children. There's no doubt that illegal immigrants are responsible for significantly less crime than the average US citizen, so it is entirely reasonable to defend them against charges that they are an 'infestation', 'plague', 'murderers', 'rapists' or whatever other form of abuse is being used to stir up emotions and justify punitive action against them.
Except that owning car in your home and driving on streets are two different things. Guns kills much less than other things...
Guns are designed to do one thing, which is kill. But this is even more true of the guns EVERY one of these shooters use, which are designed as weapons of war for the SOLE purpose of killing as many people as quickly as possible. They don't have a single other intended function. They were designed to kill on a battlefield, and we sell them to any jerk-off who walks into a sporting goods store.
Who apparently fractured his shoulder today FWIW.
https://www.wave3.com/2019/08/04/mitch-mcconnell-fractures-shoulder-fall-home/
Ohio's two senators have demanded that McConnell convene the Senate to pass these bipartisan bills that the House passed months ago.
https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2019/08/04/ohio-shooting-sherrod-brown-rob-portman-offer-proposals/1916702001/
Wrong. Guns was firstly designed to penetrate plate armor and as an "force equalizer", allowing an 50kg woman to defend himself from an guy with 100+kg of pure muscle. And a lot of jobs depends upon sports and hunting.
Guns were designed to kill, just like every other weapon in human history. They're just much, much deadlier than any of their predecessors.
So, why should the deadliest institution of human history(government) had an monopoly on who life and who die?
If you had read for comprehension, you would have seen that jj was talking about assault rifles specifically ("the guns EVERY one of these shooters use"). Those were designed with one thought in mind: the holiest of holies for modern infantry: Volume of Fire! They're designed to throw the mostest lead, with the fastest practical rate of fire, and the shortest reload times. They're designed to slaughter enemy infantry, no more, no less. A lady defends herself with a petite 380, a hunter uses a bolt-action .30 cal or a double-barrel shotgun. As for your bizarre non-sequitur about plate armor, if the price of a ban on assault rifles was a law allowing open-carry of matchlock arquebuses, I'd be happy.
EDIT: Just after posting this, I saw this quote from the CNN story on the Dayton shooting:
Less than a minute. 36 casualties. Volume of fire indeed.
It's us, the gamers.
Top House Republican says violent video games could be linked to mass shootings
We'd should all feel ashamed of ourselves to have caused these tragedies.
Wrong. But the history shows that with more power concentrated the power is on the state, more tyranny, if people can at least fight back instead, instead of only be massacred is much better.
So, what part of legal ordinance makes it possible for the average citizen to fight back against tanks? Helicopters? Jets? Laser guided missiles? Nukes?
The French resistance with improvised weapons destroyed some Luftwaffe vehicles. But guess what. Armored vehicles aren't alien technology too. Guerrilla warfare still effective and US lose despite much technological advantage on Vietnam.
Games?? No, that one is as old as Columbine and even D&D before that. But the gamer CULTURE that has sprung up since Gamergate?? Absolutely. That was, in many ways, the gateway drug for all of this. I still am pissed at myself for ignoring/not seeing it for what it was for so long. The games themselves are immaterial. But I'll be damned if I don't see a direct line between the early rants against Zoe Quinn and Anita Sarkesian and the Alt-right. And it's all due to Youtube's algorithms. I'd say if anything we are still underestimating how much it played into the radicalization of an entire generation. It was the self-alienation and aggrievement among those whose identity was so tied in being a "gamer" that was a incredibly fertile ground for recruitment to white nationalist ideologies. And one only needs to read the comment sections about pretty much any video discussing any game whatsoever for the last 5 years to see the paths converge.
So many of my posts nowadays have references to earlier conversations. I'm practically the politics board historian.
The sheer irony of this quote. Do you fail to see how this applies exactly to all these white shooters? White shooters are the minority of gun violence by a massive margin and the single most condemned, screamed about, sensationalized, and over-reacted to form of violence in the US today. Even if you want to focus solely on white nationalists, this is still true.
and going by this metric, there's a big elephant in the room that nobody seems to be talking about.
Again, the irony is just too thick. i still remember when i was having to argue for why I and others like me shouldn't be punched in the street when that was a popular thing due to all the nazi and white supremacist slanders of the past few years. nobody ever cares when it's a certain group of people being slandered though, as we see time and time again.
The difference here, to me, is that people who complain about illegal migrant crime are sincere, they really believe it's a problem. I don't think for one second people in the highest levels of media and politics can't tell the difference between a kid in a hat and a white nationalist. More like they won't.
Kinda true though. The online and unmoderated culture of online fps do play a role. It is one of the enablers but not the root cause of these incidents.
I also wanted to touch on the flu/medical procedure/suicide/car argument:
The flu is natural. It does kill people with weakened immune systems, but that is a “circle of life” thing.
There is always a risk when having a medical procedure and patients are made aware of that risk before having them.
Suicide is a mental health problem that effects the individual. Yes it needs to be tackled, but there are many places and phone numbers a person can use to seek help.
Cars as stated are regulated with enough laws to keep the death count down. Yes tragic accidents still happen but there are many laws in place to curb them from happening too frequently.
There is nothing natural about being gunned down in a Walmart or a bar. There are no signs or doctors telling you there is a slight chance that you will not survive this shopping trip. There is no number a person can phone to reach out to another person to prevent them from losing their life and sadly there are little laws in place from incidents like these from happening.
None of these are comparable to mass shootings and frankly, you’re just challenging these morons to get their death count up to top “medical procedures.”
Stop deflecting away from this problem and face it straight on.
My Dad bought an SKS for the sole purpose of heading out to battle the Chinese when they land in California. I shit you not!
My arguments that 1) the Chinese don't have a fleet remotely large enough to cross the Pacific and 2) if they did, his SKS would give him about as much chance against a trained military as a krill has against a blue-whale didn't seem to change his mind at all. Seeing as he was about 65 years old at the time, I'm pretty sure he just thought that owning an SKS would be 'cool' and was justifying his purchase in his mind. Still...
Since men skew conservative, those male-dominated communities lean to the right. If that spiral continues for long enough, you can see stuff like Gamergate and Trumpism spreading through those communities. It's a weird quirk of demographics and how people join and stay in communities.
The Beamdog forums being left-leaning is a curious anomaly. I've speculated before that it's because of the Mizhena thing. The character alienated right-leaning folks much more often than lefties, and so the furthest-right forumites were a lot less likely to stick around. As the controversy developed, the people who felt most comfortable on the forum were the same people who didn't mind Mizhena.
If you look at the earliest posts on this forum, the atmosphere and political leanings were much different back then. It took several years for the forum to transition to majority-left, and it's been hovering over that area ever since.
The interesting thing is that the political shift on this forum hasn't changed the other demographics much. Like other gaming communities, it's still very much majority male and majority white.
Most white dudes ain't evil, yeah. Like half of the ones I know are huge sweetie pies.
People on RPGCodex still joking with Mizhena until this day. And some guys hate beamdog with passion there. Some things i don't understand too. Trans people exist since ancient times. In a magical world where people can assume dragon form, genre change will not be an problem. Probably even an market around it would develop with people who can cast wish spell and true reincarnation...
Accept an trans character and accept the discourse that if you refuse to date an trans you are a trans phobic are two different things.
When I first started talking politics here, I was honestly stunned by how left leaning it was. I still am, in many ways. This is, by far, the politically furthest left place I ever find myself in, whether in real life or on social media. I'm surprised by the huge difference in even our most basic assumptions, more often than not.
And yeah, I always attributed it to the same thing, people on the extremes are usually the ones who want to talk politics and people on the extreme right probably all left long ago.
I love RPGCodex but yeah, they have a hatred for Beamdog. I've always liked Beamdog personally, their content and the company as a whole for reviving my childhood favorites.
I think it was left-leaning even before Siege, though. For one thing, Dee was pretty openly leftist compared to Julius. Also, it wasn't entirely a matter of comfort that so many conservatives exited right after Siege; a lot of them got themselves banned.