Dude is definitely crazy, but that begs the question why no one wanted to act on this fact until the murder spree?
When a Black kid gets the crazy tag in kindergarten he is then put into the special ed classes that stymie his development until he drops out of school. After that he gets sent to prison for the rest of his teenage years for selling marijuana and then returns to prison early in his adulthood for felony larceny or other drug convictions.
The Black kid doesn’t have the support network that would allow him to shoot a Congresswoman from point blank range like Jared Lee Loughner had. The Black kid is institutionalized way sooner than this kid and the chances are the Black kid is way saner. At every turn of Jared Lee Loughner’s development when it was obvious that the dude needed help people just passed him off to his parents.
The argument shouldn’t be about which talking head incited this unstable kid to commit mass murder. The discussion needs to be about who saw that crazy look in this boy’s eyes and then looked away in the hopes that someone else would deal with the problem.
Absolutely, Dallas. I’ve marveled at the callousness of our society since Day One of kindergarten, PS 321, Park Slope, Brooklyn, New York, when they put me in the low reading group for the first few days…I looked over at the smaller circle of high-reading-group kids, and their circle was a feedback loop of attention and comfort between them, an enthusiastic teacher, and a book she was reading aloud. We had each been given purple-printed mimeographs of a duck with just four letters: d-u-c-k.
Have I become just like the squawk box commentators reducing everything to the simple science of pointing a finger? Jared Lee Loughner is all of us, albeit just a lot more insane, confused and scared (and sadly enough, motivated).
And he ain’t gonna be the last either.
was talking about this wifey last night: this situation comes off as one collective failure for all of society. his schools, neighbors, even that dog-walking org all saw warning signs. and they did the most they were *expected* to do. it’s like passing the buck. in the end the buck can get passed to his parents, the last organization to have contact with him, the person who sold him the bullets, etc.
i don’t know how to handle this kind of situation b/c i agree there will be more. i wonder if it’s more productive to talk about the points in his life when things went wrong — perhaps it’ll illuminate what we as a society should or should not do in the future?
With the rate of mental institutions closing, America is reducing the cure for mental health to pills or incarceration. 15 years ago, a Zoloft tv commercial was unheard of. They’re basically telling you to do the work and medicate yourself. Even if someone noticed the wild look in his eye and called for help, I doubt that much would’ve or could have been done.
A black boy with his pants sagging to his knees AND disruptive in class is an eyesore to most grown black folk, so you know how the rest of society feels about him. His fate is sealed early in the game.
Lets call a spade a spade here. If we’re going to use the terms set my the American body politic then he’s a TERRORIST. He’s not a “disturbed suspect” as I’ve heard him referred to. If America wants to refer to suicide bombers in Israel as terrorists, and John Allen Muhammad as a domestic terrorist, that what the fuck is this guy? A TERRORIST. He’s shooting spree is a act of terror, and the media needs to stop trying to put lipstick on a pig and call this guy anything but. Knock off this bullshit of trying to figure out the “Why” and generate even the mildest of sympathies for his “troubled” life of not being accepted in to the Army and getting kicked out of community college. Dude was dysfunctional as fuck and yes, if was a different color he would have been shackled in the SHU of someone’s prison by now. Matter of fact if he was of olive complexion with a beard, would he have even made it to see a court date?
And let me say this – SARAH PALIN is the new GEORGE WALLACE. Do the knollie people. Former Alabama governor Wallace played on the segregationist fears of America in the 50’s & 60’s and used that sentiment to ride it all the way to running for president. Sound familiar? Also Wallace’s fire brand politics also inspired people to “take action in to their own hands”. One of those who did was James Earl Ray, although Wallace was absolved of anything saying “he acted on his own”. Palin’s career is taking a similar arc, and is thriving on the tweaking of the same rhetoric. Since no one wants to make this historical parallel we are doomed to repeat it.
These words this politicians and pundits spew are powerful and if they wanna give out 1-3’s on gun possession then these folks need to understand they’re becoming accessories to these crimes as well.
PS – If this is how effective our “War On Terror” is going to be with these inflated costs of “National Security”, start putting back money in to plowing the fucking streets of NYC until you come up with a better plan.
and had he been Muslim, he would have his own FBI informant boosting him up to do that shit.
This type a shit is why your one of 4 million Americans on that one list if shit pop off… And I absolutely love it. Hold fire to they feet..