Category Archives: Gun control

Why Gun Lovers Don’t Get To Grieve Another Massacre With Me

Amen. Thanks so much for this. The time for condolences is long past. Only righteous anger paired with activism is appropriate now.

john pavlovitz

Grieving
I am grieving again today.

Once more I am mourning the senseless execution of beautiful souls torn to shreds in the prime of their lives and in the middle of their ordinary. I am grieving more premature funerals and canceled weddings and discarded futures—and I want to be alone right now.

Gun lover, please don’t tell me you’re grieving along with me today too. I just don’t think I want your company.

If you’re still against greater gun control measures—you don’t get to grieve with me today.
If you’re part of the zealous, gun-glorifying community—you don’t get to grieve with me today.
If you are a militant, unrepentant NRA apologist—you don’t get to grieve with me today.
If your right to bear arms ultimately matters more to you than the human wreckage strewn about the Umpqua campus (and schools and movie theaters and shopping malls and highways)—you don’t get to grieve with me…

View original post 636 more words

With God and Our Side-Arm

Liberty-University 

At Liberty U, students can’t dance or see R-rated movies – but they can bring loaded guns to class http://on.msnbc.com/10HuEeP 

jesus-gun-350x273

Liberty University, founded as a socially conservative learning institution by the late Rev. Jerry Fallwell, restricts certain interaction between male and female students.

According to the handbook that outlines expected behaviors by Liberty students, “The Liberty Way,” students can be fined for entering the bedroom of a student of the opposite gender and are subject to disciplinary action if they are caught watching R-rated films.

Just knowing a film’s rating may not be enough to avoid punishment. Many “PG-13” and some “PG” movies, although not prohibited, may also be inappropriate.

Liberty has strict guidelines for the hairstyles of their students. For men:

Hair and clothing styles related to a counterculture (as determined by the Student Affairs Deans’ Review Committee) are not acceptable. Hair should be cut in such a way that it will not come over the ears, collar or eyebrows at any time. Ponytails for men are unacceptable

For Women:

Hair and clothing styles related to counterculture (as determined by the Deans’ Review Committee) are not acceptable. Dresses and skirts should be no shorter than the top of the knee (sitting or standing). Skirt slits should be modest; open slits should be no higher than the top of the knee, closed slits should be no higher than two inches from the top of the knee. Shoulder straps should be no less than two inches wide. Anything tight, scant, backless, see-through, low in the neckline or revealing the midriff (in any position) is immodest and unacceptable. Slips should be worn under thin material. Earrings and plugs are permitted in ears only. No other facial piercings or plugs are allowed, including tongue.

In 2004, Andrew Garib outlined many practices at the university that some find objectionable with portions taken directly from the handbook. For example, Liberty has had, since 1988, a system of mandatory, random drug testing:

To participate in this drug-testing program, which permits the University to test any student (hair, urine or blood as specified by the administration), irrespective of the method by which that student was selected. Student selection will be accomplished both on a random basis and on the basis of suspected use and/or drug possession as defined in the “The Liberty Way.”
NOTE: Students who test positive for drug use will be responsible for covering the cost of the drug test.

Students are also expected to observe a strict curfew – midnight on weekends (except Thursday, when the curfew is at 10 p.m.) and 12:30 a.m. on weekends.

 

American Barbarism

This American Life Goes to School

March 29, 2013

Last month, President Obama made a speech in Chicago, a city that has been ravaged by gun violencein the past few years, in which he lamented that “too many of our children are being taken away from us.”

One of the places bearing the brunt of that loss is Harper High School in Chicago’s South Side. Last year, a total of 29 current and recent students of the school were shot. Eight of them died. Last month, NPR’s This American Life did a two-part series on the school to find out “how teens and adults navigate a world of funerals and Homecoming dances.” They spent five months at the school, talking with teachers, students and parents about what it’s like to live amidst persistent gun violence.

The result is a stunning piece of journalism. Listen in:

http://billmoyers.com/2013/03/29/this-american-life-goes-to-school/

school

I listened to the This American Life program twice in the past few weeks.

REST

How the hell are children supposed to learn when they are subject to a level of PTSD equal to any actively deployed soldier?! Not quite genocide (I world never use the word loosely), but the perpetuation of an underclass with fewer and fewer options.

Among the barbaric elements of American culture:
– Acceptance of a perpetual homeless population
– Acceptance of a perpetual non-white underclass (black, Hispanic, certain Asian communities)
– Refusal to impose basic regulation on the sale and possession of firearms.

mourning