We heard lots of rhetoric in the past week about the unacceptability of violence in our culture - because a rich, powerful, white man was shot at. I found the level of that rhetoric either (a) disingenuous or (b) completely disconnected from reality. The continued use of violence by the state, and those who act on its behalf, as an acceptable and appropriate form of social management - IS THE PROBLEM, IS THE REASON WHY INDIVIDUAL AMERICANS BELIEVE THAT THE USE OF VIOLENCE TO SOLVE PROBLEMS IS MORALLY, ETHICALLY, AND CULTURALLY ENDORSED - BECAUSE IT IS CULTURALLY ENDORSED (GIVING THE ILLUSION THAT IT MUST THEREFORE ALSO BE BOTH ETHICALLY AND MORALLY SOUND)!!!
But it isn't. It isn't morally sound to use violence to get what you want. it isn't morally sound to threaten violence as a way to get what you want. Yet, we - as a nation - model that behavior every day. With the way we are militarizing our police departments, with they way we deploy our military to address international issues, with the way that we incarcerate and kill our own citizens at rates MUCH higher than almost all other 'first world' countries (and quite a few 'third world' ones...).
We actually don't need gun control or police reform per se, so much as we need a moral and cultural awakening: one that refuses all versions of dehumanization as a foundation.
https://lnkd.in/gBREyp-g