Yet another shooting thread

[Derec]

What do you think should happen to someone who kills another person while experiencing a severe mental illness that continues?

He certainly should get some psychiatric help, but he certainly should not get released into society.

I posted an update to this case because it was a big story when it happened.

Another shooting story. This time at Tuskegee homecoming.

Man arrested in Tuskegee shooting admits firing gun with Glock switch, denies shooting anyone, records state

A Montgomery man arrested following the mass shooting at Tuskegee University initially denied firing his weapon, but later told federal investigators he did fire his gun but did not shoot anyone, according to federal court records.
Jacquez Myrick, 25, was taken into custody on campus early Sunday. He is charged with being in possession of a handgun with a machine gun conversion device.
No one has been charged in the shooting death of 18-year-old La’Tavion Johnson or the wounding of 16 others.
[...]
The officer then spotted another man in the parking lot, later identified as Myrick, who was armed with a Glock pistol. Myrick was detained and the pistol confiscated.
Erdmann said the Glock in Myrick’s possession was loaded with a 30-round magazine containing nine rounds of ammunition, as well as a round loaded into the chamber of the pistol.
The agent said the gun was equipped with a black “invisi-switch” type machine gun conversion device and functioned as a machine gun.

Those devices are very easy to make and allow a semiauto handgun to operate like a machine pistol.

 

[Derec]

I am a white man, I feel welcome in the Democratic party. Do you realize how insultingly sexist and childish your post sounds?

You are also a leftist who thinks people who disagree with this (self)flagellation of white men are "snowflakes". Of course you feel welcome.
But the election results show that many whites and young men have become alienated from the Democratic Party.

 

[Derec]

Curious, where are the statistics showing that Black people, Latinos, and women overwhelmingly occupy top positions due to preferential treatment?

What top positions do you have in mind? It is certainly not disputed that Biden only considered black women for SCOTUS seat vacated by Breyer. Nor is it disputed that Newsom only considered black women for the US Senate seat from California.
Biden also explicitly stated he would only consider a woman for running mate, and was then pressured to pick a black woman after George Floyd riots. Kamala proved unpopular but still ascended to become the nominee. We all saw the result 9 days ago.

 

[laughing dog]

I am a white man, I feel welcome in the Democratic party. Do you realize how insultingly sexist and childish your post sounds?

You are also a leftist who thinks people who disagree with this (self)flagellation of white men are "snowflakes". Of course you feel welcome.
But the election results show that many whites and young men have become alienated from the Democratic Party.

I am not a leftist by any reasonable interpretation of the term. I do not agree with everything the Democrats stand for.

It is not self-flagellation for white people to recognize that for centuries in Europe and over a century in North America white men constructed the social structure that gives them a distinct advantage. It is not self-flagellation to realize the inertia in the society and that change is slow. It is called recognizing reality.

I do agree that many white people and young men embrace the mantle of victim-hood that Mr. Trump popularizes. I find it sad they have so little respect for themselves that they swallow such hogwash.

 

[laughing dog]

Curious, where are the statistics showing that Black people, Latinos, and women overwhelmingly occupy top positions due to preferential treatment?

What top positions do you have in mind? It is certainly not disputed that Biden only considered black women for SCOTUS seat vacated by Breyer. Nor is it disputed that Newsom only considered black women for the US Senate seat from California.
Biden also explicitly stated he would only consider a woman for running mate, and was then pressured to pick a black woman after George Floyd riots. Kamala proved unpopular but still ascended to become the nominee. We all saw the result 9 days ago.

Do you not understand the what the term "overwhelmingly" means? You are using very small samples to make your point - something you disparage when others use them to make a point that you disagree with.

 

[Derec]

Why weren't women allowed to vote until the 20th century?

Because that's when the 19th Amendment was ratified.

Why were their Jim Crow laws?

Whose Jim Crow laws? Of the women? Because that's the antecedent to "their". And why were women's Jim Crow laws what? Your sentence is missing a word.

The world was sexist and racist back then.

No kidding! Is anybody denying that?
But two wrongs don't make a right. And neither does it justify Toni's racist and sexist statements.

Trump is unabashedly sexist and racist now. Hell, he is proud of of his sexism and racism.

Yes. Relevance? Trump being racist and sexist in one direction does not justify Toni being racist and sexist in the other.

While I think Toni's observation is a bit strong. I'd say that white men stacked in their favor. Now, when others wish to unstack those odds. white men are resisting.

The odds have been stacked against whites and men through "affirmative action" for decades. Young men and young whites today have no responsibility for Jim Crow and other injustices in the past, and should not be punished for them.
Saying that members of certain races should get into med schools with lower GPA and MCAT scores than whites and Asians is not "unstacking the odds". It's stacking the odds, but in a way palatable to leftist ideology. And as I have shown in my second table, lower admissions standards carry through to lower performance on board exams.

 

[Derec]

Do you not understand the what the term "overwhelmingly" means? You are using very small samples to make your point - something you disparage when others use them to make a point that you disagree with.

Nobody is claiming that top positions are "overwhelmingly" occupied by non-whites and women. That part is gospel's straw man that I chose to ignore. But it is clear that DEI stacks the deck to the point that politicians like Biden and Goodhair can casually pledge to not consider people for top positions based on nothing more than their skin color and genitalia. And that is injustice, no matter how you try to justify it.

 

[laughing dog]

Why weren't women allowed to vote until the 20th century?

Because that's when the 19th Amendment was ratified.

Why were their Jim Crow laws?

Whose Jim Crow laws? Of the women? Because that's the antecedent to "their". And why were women's Jim Crow laws what? Your sentence is missing a word.

Obtuseness does not suit you. The point is that women were prevented from voting by white men. That Jim Crow laws were instituted by white men.

The world was sexist and racist back then.

No kidding! Is anybody denying that?
But two wrongs don't make a right. And neither does it justify Toni's racist and sexist statements.

Trump is unabashedly sexist and racist now. Hell, he is proud of of his sexism and racism.

Yes. Relevance? Trump being racist and sexist in one direction does not justify Toni being racist and sexist in the other.

It is evidence that racism and sexism is still acceptable to a large segment of the US population. We elected a racist convicted felon and rapist for President. That has prompted the meme of "your body, my choice". It is insulting and despairing that is to sizeable fraction of women in our country.

While I think Toni's observation is a bit strong. I'd say that white men stacked in their favor. Now, when others wish to unstack those odds. white men are resisting.

The odds have been stacked against whites and men through "affirmative action" for decades. Young men and young whites today have no responsibility for Jim Crow and other injustices in the past, and should not be punished for them.
Saying that members of certain races should get into med schools with lower GPA and MCAT scores than whites and Asians is not "unstacking the odds". It's stacking the odds, but in a way palatable to leftist ideology. And as I have shown in my second table, lower admissions standards carry through to lower performance on boards exams.

Do you realize how pathetically petty your medical admission hobby horse sounds in comparison to having elected a racist, sexist, rapist felon as the leader of our country?

 

[Derec]

I am not a leftist by any reasonable interpretation of the term. I do not agree with everything the Democrats stand for.

How so? You are certainly more left than most who post here, and this is a left-of-center forum already.
I bet that when you do not agree with what Democrats stand for you do it from the left, not the middle (like I tend to).
Let's see it: what Dem Party stances do you disagree with?

It is not self-flagellation for white people to recognize that for centuries in Europe and over a century in North America white men constructed the social structure that gives them a distinct advantage.

That is clearly the case, and I never said that acknowledging history is self-flaggelation. But those people are also long dead.
And P.S.: It was not "thousands of years" like Toni ignorantly claimed.

It is not self-flagellation to realize the inertia in the society and that change is slow. It is called recognizing reality.

Inertia and slow change also increases the danger of overshoot, especially when the change is abrupt. There was a sharp change of direction in the 1960s with "affirmative action" and we are in the overshoot phase. What is (self)flaggelation is to claim that white people can't compete in a fair system (as Toni claimed) or that opposition to racial preferences is somehow being a "snowflake".

I do agree that many white people and young men embrace the mantle of victim-hood that Mr. Trump popularizes. I find it sad they have so little respect for themselves that they swallow such hogwash.

Maybe Dems should have done a better job courting that demographic. Instead of calling us "snowflakes" or "selfish bullies" that can't compete for being against racial preferences.

 

[laughing dog]

Do you not understand the what the term "overwhelmingly" means? You are using very small samples to make your point - something you disparage when others use them to make a point that you disagree with.

Nobody is claiming that top positions are "overwhelmingly" occupied by non-whites and women. That part is gospel's straw man that I chose to ignore. But it is clear that DEI stacks the deck to the point that politicians like Biden and Goodhair can casually pledge to not consider people for top positions based on nothing more than their skin color and genitalia. And that is injustice, no matter how you try to justify it.

It is not injustice - it is politics where positions are not simply functions to be fulfilled, but symbols of society. In order for gov't to gain and keep the trust of citizens, it has to appear that it looks like them and cares about them.

 

[laughing dog]

I am not a leftist by any reasonable interpretation of the term. I do not agree with everything the Democrats stand for.

How so? You are certainly more left than most who post here, and this is a left-of-center forum already.

What makes you feel that way?

I bet that when you do not agree with what Democrats stand for you do it from the left, not the middle (like I tend to).
Let's see it: what Dem Party stances do you disagree with?

For example, I do not agree that deficits do not matter. I do not agree that markets are necessarily wrong or necessarily need to be corrected. I think effective price controls are an inferior method of dealing with access to goods or services.

It is not self-flagellation for white people to recognize that for centuries in Europe and over a century in North America white men constructed the social structure that gives them a distinct advantage.

That is clearly the case, and I never said that acknowledging history is self-flaggelation. But those people are also long dead.

That is irrelevant to the history and its inertia.

And P.S.: It was not "thousands of years" like Toni ignorantly claimed.

PS. Human beings have been around for thousands of years.

It is not self-flagellation to realize the inertia in the society and that change is slow. It is called recognizing reality.

Inertia and slow change also increases the danger of overshoot, especially when the change is abrupt. There was a sharp change of direction in the 1960s with "affirmative action" and we are in the overshoot phase. What is (self)flaggelation is to claim that white people can't compete in a fair system (as Toni claimed) or that opposition to racial preferences is somehow being a "snowflake".

Certainly white people didn't think they could compete in a fair system in the past. Why else rig it? Why else complain when it is getting derigged?

I do agree that many white people and young men embrace the mantle of victim-hood that Mr. Trump popularizes. I find it sad they have so little respect for themselves that they swallow such hogwash.

Maybe Dems should have done a better job courting that demographic. Instead of calling us "snowflakes" or "selfish bullies" that can't compete for being against racial preferences.

Calling people names does not induce them to join you, even when the names are accurate.

 

[Toni]

Why weren't women allowed to vote until the 20th century?

Because that's when the 19th Amendment was ratified.

Why were their Jim Crow laws?

Whose Jim Crow laws? Of the women? Because that's the antecedent to "their". And why were women's Jim Crow laws what? Your sentence is missing a word.

The world was sexist and racist back then.

No kidding! Is anybody denying that?
But two wrongs don't make a right. And neither does it justify Toni's racist and sexist statements.

Trump is unabashedly sexist and racist now. Hell, he is proud of of his sexism and racism.

Yes. Relevance? Trump being racist and sexist in one direction does not justify Toni being racist and sexist in the other.

While I think Toni's observation is a bit strong. I'd say that white men stacked in their favor. Now, when others wish to unstack those odds. white men are resisting.

The odds have been stacked against whites and men through "affirmative action" for decades. Young men and young whites today have no responsibility for Jim Crow and other injustices in the past, and should not be punished for them.
Saying that members of certain races should get into med schools with lower GPA and MCAT scores than whites and Asians is not "unstacking the odds". It's stacking the odds, but in a way palatable to leftist ideology. And as I have shown in my second table, lower admissions standards carry through to lower performance on board exams.

Omg: you are right! Looking at the CEOs, CFOs, heard of corporations, doctors, lawyers, elected officials, power brokers: all of the sudden they are…..still overwhelmingly white and male.

 

[Gospel]

Curious, where are the statistics showing that Black people, Latinos, and women overwhelmingly occupy top positions due to preferential treatment?

What top positions do you have in mind? It is certainly not disputed that Biden only considered black women for SCOTUS seat vacated by Breyer. Nor is it disputed that Newsom only considered black women for the US Senate seat from California.
Biden also explicitly stated he would only consider a woman for running mate, and was then pressured to pick a black woman after George Floyd riots. Kamala proved unpopular but still ascended to become the nominee. We all saw the result 9 days ago.

People say and do a lot of things, but actions and claims aren’t automatically evidence of systemic trends. For instance, many people claim that minorities face significant inequality in opportunities, but you wouldn’t accept that without supporting data, right? Similarly, I’m not asking for anecdotal examples or isolated cases; I’m asking for comprehensive statistics that show Black people, Latinos, and women overwhelmingly occupy top positions—such as CEOs and other high-level executives—specifically due to preferential treatment.

Where is the data that backs this claim across the board? If such preferential treatment were so pervasive, surely there would be clear, consistent evidence of these groups disproportionately occupying these roles as a result. Until then, I remain curious to see the actual numbers, not assumptions or cherry-picked examples.

 

[Gospel]

So, you believe that it came to be that white men are in charge …because they are just naturally superior? Smarter, stronger, harder working? More intelligent?

You are shifting the goalposts. You accused white men of being lesser than others. This is what you wrote.

Because white men cannot compete if the odds are not stacked in their favor. They cannot stand against real competition unless they make all the rules and judgements in their favor.

I think centuries of privilege have made people complacent. In this particular case: white males. Also insecure and less sharp.

It's actually the opposite. Decades of racial preferences have made blacks and Hispanics complacent.
If they don't have to work nearly as hard in high school as their white and Asian brethren to get into a good college, most will not.
If they don't have to work nearly as hard in college as their white and Asian brethren to get into a graduate/professional school, most will not.

I have posted this before, and you and your side never has a good apologetics for it:
View attachment 48485
View attachment 48486

Look at how any non-white non-male person who gets any kind position that a white make wants is immediately decried as Affirmative Action hire—or to be more modern: DEA hire.

Many of them are. Not all, but it taints everybody. That's the perversion of AA/DEI. Just like the nephew of the company owner is not necessarily an incompetent nepotism hire, but he or she will be under suspicion of that at least until they prove their mettle.
Same with AA/DEI. It not only harms groups discriminated against by those efforts, but also the groups ostensibly helped. Why is it so controversial to just treat applicants as individuals, and not discriminate against one group or another?

I think Biden administration/Democratic Party holding steadfast to the concept of racial preferences is part of the reason they lost in 2024. "Affirmative Action" is so unpopular that it even lost when it was on the ballot in California of all places. And yet:
‘This Is Not a Normal Court’: Biden Denounces Affirmative-Action Ruling
Read the room!

Trump is the result of thousands of years of affirmative action for white men.

Thousands of years now? How so?

To make this even slightly on topic, I can see the same reality inversion field operating on the subject of shootings. Even though blacks kill people at a rate ~5-6x that of whites, the leftosphere always claims that it's white people with AR15s that are the real problem, never black bangers with Glocks.
FBI Expanded Homicide Data Table 6

I could not find a chart comparing offenders, only victims, but since vast majority of homicide is intraracial, the rates are not very different. It also shows that this "blame whitey" attitude predominately harms black victims of gun violence.

1: Your so-called "evidence" for "complacency" only shows that different groups perform differently on standardized tests and GPA metrics. It doesn’t prove that these differences are caused by affirmative action or is the result of complacency. While it's plausible, your claim remains speculative without data linking these factors directly.

2: You raise a valid point about higher victimization rates among Black individuals, but your assertion that focusing on white mass shooters over intraracial violence harms Black victims is purely your opinion. Also, while plausible and I agree to an anecdotal extent, without data showing that "blame whitey" influences policy or crime outcomes, that claim remains unsubstantiated.

I see intraracial violence in the Black community as a matter of cause and effect. Not long ago, the family structure among Black Americans was systematically dismantled, leaving painful experiences as the foundation for our identities. While some Americans may feel distant or disconnected from that history, the harm inflicted upon us has, tragically, become woven into our culture—a culture that is as much America’s as it is our own—resulting in a cycle where, all too often, we turn that harm inward.

To elaborate, Black-on-Black violence is part of a broader pattern of intracommunity violence observed in many groups that have endured systemic hardships. Asian, white, and Latino communities have all experienced various forms of discrimination, economic challenges, and social pressures, and these hardships have also affected how individuals in these communities sometimes treat one another. The difference lies in the severity and duration of these hardships. Black Americans, whose history of systemic oppression—through slavery, segregation, and deliberate and comprehensive socioeconomic destruction—has had particularly deep and long-lasting impacts. This difference in severity is reflected in the more abundant and pronounced ways that violence and internal struggles manifest within the Black community.

 

[Toni]

I am not a leftist by any reasonable interpretation of the term. I do not agree with everything the Democrats stand for.

How so? You are certainly more left than most who post here, and this is a left-of-center forum already.
I bet that when you do not agree with what Democrats stand for you do it from the left, not the middle (like I tend to).
Let's see it: what Dem Party stances do you disagree with?

It is not self-flagellation for white people to recognize that for centuries in Europe and over a century in North America white men constructed the social structure that gives them a distinct advantage.

That is clearly the case, and I never said that acknowledging history is self-flaggelation. But those people are also long dead.
And P.S.: It was not "thousands of years" like Toni ignorantly claimed.

It is not self-flagellation to realize the inertia in the society and that change is slow. It is called recognizing reality.

Inertia and slow change also increases the danger of overshoot, especially when the change is abrupt. There was a sharp change of direction in the 1960s with "affirmative action" and we are in the overshoot phase. What is (self)flaggelation is to claim that white people can't compete in a fair system (as Toni claimed) or that opposition to racial preferences is somehow being a "snowflake".

I do agree that many white people and young men embrace the mantle of victim-hood that Mr. Trump popularizes. I find it sad they have so little respect for themselves that they swallow such hogwash.

Maybe Dems should have done a better job courting that demographic. Instead of calling us "snowflakes" or "selfish bullies" that can't compete for being against racial preferences.

Maybe the fact is that you are not actually against racial preferences, just racial preferences that do not rate white and male as #1 priority. Because that has been the preference in the US and most of the western world for the last several centuries.

I realize that you do not like the term 'snowflake'--nor do I but tbh, mostly 'snowflake' has been deployed as a pejorative term deployed against those who protested against the maltreatment of minorities or any 'out' groups.

As for the term; selfish bullies: well, if the shoe fits....
And if it doesn't, stop trying it on.

 

[Toni]

I did not write nor imply that white men are inferior to anybody.

Again, this is what you actually wrote:

Because white men cannot compete if the odds are not stacked in their favor. They cannot stand against real competition unless they make all the rules and judgements in their favor.

Are you taking that back?

I said that they could only maintain their near exclusive hold on wealth and power by writing the rules so that they favor maintaining wealth and control in the hands of white males, and limiting the abilities of women and non-whites so that they had less access to education, accumulation and control over wealth—or their own bodies, their own labor and the fruits of their labor for that matter.

That state of affairs is in the past. It has not been the case for decades. In more recent decades we have had the opposite under the banner of "affirmative action".

At most, I implied that white men are selfish bullies.

That too is a racist and sexist generalization. You are also still using present tense when referring to something that happened in the past.

I will further state that at least in some cases, as you so richly illustrate in your oddly but so predictably aggrieved post, white men seem to lack any awareness outside of their own personal experiences and their self-entitlement fueled insecurities.

We can't compete, we are selfish bullies, we lack self-awareness. Are you even aware of racism and sexism in your posts?

The embrace of victimhood is strong in your post.

I repeatedly said that people should be treated as individuals. There should not be discrimination based on race or gender for or against certain groups. You dislike that - you want there to be discrimination in favor of groups you like. And you insult white men if we disagree that we should be discriminated against.

I think Trump's reelection is a disaster. But it was made possible to a large extent by attitudes of leftists like you. White men do not feel welcome in the Democratic Party because of people like you who view us all as unable to compete, selfish bullies and oppressors.

I am a white man, I feel welcome in the Democratic party. Do you realize how insultingly sexist and childish your post sounds?

Nope, I’m sure he does not. Instead he embraces victimhood because not everybody is on board with persecuting women and persons of color. He should cheer up, tho. That will all change come Jan. 20. *

* Before Derec gets all hot and bothered, no, I don’t believe he voted for that creature. What I do think is that like a lot of people, Derec slips into the mode where it is difficult/impossible for him to hear other people imply that maybe the reason white men are not at the top of every list, pile, whatever is because fir to long, the rules have revolved around stacking the decks to ensure that they remain at the apex of all good things. This does not mean that ALL white men are at the tippy top of everything but by being white and male, one has cleared the first two and most important hurdles to the top. Nor does it mean that white men do not work hard and achieve great things. But again, things are stacked such that we hear so little about women and persons of color who have achieved great things—sometimes because credit was stolen, sometimes because credit was overlooked —precisely because some important achievers were first achieved by women and/or persons of color. That does not in any way erase the accomplishments of white men. Erasing the achievers, the rights, the opportunities, the personhood of other people is not my style. Maybe because I know a tiny bit about how that feels. Only a teeny tiny bit yeah.

 

[Elixir]

Maybe Dems should have done a better job courting that demographic. Instead of calling us "snowflakes" or "selfish bullies" that can't compete for being against racial preferences.

Nah. The fact is that white racist snowflakes are already a minority. So much so in fact, that ignoring them entirely in favor of courting other minorities became a viable political option in 2020.

Only through tens of billions of dollars worth of lies, foreign dictators’ support and disinformation, was the WRS faction able to prevail electorally in ‘24. They know it may be the last time, so everything will now be done to subvert, rig or obviate any further elections.
Murkins sure are stupid.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I think of professional sports may be an example of what can happen when the market is opened up to all, not just whites.
What would baseball have looked like in the 20's and 30's if it was open to all?

Or is this racist somehow?

Economic reality: Sports like baseball are not for the poor. A bat, a ball, a glove are not expensive--but the land to play the game on is.

The poor sport is basketball due to it's low facility requirements. (Although there is a genetic factor, also--blacks are on average slightly taller than whites. Basketball puts a huge value on height and a tiny shift in the center produces a big difference far out on the tail. Same reason we see almost no orientals--they tend to be slightly shorter and that likewise produces a big difference in the tail.)

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Because white men cannot compete if the odds are not stacked in their favor. They cannot stand against real competition unless they make all the rules and judgements in their favor.

That is an incredibly sexist and racist statement!
You are basically saying that white men are inferior to others. Furthermore, you support discrimination against white men and are pretending that there is no such discrimination. Much has been said about MAGA having alternative facts, but you are the proof that similar denialism exists on the Left as well.

I want people to be treated as individuals. No stacking odds in anybody's favor.

So, you believe that it came to be that white men are in charge …because they are just naturally superior? Smarter, stronger, harder working? More intelligent?

More blessed by God?

I think centuries of privilege have made people complacent. In this particular case: white males. Also insecure and less sharp. Look at how any non-white non-male person who gets any kind position that a white make wants is immediately decried as Affirmative Action hire—or to be more modern: DEA hire.


Trump is the result of thousands of years of affirmative action for white men.

You fail to understand.

Yes, the deck was unquestionably stacked in the past. That was exceedingly unfair.

The problem is that stacking the deck in the other direction is not the path of fairness. Don't stack the deck in either direction, let it behave naturally.

 

[Elixir]

Don't stack the deck in either direction, let it behave naturally.

I don’t like that. In full implementation it would amount to finsncisl libertarianism, or financial “might makes right”, Economic parity of opportunity would never be approached.
SOME restraint is needed, at least on guys like Fred Trump, Not deck stacking - it’s prevention of deck stacking by guys like that. Racist landlords racist employers seeking to take advantage of, or disadvantage minorities and even white immigrants. There are thousands of guys like Fred, and collectively their words and actions serve to suppress people and perpetuate inequity.