Social Question

mazingerz88's avatar

Do you think mass shootings would compel Trump to stop his hateful rhetoric?

Asked by mazingerz88 (29260points) August 4th, 2019

Along with his campaign rally chanters?

Observing members: 0 Composing members: 0

53 Answers

wiscoblond's avatar

Just five minutes ago I read that Trump is removing all tweets with the word invasion in it.

The shootings won’t stop him. He continues then tries to erase any evidence of his involvement in anything that is morally or legally wrong. The dumb ass doesn’t realize that you can’t hide what’s been written on the internet.

mazingerz88's avatar

This is just part of what former FBI Director James Comey wrote in an article.

____________________________

America has long had a radioactive racist soup in the center of our national life. Donald Trump thinks he is stirring it for political benefit. He’s actually doing something more dangerous.

For much of our history, the soup was deadly and uncontained, spewing radiation that led to the enslavement, terrorization, murder and oppression of African-Americans. One hundred years ago this summer, it erupted on the streets of Washington, leaving dozens dead. The president of Howard University narrowly escaped being lynched. The murders, beatings and threats erupted in countless places during the first 200 years of American life. To visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture is to discover that the violence and mistreatment is beyond count, but not beyond imagination.

Yet something good happened over the last 50 years. America started to get control over the dangerous radiation. We erected a containment building made up of laws; we passed statutes making the abuse and mistreatment of people by virtue of their race a crime. More important, we began enforcing the laws we already had. It was long a statutory crime to kill another human being; it just wasn’t against the law in practice to kill a black person in many places. The rights to vote and to equal treatment sounded muscular on paper, but they were weaklings in much of America. Slowly, slowly that began to change, through progress at ballot boxes and jury boxes, in police squad rooms and classrooms.

But the containment building of law was only part of the solution. Radioactivity lasts for centuries and it can still blow the lid off the building; true safety lies in control rods, pushed down into the soup to calm it, to cool it. Those control rods in America were Today, the control rods are being lifted. With each racist assault — on a judge, an athlete, a country, a member of Congress, or a city — and with each kind word for “very fine people on both sides,” our president allows the stew to boil and radiate more dangerously.

You can feel the effect: in the F.B.I.’s burgeoning caseload of hate crimes and white supremacist investigations, and in a stadium full of Americans who, even knowing they are on television, chant in unison, “Send her back.” That burst of negative energy was met, not by efforts to control it, but by 13 seconds of presidential silence, the same silence that his fellow Republicans have adopted.

Our president thinks he is doing something clever. He lifts the control rods for a calculated and deeply cynical purpose: to harness the political energy unleashed. It will heat his re-election bid, he likely thinks. But unconstrained, it will damage the nation, in all directions. Only fools believe they can ride the gamma rays of hate.

According to a “manifesto” widely attributed to him, the Texas terrorist who killed at least 20 people in El Paso on Saturday wasn’t directly motivated by Donald Trump. But he is a horrific example of what can happen when the control rods are lifted.

Every American president, knowing what lies deep within our country, bears a unique responsibility to say loudly and consistently that white supremacy is illegitimate, that encouraging a politics of racial resentment can spawn violence, and that violence aimed at people by virtue of their skin color is terrorism.

Mr. President, because of what you have done, you owe us more than condolences sent via Twitter. You must stop trying to unleash and exploit the radioactive energy of racism.

You hold the biggest control rod of all. You must push it back into place, for all our sakes. The vast majority of Americans believe the core ideals of our founding documents and we expect our culture to reflect those ideals. Show us you believe in them, too.

LadyMarissa's avatar

Noooo…it makes him feel in control!!! Think about it…have you ever known a racist who proudly proclaimed their racism??? Nope, they always say “I’m not a racist because…” then they go back to hating

elbanditoroso's avatar

No. Trump may tone things done for a day or two, but he will be right back at the incitement thing within a week, because he thinks it get him votes.

LostInParadise's avatar

Trump is giving a speech today on the latest two mass shootings. I doubt that he will mention that Texas officials are treating the El Paso shooting as an act of domestic terrorism.

kritiper's avatar

No. I don’t think he really cares. His ego is far more important.

JLeslie's avatar

Yesterday I saw Trump condemning the shootings, White Supremacists and hate. I don’t remember his exact words.

The news I was watching said he didn’t do enough. His statements that they showed (it was actual video of him) weren’t enough in the journalists opinion. They also showed a photo of Ivanka and a quote from her condemning White Supremacy.

I found myself wondering again: should the news be gathering together all the video of Trump condemning hate, WS, and anything similar and be changing the message to our President being against these groups? The media can propagate the message if they choose to cherry pick. The media does this all the time.

I understand why people would be against this idea. The fact is he does give permission to chanting crowds and seems fine with any group that will give him votes and adoration. Even if the majority of media outlets were playing Trumps dissatisfaction with WS the WS groups probably wouldn’t be listening to those channels, they would twist the message back to Trump supporting them. However, maybe it would help the majority of the country work together and not be so derisive? Then at least the average Republican would be able to speak out against WS without feeling they are going against the president or the party. Maybe the white culture talk would fade. Maybe the idea of a white parade would be less likely.

I know it won’t happen because Democrats would feel like it could help Trump win the next election or they would worry it downplays the ill Trump causes, but I still wonder if it would take away some of his power to wrangle the haters out there.

I think Trump must worry about these hate groups. In his younger days he expressed worry in interviews where he raised the point. His BIL, daughter, and grandchildren are Jewish. I know some people say they aren’t really Jewish, but I disagree, and for sure the WS would view them as Jewish.

I guess the Trumps might feel immune. They’re rich, have body guards, and money, etc. Even some average Americans probably see these hate filled mass shootings and don’t identify. They never go to gay nightclubs or Walmarts in Hispanic parts of towns, or however they rationalize things to feel safer.

elbanditoroso's avatar

Given the vehemence of the White Supremacists, and the fact that he and his supporters have let things get so out of control, Trump may very well be worried about his fate.

The Jewish family doesn’t count for much. I think he would sell them out in a heartbeat. Even his daughter, if it came to that. He is all about self-preservation.

JLeslie's avatar

I don’t know if he would sell out his daughter, but I think it’s very possible he would rationalize she is protected or “different” than other Jews, and would never be a target.

Dutchess_III's avatar

No. They play right into his hands of what he has to “save” America from.

JLeslie's avatar

Trump’s recent statement about the shootings. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cincinnati.com/amp/1920116001

No mention of his chanting crowds, wrong city in Ohio, and to be honest, when he talks about changing gun laws it isn’t very comforting to me.

Call_Me_Jay's avatar

“Trump is removing all tweets with the word invasion in it.”

Well, people in his office are doing that. It’s simple to identify his activity on the Twitter account compared to whoever else has access.

There are rants with Unnecessary Capitalization, misspelling, and angry hateful rhetoric. And then there are the posts with complete sentences and fairly normal sentiments.

Inspired_2write's avatar

No, only behaviour modification in that we as the general public should Stop reacting to his comments online or other and as soon as he realizes that that does not garner an audience interested in what he has to say or do, it is only then that he will start to change.
And that is a big “IF” as his behavior is ingrained so that much more difficult to curb.

flutherother's avatar

Patrick Crusius is believed to be the author of a text posted on 8chan, an online message board frequently used by the far right, which says “this attack is a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas” and rails against a “cultural and ethnic replacement brought on by invasion”.

It is no coincidence that Trump is now deleting the word “invasion” from his Twitter feed and asking us all to denounce white extremism – something most of us have been doing all our lives. Trump is today saying the right words in the right order but based on his past form I doubt if it will last.

Aster's avatar

Here’s all you need to know about shootings. Be careful; it could bring on a heavy dose of denial: https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2017/01/updated-mass-shootings-surge-246-7-obamas-presidency/

elbanditoroso's avatar

What make’s @Aster ‘s posting particularly useful is that it is dated 2017 and doesn’t include the Trump years at all.

Certainly relevant to the discussion today.

Aster's avatar

Thanks. I thought it was more than useful.

elbanditoroso's avatar

I was being sarcastic.

stanleybmanly's avatar

Why should the shootings compel Trump to tone down his rhetoric? The bulk of his followers don’t recognize his tirades as hateful, and the minority who do are relegated to veneration of the fool for saying out loud what they themselves have better sense than to openly espouse

JLeslie's avatar

I just found out Trump is cancelling his scheduled trip tomorrow where I live because of the recent shootings. One positive for me in this whole mess. I won’t have to worry about blocked traffic the day I fly home from my current out of state trip.

JLeslie's avatar

Wasn’t there over 300 mass shootings in 2018? Obama’s percentage might sound high, but it starts with a much lower number than what we are seeing the last two years. Not that I’m saying the number during Obama is ok, I’m only saying the numbers are growing bigger exponentially.

elbanditoroso's avatar

@JLeslie – my guess is that someone called him and asked him if he were free for golf.

stanleybmanly's avatar

You can’t pin the rising mass shooting rate on any particular President. That rate is going up and will continue to inexorably accelerate as the number of automatic weapons proliferate. We are currently reaping the proceeds from investments in weapons proliferation sewn 20–30-40 years ago. The future looks grim.

Dutchess_III's avatar

What the hell CAN we pin it on? We’re the only developed country with this problem! We have to be able to pinpoint WHY.

Aster's avatar

We could start by “pinning it on” drugs and the breakdown of the nuclear family. This is still a world in which I am not familiar.

Dutchess_III's avatar

Other countries have drug addicts and non-nuclear families.

stanleybmanly's avatar

You can pin it on the simple fact that the automatic weapons make it easy. There’s nothing less complicated. It’s easy to forget until you blink and look around at (for example) the current President, that we are living in what amounts to one big asylum. What do you suppose happens in the place if guns are lying around? The critical mass was achieved decades ago. Now, there is no predicting how far in the future our maximum mass shooting rate lies.

flutherother's avatar

@Aster To bring your figures up to date the Gun Violence Archive lists 51 mass shootings in the United States in the two and a half years since Trump took office. That compares with the 74 mass shootings that occurred during Obama’s eight years in office. If you work it out there have been 1.6 shootings in each month of Trump’s tenure compared with 0.8 a month under Obama. That is twice as many.

To be generous, there could be other factors contributing to this increase but what we should focus on is the language used by the two men at public addresses and rallies. I don’t recall Obama ever using the kind of hateful language we associate with Trump.

JLeslie's avatar

@elbanditoroso We have over 30 golf courses. If he wants to play golf he could have done it after his speech.

stanleybmanly's avatar

@Dutchess III I know. But the critical laws in this instance were to allow military grade automatic weapons to float around in the society. They are laws from the Vietnam era, and there is no way of knowing just when the tipping point in numbers of rifles was reached guaranteeing the certainty of our bullet laden existence. There are threads here where the wringing of hands is about the supposition that we are crazier than we used to be, but I insist this explanation ignores the fact that people, even crazy people are basically lazy. Crazy people who would otherwise pass for quirky will shoot up a playground if you make it cheap and easy for them.

ucme's avatar

Moronic, scared shitless americans were shooting each other long before Trump rocked up in the WH & will continue to do so long after he pops his clogs.

Patty_Melt's avatar

The problem stems from the fact our country is quite young.
At a time when most of the rest of the world had established homes, governments, and boundaries, Americans were tasked with crossing a wilderness continent. There was hunting, and killing natives involved. People were populating areas without lawful protection, and found themselves having to rely on guts, guns, and cunning to live.
There were mostly decent, honest people just wanting to find a place to call their own. However, there were also bloodthirsty psychopaths who were giddy over the knowledge that killing the indigenous population was acceptable. Those same message e people also preyed upon others. This country got its beginning with guns being necessary for daily survival. Women carried daringers. I mean, lots of women, society types even. There came a point when we all should have seen we didn’t need them much anymore, but we missed that boat.
It was a way of life. Coming to a change was difficult part because nobody wanted to be the first to lay their protection down.
Hunting is still done a lot.
I believe Nevada now has a bear season.
Because we needed them, but still had them as the population boomed, we now have more freaks than ever packing heat.

LadyMarissa's avatar

I believe that in the speech I heard yesterday we were told that it is up to the American citizens to stop the bigotry. I believe that the BEST way to do that is to vote for anybody NOT named trump come 2020!!!

I saw a man who said all the right words; however, his eyes told me that he didn’t mean a word of it!!!

elbanditoroso's avatar

@LadyMarissa Here’s the problem. Trump has lied 10,000 times or more in his first two years as president.

Specifically, he has supported White Supremacists more than once and condoned what they do.

why should we believe anything he says? today.

LadyMarissa's avatar

@elbanditoroso He has been known to lie 10K times in one 24 hour period so he’s trying to do better!!! His need to lie was the main reason that I could NOT vote for him in 2016 & why I refuse to vote for him in 2020. As a formerly abused spouse, I can assure you that lying is the least of his transgressions. I also have to wonder why a grandson of an immigrant who has been married to 2 possible illegal immigrants would hate immigrants so much??? Was his father not a DACA???

MrGrimm888's avatar

Trump is not a “normal American.” He was raised super wealthy, and has a severe disconnection, from reality. It’s not his fault, he was born into such wealth, anymore than a mosquito being born as a mosquito. He’s definitely a piece of shit, but it’s just the way of the world. I am, potentially wrong, but I think he’s learning more about reality, by being POTUS. He has MUCH to learn, and may be incapable of ever seeing the world, the way it is.

I still don’t blame him, for his ignorance. It is his supporters, that give him power. THEY, IMO, are the ones responsible for his rise to power, and any problems that come from his rule…

Aster's avatar

The Luby’s shooting, also known as the Luby’s massacre, was a mass shooting that took place on October 16, 1991, at a Luby’s Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas. The perpetrator, George Hennard, drove his Ford Ranger pickup truck through the front window of the restaurant. He quickly shot and killed 23 people, and wounded 27 others. He had a brief shootout with police, refused their orders to surrender, and fatally shot himself.”
I have no idea how long these shootings have been happening. Maybe longer than we imagine.

MrGrimm888's avatar

Mass killings, for one reason or another, are as old as our species.

elbanditoroso's avatar

University of Texas – Austin – 1966 link

Tropical_Willie's avatar

Aren’t there more guns in Texas than people? ??

Patty_Melt's avatar

Sort of makes Billy the kid seem more like the kid next door.

I need be er saw that university before. Looks impressive.

MrGrimm888's avatar

There was a good old fashioned stabbing spree in California. Police say he only targeted Hispanics. 4 dead. 2 in the hospital.
#MAGA~~~~

LadyMarissa's avatar

He was Hispanic himself according to the news report that I heard.

LadyMarissa's avatar

I do my best to NOT use the “t” word anymore than necessary. The nut job who did the stabbing is Hispanic…the “t” word is of jackass descent!!!

MrGrimm888's avatar

The report I read, didn’t mention the killer’s race. It said that he only targeted Hispanics. It also said, it was a killing, and robbing spree. He also disarmed himself, when police confronted him. What an odd situation…

LadyMarissa's avatar

The whole thing is strange. Thus morning I read 5 different reports that said he was Hispanic. I went to get you a link showing what I has read & now all reports are geared to saying he is a violent gang member with no mention of him being Hispanic. OK found it part way down the page “These crimes have nothing to do with hate or race,” he said. “The suspect is Hispanic and so are most of the victims.”

A woman was stabbed to death by a man in Pittsburgh PA today also with a 2nd woman wounded. Then my family wonders why I choose to stay at home most of the time…only going out for necessary trips!!!

Dutchess_III's avatar

People of color can be racist too. I dated a black guy who was crazy racist. He didn’t recognize it though.

MrGrimm888's avatar

^That’s true.

Patty_Melt's avatar

In the words of Bill and Ted, “Be excellent to each other.”

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