Reload, Sarah, right?
No, Sarah, it's time to cease and desist.
What do you think of your word choices, now? Does your verbal history give you pause? You had your crosshairs right over Congresswoman Giffords’ district. And now the unspeakable has happened. What you so blithely pictured has come to pass.
How do you feel as she lies in critical condition in the hospital? How do you feel as U.S. District Judge John Roll lies dead?
Do you feel in any way responsible for the vitriol? Or do you continue to believe your hate-filled, ill-educated rhetoric is cute and folksy?
Is violent rhetoric a down-homey way to draw followers, or could it, in part, convince any individual that violence is an answer to our country’s divisive politics?
Does your snappy gun-speak add something to public discourse beyond its potential to incite violence?
Your self-appointed gun guru "lock and load" talk bears more resemblance to terror-speak than it does to political discourse held in a democratic republic.
Does talk have consequences? Does the written word? Did it have consequences, today? Could today’s violence in Arizona be a consequence of vitriol turned violent?
It’s time to end the acceptance of leaders using virulent rhetoric laced with violent overtones such as “reload,” "target," and “Second Amendment solutions,” as well as hate speech and virulent rhetoric.
Lay down your weapons of violence Sarah, Sharon, Bill, Glen, Jan and Rush. Your words carry deadly consequences.
It’s time to join the civil conversation.
Peace and blessings. (Practice the first; count the second.)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
As much as I can't stand her, I can't help think that the targets poster probably contributed zero to to shootings yesterday. There's no sign that the shooter had any interest at all in Sarah Palin or that he even knew about the posters.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading some of the things he's written and the videos he's posted, I'm going to bet he's not a fan of Palin to begin with in the first place. So while I think the posters are in poor taste, I wince and the thought of drawing connections between her and the shooter when they really don't exist. In fact, so outrageous and insanely anti-establishment was his thinking, that Loughner would have probably still done what he did had Sarah Palin herself been the representative in Giffords shoes that day.
Hi Scott!
ReplyDeleteThank you for your thoughtful comment. I understand what you are saying and I believe I was careful only to suggest that there could have been a correlation, not that there was an actual correlation between such hate-filled diatribe and yesterday's shooting.
However, I do believe that the vitriolic speech embodied in the words of those to whom I am speaking have the potential to incite violence and such speech has no place in civil discourse.
I'm not suggesting that yesterday's shooter acted upon the violent rhetoric they have spewed, but that it COULD create just such an outcome. And that, it being within the realm of possibility, perhaps probability--that fact alone should give them pause.
We must contemplate just what outcome our words and actions could engender and be responsible for them.
While yesterday's actions were very likely the actions of a seriously imbalanced and mentally ill individual, there are those who could and would use the current divisiveness to act with violence.
The fact is the very event depicted on the poster did occur.
Shouldn't that alone be enough to give a thinking person pause?
Now is the perfect time for those who engage in inflammatory rhetoric to rethink their choices and to engage in civil discourse.