On Compromising Our Bloody F*cking Freedoms

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Abby Zimet, staff writer

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Grieving in Las Vegas. Photo by Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty

The carnage goes on. The Las Vegas shootings have sparked a loud, familiar outcry that something be done to staunch the flow of blood in a country with too many guns, not enough gun laws and a few sick goons getting rich off the killings. An appalled  American College of Physicians, the country's largest medical organization which for 20 years has cited gun-related injuries and deaths as "a critical issue of public health," calls for a ban on automatic and semi-automatic weapons - and damn how can you not? The great Rosanne Cash wrote an op-ed urging her fellow musicians to stand up for gun control, blasting a "deeply sinister" NRA that panders to the country music fan base but in fact "funds domestic terrorism."

Still, a Trump administration waist-deep in NRA-funded blood does nothing. Trump refused to go there when asked in Vegas about the murderous state of the nation, his minions are still making moronic yeah-but-trucks-kill-too arguments, and leaked talking points argue "new laws won’t stop a mad man." They conclude, "We shouldn't  rush toward compromising our freedoms before we have all the facts." So. Some facts: 

About half the Congress is bought and paid for by the NRA. They gave $5,900,000 to Republicans in the 2016 election cycle; they also gave $106,000 to Democrats. Here are the legislators who took their money. Also here. They have telephones. And they sure as hell better have guilty consciences.

Another fact: There are a zillion humdrum, daily, dumb, largely harmless activities that Americans undertake all the time that are more strictly regulated than buying a gun - even an assault weapon whose sole purpose is killing people. Some of those benign pursuits, noted by McSweeney's in a manner entirely appropriate to the gory insanity afflicting us all: 

Having a fucking bake sale

Building a fucking shed in your own backyard

Owning a fucking car

Driving someone else’s fucking car

Riding in a fucking car

Disposing of fucking batteries

Cutting fucking hair for a living

Owning a fucking dog

Walking a fucking dog

Watching a fucking DVD

Importing foreign fucking cheese

Buying fucking fireworks

Riding a fucking bicycle

Transporting a bottle of opened fucking wine home from a restaurant

Using a fucking skateboard

Buying unpasteurized fucking milk.

So yeah. Call your legislators, and tell 'em facts owe.

https://www.commondreams.org/further/2017/10/04/compromising-our-bloody-fcking-freedoms