Young Courage vs. White Male Rage

[babylonsister]

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/counting-young-people-stop-deadly-weapon-white-male-rage/

Feb 22, 2018
Young Courage vs. White Male Rage
Sonali Kolhatkar

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We cannot simply fixate on the NRA’s financing of political campaigns or jump to conclusions about mental illness diagnoses whenever there is a gun-related massacre. The Florida shooting is symptomatic of a toxic mix of weapons promotion paired with racial and gender-based resentment and pitched to a segment of the American citizenry from whom the NRA draws power and profit. Those people see the “other”—immigrants, people of color, women, LGBTQ folks—as the enemy against whom the weaponry may be used. Trump’s constant and direct incitement of violence to his well-armed supporters, and his crude and unapologetic bragging about assaulting women, have made actions like Cruz’s not just more likely but almost inevitable. A recent report found that white supremacist homicides doubled last year compared to the year before.

But the political power that the NRA and politicians draw from gun buyers is still confined to a minority of Americans. While a third of Americans admit to owning guns, only 19 percent of owners are NRA members—and are more likely to describe themselves as “very conservative,” according to the Pew Research Center. The NRA and its members, together with the lawmakers they buy off through political contributions, have an outsize impact on American politics. They are adept at keeping this country floating in a sea of guns because they are extremely well organized.

Now the gun-toting right may have met its match in a new generation of youths who are refusing to become cannon fodder at the altar of the Second Amendment (or at least the NRA’s interpretation of it). The survivors of the Parkland massacre wasted no time in getting incredibly organized, working out of their parents’ living rooms to set up a website and mobilize a national march as they deal with their rage at the inaction of politicians and the trauma of surviving the shooting. They showed up in person to face Florida legislators during a vote on a gun control measure, inspired teenagers in Washington, D.C., to stage a “die-in” at the White House, and motivated eloquent editorials against gun violence, like this one on Vox.

The survivors of the Parkland massacre are determined that what happened to them will be the last school shooting. The entire nation hopes they are right. Politicians, who are rightly being lambasted for sending their “thoughts and prayers” in lieu of taking action, ought to take note of this growing movement. The NRA, whose reputation is in such tatters that some are simply calling it a “terrorist organization,” should also be seeing the writing on the wall about the beginning of the end of its power.

[sharedvalues]

1. White males are propagandized

Most of the right wing propaganda machine is aimed at older white males. Fox and Limbaugh intentionally try to incite them; to inspire fear and hate.

A lot of white males can be reached. But we need to stop Fox and Limbaugh and right wing propaganda first.