"Make an action flick and they'll show up with automatic weapons."

[KurtNYC]

1979:

A Street-Gang Movie Called The Warriors Triggers a Puzzling, Tragic Wave of Audience Violence and Death

http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20073115,00.html

1991

Just ask director Mario Van Peebles. Violent melees and shoot-outs attended the opening of his first feature, New Jack City, in Los Angeles, Brooklyn, Chicago, Las Vegas, and Sayreville, N.J.

http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,313772,00.html

2009

"I believe that vulnerable youth [with emotional, behavioral, learning or impulse control problems] may be more easily influenced by these types of movies and videos. The problem is aggravated if they role-play through fantasy, or if they lose reality testing and believe they are amid the violence," says Dr. Beth Ann Brooks, professor in psychiatry and behavioral neurosciences at Wayne State University in Detroit.

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=116720&page=1#.UAmmSqCYvRQ

...so maybe these movies did have at least a little to do with this ?

[AnotherMcIntosh]

3. That quote is Dick Cheney's favorite.

[fishwax]

15. I don't see how it could be, given how aggressively the bush/cheney administration worked

to strip Americans of various liberties.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

17. You don't see how it could be? And yet you recognize that Bush & Cheney worked to

strip Americans of various liberties?

Are you located in a country outside of the United States?

If you don't understand, then you have to look at the quote and not do so from Franklin's point of view but in the context of Cheney's actions.

Obviously, or it should be obvious to Americans, that Cheney who described the Constitution as "just a damn piece of paper" and who showed contempt for ordinary Americans by gaining support for endless wars, while taking action to strip away liberties and safety, viewed ordinary Americans as not deserving either liberty or safety.

If you're not an American, I hope that this explanation helps.

[fishwax]

27. wow, alright then

I initially took your statement at face value: that it actually was one of cheney's favorite statements (not unusual, after all, for republicans to have that kind of dissonance between rhetoric and action), and so responded by commenting on the irony of that.

You've offered a clever and interesting twist on the phrase (which is so often invoked in arguments against the restriction of liberty), though I must say the tone of your response undermines the effectiveness of the delivery. I'm not sure what inspires the assumption I must not be from the United States if I didn't get what you meant. Yes, it's obvious that Cheney has contempt for the safety and liberty of ordinary Americans, but it wasn't really obvious that this is what you meant when you said "That quote is Dick Cheney's favorite." (And yes, I'm in the States. )

Anyway, thanks for the explanation, though. It was a clever comment.

[KurtNYC]

5. You don't like the First Amendment?

I think it rules.

[GarroHorus]

9. I like the entire constitution

Including both the first and the second amendments, neither of which deserve being attacked because some nut went off in a movie theater.

[KurtNYC]

10. "YAY, now we go after the first amendment." -GarroHorus 7/20/2012

[GarroHorus]

12. Ah, you're playing a "Mitt Romney" on me

You left out the Franklin quote.

[KurtNYC]

14. You also don't believe that we deserve liberty and safety.

Happy now you gun and tongue-grabber you?

[GarroHorus]

16. And you doubled down on the Mitt Romney!

Is that you, Karl?

[Scootaloo]

7. It's an interesting quote

What about those whose lives are taken, so people like you can feel safe from the big bad evil "thugs" who wants to touch your stuff?

Your temporary safety for their essential liberty. Hope you like it.

[Posteritatis]

18. Isn't the "fewer rights!" kneejerk awesome? (nt)

[Posteritatis]

20. Or think it's okay if we're the ones doing it.

Though in cases like this it's a little more common to just you-people the mentally ill population so people can argue that "they" shouldn't have had as many rights in the first place.

[Blue_In_AK]

2. Warriors ... come out and play-a-a-a-ayyyy...

[KurtNYC]

4. I think that guy's voice and the bottles is what drove them over the edge

Cyrus!

[Blue_In_AK]

6. Yes, obviously, that whiny, obnoxious voice.

I don't know exactly why, but I loved that movie. Can you dig it?

[KurtNYC]

11. I think of the Baseball Furies every time I go past the monument at West 77th and Riverside Drive

and btw...

"The chicks are packed!"

[JHB]

23. That's why Arnold lied about killing him last n/t

[Comrade_McKenzie]

8. Yeah, really. Speech hasn't changed since the 1st Amendment...

But weaponry has changed dramatically. The 2nd Amendment is obsolete.

[KurtNYC]

13. To be more clear, I don't want to change the Constitution but

I wouldn't advise going to these movies on opening night. For whatever reason, based on 33 years of data, that is when this stuff seems to occur.

[Posteritatis]

21. How many opening nights have there been since 1979? On how many screens?

And how many of them had anything violent happen at them, never mind something like this?

This is an extremely silly thing to be afraid of. It'd be like worrying about hiding indoors for fear of being struck by lightning, but even that's a more common event.

[KurtNYC]

22. New Jack City, The Warriors and this Batman fit a pattern of

violence on opening night.

People used to be afraid of MacBeth.

[Posteritatis]

24. Three incidents out of hundreds of thousands spread across decades is not a pattern. (nt)

[tridim]

26. The other Batman movies were violent too. There is no pattern.

[Angleae]

25. It hasn't? News to me.

Radio, TV, and the internet are all protected under the 1st amendment.