I had to do some running around tonight– I had my final LASIK follow-up appointment, and stopped by my dad’s to mutilate him give him a haircut, and I have some thoughts. Now, these should not be taken especially seriously, and I want to emphasize that they are based on a snapshot of maybe 10-15 miles of driving on a small number of streets in the Democratic part of Indiana. Take this all with a substantial amount of salt.
Nonetheless!
In general, there are fewer yard signs out than I would normally expect this close to the election.
Most of the signs that are out are for local or statewide races. There are a lot of school board signs, and more than I’d expect for the coroner’s race.
There are a handful of yards on this drive that can be reliably counted upon to have a sign for everyone running in whatever political party the house belongs to. Interestingly, while the Democratic houses all have Biden signs, the Republican houses do not have signs for the other guy. Houses with signs for him tend to have only a sign for him.
If you have this in front of your house I’m going to assume you’re a crazy person:
I assume that the stake is because of vampires. Like, seriously, people, the man is an atheist and he hates you.
I only saw one yard with that sign but it’s uncomfortably close to my house.
There is no gubernatorial race. Not one sign for Holcomb, even in the “we have signs for everyone” yards, and none on their own, and not one sign for his opponent anywhere.
There are also a couple of houses that reliably have large signs for Jackie Walorski– like, the size that require 4×4 posts driven into the ground– and those houses do not have signs up for That Guy either.
Again, draw no conclusions from this and I make no predictions. I’m mostly writing this now so that I remember to compare it to what that same drive looks like on, say, the 30th.
Many moons ago, I had a kid in my class named, oh, let’s call him Lafayette, for the usual “it amuses me for reasons I won’t reveal” rationale. Lafayette transferred into my room in December, and on his first day took a seat as far away from everyone as he could get and didn’t make a sound. He got called down to the office after about an hour and didn’t come back. When I inquired about it later, I was told that he’d been expelled from his previous school for threatening to murder his teacher, and that we were honoring the suspension. He’d be back in January.
For the record, while he wasn’t a great student by any stretch of the imagination, I had no real discipline problems with Lafayette. He was, on his worst day, squarely in the middle of that group in terms of his behavior.
The year after I had him, a photo of him went Facebook viral, as his mother forced him to stand on a street corner for several hours carrying a sign announcing to everyone who drove by that he was failing all of his classes and was generally not a good person. I can’t find the picture now, but it still resurfaces every now and again.
Several years later, at 16, he was arrested for attacking an elderly woman, beating her unconscious, and stealing her car. He’s in state prison now; the soonest he has any chance of getting out is 2027. I assume he was tried as an adult.
His younger brother, who wasn’t ever in my class but who I met at least once, is currently the subject of a manhunt for murder. They haven’t caught him yet, but his face is all over the place.
Every so often, my wife will get into some sort of conflict with my son when I’m in another room. This isn’t something that happens a lot, mind you; once or twice a week, maybe, generally around bath- or bedtime. The details don’t really matter all that much. He’s either doing something she doesn’t want him to do, or he’s not doing something she wants him to do. Sometimes he manages both at the same time.
And my reaction, generally, is to let her handle it. Not because I don’t care, or because I think discipline is her job; we co-parent as much as we can, and on the rare occasion where we disagree on how to handle something involving him we sort it out when he isn’t around. Because here’s the thing: if my wife and son are having an issue, particularly if he’s already upset and not just being a butthead, the second I show up– even if I don’t say anything– I have escalated the situation, just by my presence. Now my son’s not scared of me, there’s no threat of physical violence here– I’ve never laid a finger on him. But if he’s already upset, the second he’s outnumbered he’s twice as upset as he was before.
I have made things worse, simply by showing up. It might be my intention to calm things down or, alternatively, to lay down the law and quell the misbehavior, but what I have done is escalated the situation.
Now let’s imagine that I walk into the room, and my belt is in my hand. I don’t say anything; I’m not screaming or yelling or carrying on. I’m just there, leather belt in hand, perhaps doubled over on itself.
That’s gonna be even worse, right? Even though I haven’t actually done anything. I’m just standing there, with my belt, and I’ve made things more frightening, more violent, more alienating, more dangerous. Just by standing there.
Funny how that works.
8:34 PM, Monday, June 1: 1,809,109 confirmed cases and 105,099 Americans dead.
My day started off with finding a suicide note tucked inside a computer case and having to report that to administration, then half an hour later I got punched in the jaw while breaking up a fight between two girls.
(I’m fine.)
The day did not get worse from there, which I suppose is worth something, but that’s quite a starting point, wouldn’t you agree?
I’m going to spend my evening sitting in my recliner and reading Pete Buttigieg’s book. I’m only about 1/3 of the way through it but it’s shaping up to be a hell of a thing and you probably ought to assume I’ll be recommending you read it later.
I had plans for a longer post tonight– a double book review, in fact– but life appears to have gotten in the way, so this:
I intend to be the type of person who believes victims of violence first, even– and quite possibly especially when– the victim’s version differs from that of the police. As someone who lived in Chicago for a decade, this was the only reasonable way to act.
It is true that this hierarchy of belief may on rare occasions lead me to initially support someone who has behaved dishonestly. That fact changes nothing; I will continue to provide victims of violence with my support and with the benefit of the doubt until specific circumstances demonstrate otherwise.
On a broader level, anytime someone throws a rock at a tank, I am on the side of– or at least more interested in hearing from– the person throwing the rock.
Yes, this could probably have been a Twitter thread; I’d prefer a bit more permanence to it in this case, so to the blog we go.
We had … I dunno, six fights in the building today? Let’s say six, it was close to that one way or another. One kid caught what I think is probably the worst ass-whipping I’ve ever seen short of Rodney King. I hope to hell the other kid is in jail right now. I don’t know why they don’t take you to jail when you attack someone at school; school is the only place you can just beat the shit out of someone and then expect to go home afterwards like nothing happened. This kid should be in jail. He should be there until he turns 18, frankly. But he’s not, because he attacked someone at school and not out on the street.
Go ahead; there’s six plus years of damn near daily blog posts around here. Hell, the running average is probably still more than one a day. I wrote a whole-ass book about teaching that you can look through too if you like. See if you can find another post where this kid needs to be in jail for what he just did is the topic. I can’t think of one. That rough of a day.
And I do not have a hard job, guys. I really don’t. There’s a lot of moving parts but I don’t have a hard job, not compared to what everyone else in the building is doing. And today was damn near too much for me anyway. I don’t know how the hell any of these people get up and go to work every day. I do know that there’s no way in hell I return to this building next year. Not if my life depended on it. Which means I get to start jobhunting again. There’s a chance to do the same job just in some other school but for various reasons (which I’ll probably get into eventually, but not now) is not as likely as I’d like it to be, so the best move is to start looking for alternatives now. Because I can’t be in a place with this rotted a culture any longer. I’ve never worked in a school this bad. Not even close. And I’ll make it to June, but I need to be gone after that, and if something good turns up before then I’ll jump ship. I’ll be burning this bridge for the last time, but I think it needs to be done.
(Then again, for fun, especially if you know me in the real world, think back over my life since graduating in high school and count the good decisions. Other than marrying my wife, there aren’t as many as I used to think there are. I’m actually not very good at this being an adult nonsense. I remember when I thought I was good at stuff; it was a while ago.)
And tomorrow I’ll get up and do it all over again. Six more days with the kids and then I get a couple of weeks off. I can manage this, I think. I don’t have much of a choice, one way or another.
Punch them every time they show their faces in public. Chase them away from cameras and microphones. Do whatever the fuck you want to them. If they want these things to not happen, they can stop being Nazis. There’s plenty of room to be an asshole without being a Nazi. Dox them, call their bosses, drive them entirely from public life.
We fought a fucking war over this. Hell, we fought two. We won both. There is no place in civilized society for these fuckers and if I have my way there never will be again.
Tear down monuments to the Confederacy. Vandalism? Fuck vandalism. Every monument to the Confederacy or any Confederate figure on public land in this country should be torn down, melted, refashioned into sewer pipes and sent to Flint.
So, you’d think if somebody wrote an article called “It’s Time for Democrats to Take Responsibility For Their Assassination Porn,” there would be a real good chance that that article would be about 1) assassination porn, whatever the fuck that is and 2) Democrats. That would be a reasonable assumption! Even, perhaps, a common one!
Unfortunately it’s 2017 and everything is stupid as fuck and it’s been a long time since I’ve ripped a politics article to shreds so let’s do this shit.
Wednesday, our public servants were violently attacked. Except, this time it wasn’t a man or woman with brown skin who swears allegiance to Allah. Nor was it a man or woman who worships in the “deep state” of Pepe the Frog and Alex Jones conspiracies while swearing allegiance to right-wing conservatism.
Okay, first of all, this intro would be half-assed coming from a high school student. The phrase “swears allegiance” is used twice in two sentences and you don’t worship “in” a “deep state,” much less a conspiracy. It sounds like it makes sense until you actually pay attention to it. Maybe the next couple of sentences will be better.
Instead, the perpetrator shares the same political ideals as 50 percent of the country.
Which fifty percent? Because that “right wing conservatism” thing is close enough to half of us to not be worth grousing about, and if you think “the left” is half of the country…
Yesterday a liberal supporter who volunteered for the Bernie Sanders campaign attacked a political servant, capital police officers, and Hill staffers.
Again, grammar: attacked a political servant? Just one? And what part of “liberal” and “volunteered for Bernie Sanders” says 50 percent of the country to you? Fuck Bernie Sanders.
But I’m quibbling. Let’s get to the meat of the article:
a madman released several gunshots at the representatives
Okay I can’t actually let that pass. Released? He released several gunshots? You release doves.
As the events unfolded, Sen. Rand Paul commented that if it weren’t for the capital police, everyone would have been dead on the field.
Yeah, let’s talk about some things Rand Paul has said real quick. There’s this, for example:
Now, Paul’s apparently quoting this “judge nap” individual here. Do I care? Not a fucking bit; he’s RTed this guy’s words without condemnation or equivocation and so he gets to fucking own them. Remember, it’s the Democrats who need to “take responsibility for their assassination porn,” but this fucker literally calling for people to shoot at the government (and then crying when they do!) gets a pass.
For years, the Left has focused on the racism and demagoguery on the Right that they believe led to the election of Donald Trump.
This is absolutely true.
Certainly, Trump’s comments about how “Second Amendment people” could do something about Hillary Clinton, or that he could assassinate someone on the street and still get elected, didn’t help negate such stereotypes. Neither did depictions from radical conservatives of Barack Obama being burnt, lynched, or hung from a noose ease tensions between the Right and Left.
These things all happened! Now, this person talking about “Second Amendment people” was running for President while he said that, and he’s supposedly the President now. And those “radical conservatives” include close associates of that so-called President, including his own employees, as well as violent scumbags like Ted Nugent who he has invited to the White House. Meanwhile, there’s that asshole who physically assaulted a reporter– he’s in Congress now, too!
So, I’m sure the Democrats who are guilty of “assassination porn” will be of similar influence as the President of the United States, right?
When former governor of Alaska Sarah Palin released a “crosshairs” target map of 20 congressional districts under faces of Democratic lawmakers with the text “Don’t Retreat, Instead – Reload,” liberals immediately chastised the violent, disgusting act “critics saw as a winking approval of violence,” wrote Max Fisher of The Atlantic.
“Former governor of Alaska.”
Former governor of Alaska.
Former governor of Alaska.
…
Man, I coulda sworn Sarah Palin did something other than be governor of Alaska for half a term. OH WAIT RIGHT SHE WAS A VICE-PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE. So so far we have the actual fucking President and the VP nominee from the previous political cycle who are guilty of violent, eliminationist rhetoric. So, man, we must really be up for something once they get around to those Democrats who need to take responsibility for their assassination porn. Sarah Palin putting literal crosshairs on people’s faces wasn’t quite enough to qualify, apparently; whatever it is the Democrats have done is probably way worse.
Liberals’ anger at Palin was justified, considering that soon after Gabrielle Gifford, a Democrat, was shot in the head and 13 others were wounded, including six killed.
Yeah, let’s not forget that that happened. Democrats reacted exactly the same way they’re reacting to the most current attack– calling for some sort of sane fucking gun policy in this country, because we want people to stop getting shot. Guess what: that’s going to be our reaction to every single shooting, no matter who does it or who they’re shooting at! Maybe there should be fewer guns, and it should be harder to get them! This might happen less often if that were true!
Republicans blew it off, since they only care when it’s them getting shot at. Two dozen fucking children were murdered and they called the entire thing a conspiracy and mocked us for caring. I’m supposed to cry when it’s one Republican congressperson who survives the assault?
Of course, Palin isn’t responsible for that tragedy, but I agree with Andrew Sullivan that her “inflammatory rhetoric has poisoned the discourse and has long run the risk of empowering the deranged.” Like our actions, words have consequences.
You didn’t have a stroke; the first half and back half of this quote do, in fact, directly contradict each other.
If “inflammatory rhetoric” poisons the well of civility, then certainly liberals bear some responsibility for Wednesday’s hideous assault against Republicans.
MY BODY IS READY. Hit me with some of that Democratic assassination porn!
Since last November, liberals (including myself) have engaged in rhetoric and disdain against Trump and conservatives for myriad reasons. But some of the arguments and intense conversations, especially on social media, have been utterly gruesome. This rhetoric I’ve personally refused to partake in, like pondering the assassination of the president.
I am super fucking psyched for the long list of examples of Democratic elected officials who have pondered the assassination of the President and/or called for violence against the same. I’m ready. Let’s go. Example time, assholes!
Recently, comedian Kathy Griffin
Wait what
Political commentator and activist Reza Aslan
Hold the fuck on
To this day, liberals refuse to accept that Trump won the presidency, despite the interference of the Russians.
Oh you did not just bring up Kathy fucking Griffin and Reza Aslan— Aslan’s sin, by the way, is calling the President a “piece of shit,” not, like, any violent rhetoric of any fucking kind at all– and then change the fucking subject like you were done talking. Is this seriously where we’re going, here? We’re juxtaposing literal violent threats and violent fantasies from the highest echelons of the Republican party with a third-rate comedienne doing a routine no one understood or gave much of a shit about and a religious studies professor with a potty mouth? Are you fucking kidding me?
How the fuck do you type something this stupid and not just hurt all over while you’re doing it? I would expect my brain to slowly shut down autonomous processes until I died if I persisted in something this fucking dumb.
We’ve engaged in mindless conversations about how Clinton won the popular vote, Trump is a moron, and Republicans are heartless.
Oh, go fuck yourself. I’ve not been talking about it much around here, but it’s becoming increasingly fucking clear as time goes on that that was the least legitimate election in American history. This isn’t that post, but these are far from fucking “mindless conversations,” and I’m sick to fuck of people acting like vote suppression and Russian interference in our electoral processes are just things that happen that no one should worry about. I repeat: go fuck yourself.
None of these arguments over semantics resolve real peoples’ problems, such as economic disparity, affordable health care, lack of job opportunities in urban and rural areas, climate change, and an out-of-control prison system.
You know what else isn’t going to resolve those real people’s problems? The Republican party. They don’t give a single fucking wet shit about people. Look at this abomination of a health care bill– oh, wait, you can’t. They screamed for years about how Obamacare, which was debated for a year and a half, was “rammed through,” and literally no one outside of the Republican half of the Senate has seen the fucking bill.
So, right. Still waiting for that assassination porn. There’s gotta be one elected Democrat in here somewhere. Just one.
Sanders isn’t responsible.
Well, then.
He’s been responsibly engaging in conversations on practical progressive ideas,
Have I said “fuck Bernie Sanders” yet? No? Fuck Bernie Sanders. He’s not a Democrat and neither are his followers– in fact, they’re fucking proud of it. And gaslight as much as you like but there is a part of his base that crosses over quite neatly with Trump’s base, and that crossover element is pure fucking misogyny. Every white dude who thought he was a lefty but hated women anyway voted for Sanders. Every single one. And Sanders’ reaction to this rot in his midst has been to repeatedly deny that these people exist and try to gaslight those of us who have had to put up with them into believing we’re making that up. Yeah, I said it: that fucker who shot at those Congressmen was a Bernie Bro, and fuck him.
NOTE: this is another difference between us and them, by the way– any Clinton supporter/mainline Democrat who gets it into his or her head (who the fuck am I kidding; it’ll be “his”) to go shoot up anyone at all under any circumstances can also be similarly fucked. The Republicans defended the shit out of motherfuckers for pointing guns at federal agents when those motherfuckers were white conservatives. Does the word Malheur ring a bell to any of you? Do you remember these assholes?
I’m sure there’s a Democrat doing some assassination porn here somewhere…But yeah, back to Bernie for a sec, and in the interest of precision: I don’t hold him responsible for the misogyny of so many of his supporters. I hold him responsible for not openly condemning them until they were run the fuck out of his “revolution.” Which he never came close to doing.
But anyway. Bernie’s not a Democrat, and it’s the Democrats who are doing the assassination porns. I’m sure the last couple of paragraphs are going to get to the porny part. Surely.
Despite past rhetoric, Trump isn’t responsible for this recent attack either. In fact, he gets the severity of this tragedy: “Many lives would’ve been lost if not for the heroic actions of the two Capitol Police officers who took down the gunman, despite sustaining gunshot wounds during a very, very brutal assault,” said Trump in a statement from the Diplomatic Room at the White House. In my opinion this shows Trump is growing to understand his responsibility as president and commander in chief.
Wow.
We liberals have been too busy arguing with and hating on “the others.” We’ve done what we accused the Right of doing. And what has that gotten us?
Liberals, it’s time to have a serious talk about the dangers on the Left to prevent this type of tragedy from happening again.
So. Went to see this school. Long story short: it’s amazing. Amazing. And then we sat down with the director of admissions and the principal, who had led our tour, and I brought up the tuition issue.
Now, I was already aware of what their tuition was going to be for my son. It’s… we’ll say considerable. It regularly elicits a low whistle or a raised eyebrow from people when I tell them the number. But the thing is, quality day care is amazingly expensive, and we’re already spending something like 90% of the cost of tuition at this place on day care, so the move from one to the other is not actually that extreme over the long run.
The problem is that I was expecting a move from $X to <$X when we moved beyond the preschool years, because preschool classes 1) are resource-intensive, 2) are tiny, and 3) contain two adults as opposed to one. I was thus startled to hear that rather than going from $X to <$X, tuition beyond the first year is more like $1.8X.
X was already ludicrous. $1.8X provoked open laughter from several people today. We do not make remotelyenough money to pay $1.8X. That’s Scalzi money. But goddamn, this is probably the best school I’ve ever set foot in, and they offer a fairly robust financial aid package, and the principal looked me in the eye and told me flat-out that they do whatever they can to keep their families once they get them. And honestly? Even if the boy’s only there for the first year and then we can’t get it together for the second, we’ve still got that first year. Honestly, the ECE classrooms impressed me more than the rest of the building did.
So we’re gonna see what we can do. Meanwhile, buy a book, goddammit, and if anybody out there is interested in optioning me for film or TV the rights will come cheap.
And then I went to my school, where this afternoon’s activities involved finding out that a student at another middle school had committed suicide last night and left a note behind that blamed some of our students for the bullying that led to her suicide. Also, unrelated, I collected two bullets from one of our 8th grade classrooms.
Did I mention the other school offered me a job? Yeah, that happened too. And I had to turn it down because it wouldn’t pay me nearly enough to make my bills.
So, you’d think if somebody wrote an article called “
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