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Lessons from Orlando
This is getting to be a regular type of post for me on Ricochet. I am not happy about that fact.
My heart goes out to everyone affected by the horror in the Pulse nightclub, and I join with those who are calling for peace in the wake of this massacre. But I am also preparing for war.
By now, the motive behind the worst mass-shooting on American soil is known, and the motive was radical Islamic terrorism. Again.
Here’s what we know about what happened in Orlando early Sunday morning.
Background Checks Didn’t Stop the Attack
The shooter (who I will never, ever call by his name because he deserves our scorn, not our recognition) had a Florida security guard license, which means he passed quite of a number of background checks based on his previous activities (or lack thereof). He was investigated by the FBI (twice!), but there was not enough evidence to arrest him. If only he’d been a member of a Tea Party group or something similar, then the government would have kept close tabs on him…
“Gun-Free Zones” Didn’t Stop the Attack
Florida law does not permit taking a firearm into a business that makes more than 50 percent of its revenue from the sales of alcohol. The Pulse nightclub was therefore a “gun free zone,” and the shooter ignored that little part of Florida law on his way to commit other, multiple, violations of state and federal laws. Why, it’s almost as if criminals live outside the law and chose to ignore them.
A Good Guy with a Gun Stopped Him
Actually, a whole bunch of good guys. Kudos to the Orlando Police Department and other agencies for the efforts in stopping this attacker in his tracks.
You Are on Your Own
That sounds rather scary, and it is, to some extent. No one likes to think that’s they’re alone in a hostile world, but the fact is, people who wish to do us harm select people who cannot or will not fight back. Take all the steps you can right now to lessen your chances of being a victim of violence. Churches and synagogues have been a target of Islamic terror in the Middle East, and there is no reason to believe they won’t be a target here as well. Keep at least one eye out, and if something doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t.
Have the Will to Fight
In Peter Jackson’s excellent movie adaptation of Tolkien’s “The Two Towers,” Theoden, king of Rohan asks, “What can men do against such reckless hate?” The answer his companion Aragorn gives is both succinct and chock-full of wisdom: “Ride out with me. Ride out and meet them. For Rohan. For your people.”
Fighting a defensive battle on our own soil will not defeat an ideology based in the Middle East. We are facing a global existential threat to Western culture, and it is time for the men (and women) of the west to stop calling ISIS “the JV team” and treat Islamic jihad as the threat it really is.
It’s Not the Guns, Stupid
There are three things needed to commit a crime: Motive, means, and opportunity. The motive was radical Islamic terrorism (again) which does not tolerate Christians, gays, Jews, or intellectuals. The opportunity was a large group of people who fit one of those descriptions who, by Florida law, could not be armed at their location. The means, therefore, was at best tertiary. This is backed up by the fact that in Israel, Islamic terrorists use knives to kill Jews. In Iraq, its car bombs to kill Christians. In Bangladesh, they hack intellectuals and gays to death.
The NRA does not exist in any of those countries, and and yet this kind of terror happens overseas. It’s long past time that our media and the Democrats (but I repeat myself) stop blaming the inanimate objects that constitute the means of such massacres, and start addressing the motives and the opportunities.
Published in Culture, Guns, Islamist Terrorism, Politics
If you have to ask the question you will not accept the answer.
Somebody should share this wisdom with the jihadis.
A concept of Judea Christian values of America is tolerance. Those that forsake tolerance to further tyranny in the name of a religion have no place here.
Well, OK. I lumped Iran in with ISIS as an “associated group.”
The problem is Islam as an ideology. We’re dealing with people who are still ticked off that Charles Martel kicked them out of France in 732.
I don’t dislike your answer or your position Brent. But without drawing a very very hard line between Church and State, how does one deal with intolerant religious beliefs?
Islam was from the beginning a system of government as well as a religion. Am I wrong?
In our system, if an individual’s beliefs can be relegated to the private sphere, fine. If an individual’s beliefs are part of an ideology of violent world conquest, which ideology dictates that he/she mount murderous attacks, not so fine.
You’ll Point to bloody battles from the Old Testament. But what Yahweh is saying there is: I’m giving you (Jews) this land. These people are in the way. kill ’em all, I will give you the victory. He does not say, go to war to force these pagans to worship ME.
Jesus was an itinerant begging preacher. He has nothing to say about temporal power. Render unto Caesar, agree with thine adversary quickly, stay under the radar so you can spread the Word. If people don’t listen, leave that town and shake the dust of it off your feet. (Note: not “Put them to the sword”.)
The Prophet was a general. Between his revelation and his death he led 15 military campaigns. He makes Napoleon look like a slouch! Islam means not “peace” but “submission”. He waged those wars to spread his new creed. “Renounce your own faith and convert, and (maybe) we won’t behead you.”
‘Course, when you’re running an empire, you need, well, subjects. Can’t in practice kill everybody among the subjugated population. So we get Christians, Jews, zoroastrians, and followers of any other religion living as Dhimmis”.
If we remain clueless dummies, we will end up Dhimmis.
There isn’t a hard line between Church and state in America. Courts have attempted to erect one with limited success and unintended consequences.
There is continuous evidence of Faith in our founding. What separated Church and state was the absence of a national religion and memorializing the free practice of one’s religion.
As with any of the rights from our creator and enshrined in our Constitution there is an equally important responsibility in their practice.
Indeed. Iow, your freedom of religion stops when it hits my nose, to mix the metaphor – and I think that’s a very good position for a society to take wrt the State and its laws.
I will not. I honestly don’t see the point in this context.
More to your question is that all liberties extended to religions orders should be retracted in the case of Islam.
It’s a great time for Gays on the left and their supporters to make it easier for other “un-Islamic” groups to adhere to the truth that we’re all in this together by refusing to continue to persecute people who feel they can’t, in good conscience, say, sign a same sex marriage certificate or bake a cake for a same sex wedding or refrain from arguing for traditional marriage.
We wouldn’t have to force ourselves to adhere to that truth if they could find it in their hearts to have the same respect for our freedom that they want for their so called equality.
How do you mean?
That seems like a good hard line. What am I not getting?
Here is the Wikipedia article. Short answer – 400 KM~ 250 miles ~ 1,312,000 feet
More that the liberties extended to Islam should be the same (ie in the domain of the Church rather than the State) as those extended to any other religion. No?
Edit: liberties are enjoyed by individuals, be they Christian, Jewish, Muslim Buddhist or Hindu. Not by institutions or by religions per se. So perhaps rephrase along the lines of the liberties extended to Muslims should be the same as those extended to Jews or Christians or Buddhists or Hindus or Pastafarians or whatever?
There was never intended to be a separation of Church and state. During the early years it was very common for Church services to be held in public offices, prayer in school, and before legislative meetings. American politics were heavily influenced by faith.
I don’t take it that way. The absence of a national religion was as much out of fear of religious persecution. The fear that a government strong enough to promote a national religion could stop the free practice of religion.
The issue I am raising isn’t with how the U.S. memorialized the free practice of religion in 1A. The issue I am raising is that firstly Islam is political ideology, not religion. Islam should enjoy no protections under 1A.
Almost two dozen were killed in a school by one guy, with a knife, and ten guys with knives teamed up for triple-digit casualties in a train station. As it was a night club where this maroon chose to commit his crimes, if he really wanted to appease his twisted god by killing the blasphemers, he’d have started a fire.
Mark, knife attacks are a serious problem in many places with strict control of firearms like China.
In 2014, 29 were killed and over a hundred injured in Kunming.
In Kenya “assault weapons” are prohibited – 67 died and 175 were injured in Nairobi during an attack on the Westgate shopping mall in 2013. Disarmament isn’t a way to stop mass attacks, it’s only a way to make yourself a target.
A police officer was reportedly outside and facing an unimaginably difficult situation with a moving backdrop of innocent people and a police department that might have his back if he missed.
On top of that the chances are he hadn’t been given the appropriate training for that kind of situation because it was considered too expensive by the city.
The bottom line is that the veneer of civilization is no protection against the barbarians inside the walls – if you’re physically and mentally capable you should be armed and train religiously to employ those arms because that is the only way to know you’ll be able to protect yourself and your loved ones if the “unthinkable” happens.
And they still are because many (most?) Americans are.
Churches have political importance because they influence how people vote, not for any other reason.
It’s a hard case to argue. Any ideology which deals with God, the afterlife and morality has a religious component.
Without using a “specific belief” litmus test (an expression of the national [broad] Church), how would you argue that it isn’t a religion while Buddhism and Hinduism are?
You are so right; there is no point in this context; all that matters is what’s going on in the world right now. But from Other Ranks of online chat, I have very, very often encountered the spurious argument that the OT also exhorts destruction of life to spread Judaism. So, sorry for insulting your intelligence by anticipating that you might make this argument.
And what about the “Church Militant”? (An oxymoron, if you study Jesus’ words. ) But in any event, I wouldn’t defend the Church for an instant. I’m talking about the original revelation.
Because Buddhism and Hinduism are spread by love, teaching, witnessing, etc. Islam is spread by conquest and fear.
I don’t know enough about Buddhism and Hinduism to know their level of tolerance regarding other religions, but my perception is that they are quite tolerant.
They key word is tolerance.
I believe the 9/11 hijackers killed over 3,000 Americans with…box cutters.
Kevin, I don’t use the term “shooter,” as you propose. Virtually every shooter I know is a good person – a “sheepdog,” or at least a person who recognizes the danger in the world around him / her.
I stick with the term “murderer.” Or a less flattering term, if I can think of one at the moment.
When Hindus and Buddhists take down skyscrapers with airliners full of innocents and shoot up gay bars, we’ll reassess.
They believe they are, and we have to accept that idea as one of their goals and work to avoid it from become reality, rather than dismiss it out of hand.
In the (possibly apocryphal) words of Wyatt Earp: “The fight has now commenced, go to fighting or get away!”
Good point. Sunday morning, I was surrounded by people shooting guns, and somehow, I managed to survive the ordeal.
According to Democrats and/or the mainstream media, I should be dead right now.
The history of Indian subcontinent is FILLED with warfare between Muslims and Hindus, and while the Sikhs are calm and peaceful, they’re also second only to the (Buddhist) Gurkas when it comes to badassery in that area.
Tolerance is easier when firepower is on your side… ;)
And I wouldn’t attack this revelation, because it’s your belief. Attacking it would be both pointless and vulgar – and while I can do either one of these, doing both at the same time would be just too much.
Any references to how religious organisations used to act (say the Catholic Church and the conquest of South America, or Goa) only make sense (imho) if one is talking about how these communities changed between then and now, and therefore perhaps others (you know who I’m looking at) might also have the potential to do so.
Otherwise – no point.
We applaud and encourage designated drivers because they make the consumption of alcohol safer for everyone else.
Why not applaud and encourage the (sober) carrying of defensive firearms as way to prevent this sort of attack? Arizona used to ban guns in bars and changed it to where you could carry but not drink. No shooting sprees occurred after the change. People who broke the laws before the laws were changed kept on breaking them afterwards, and people who followed the law were allowed some measure of protection from the aforementioned group.
And between Muslims and Muslims and Hindus and Hindus and Christians and all of these and also with other Christians. That’s the downside of having a lot of history.
I am actually a fan of [real life] Sikhs, but calm and peaceful is not how I would describe them : – ) Sikhs have a massive warrior tradition, which they’re pretty happy with.
They’re calm and peaceful… up to a point, and then all H-E-Double-Hockey-Sticks breaks out.
Them “ceremonial daggers” they carry are daggers first, ceremonial second. :D
If you have a large jar of 100,000 jellybeans, 4 of which are potentially poison, how many will you let your children eat?
Dear Zafar, I very much appreciate hearing your point of view. And when I talk about the original revelation of Christianity, let me also say it exhorts believers to live as itinerant begging preachers, taking no thought for what we shall eat, drink, wear. “Consider the lilies of the field”etc. but most Western Christians don’t aspire to live as itinerant begging preachers, let’s face it- we’re all for Good Government in the City (pace Lorenzetti), so we can go on with getting and spending. My “belief” is that the original revelation was contra. And not at all militant.
So I’m not attacking your belief in your own revelation. But I will ask: whatever your personal belief now, am I wrong to say that the original revelation of your faith envisions a worldwide theocracy?
And yes, Islam could certainly change, as Christianity has, so that the most important thing in each individual’s life is to live at peace and in prosperity, protect and nurture his own family, cultivate one’ own garden, practice the faith in peace. (Is that what you meant?) Indeed Islam was going in that direction, in my opinion. But now it seems there’s a large faction which wants to return to taking the scriptures and other texts literally. Or is the Dar -al-Islam/Dar-al-Harb Dichotomy something bigoted Christians just made up?
I agree, we can certainly all live in harmony, if Islam can get back to also aspiring to the goal of Good (secular) Government in the City. They’ve done it before, and they can do it again.