Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to Okay f Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet your Girl Danielle Moody, recording from the Long Island Bunker. Folks,
Speaker 1: there are some days where rage collapse into grief, and
Speaker 1: grief collapses into despair and the conversation that I have
Speaker 1: to offer you all next with our friend Jonathan Metzel.
Speaker 1: It's one of those days where I am struggling and
Speaker 1: realize that I am having an emotional reaction in real time,
Speaker 1: which you will see to the conversation that Jonathan and
Speaker 1: I have with regard to the latest mass shooting in
Speaker 1: Colorado Springs at Club Q. I try really hard to
Speaker 1: provide all of you with information, community conversations that make
Speaker 1: you feel less alone, less crazy, and something that gives
Speaker 1: you a yeah, okay, this is what we can do
Speaker 1: or yes, I feel this way to moment as you're
Speaker 1: listening to the show today, I'm going to be honest,
Speaker 1: I am really just sad. I am really sad and
Speaker 1: tired of covering mass shootings, particularly ones that are aimed
Speaker 1: at communities that I'm a part of. I wish that
Speaker 1: this country was better. I wish that our politicians, all
Speaker 1: of them, gave a shit about saving actual lives, not
Speaker 1: just pretending. I wish that people who stoke violence, like
Speaker 1: Lauren Bobert and Donald Trump and Marjorie Taylor Green and
Speaker 1: Paul Gossar and the entirety of the Republican Party were
Speaker 1: held accountable for the crimes that they are committing, not
Speaker 1: only against their constituents, but against this country. I wish
Speaker 1: that for every single tweet and statement that went out
Speaker 1: with pictures of politicians posing with weapons of mass destruction,
Speaker 1: that they were fined, that they were tried as accomplices
Speaker 1: or accessories after the fact. I wish that there were
Speaker 1: penalties for their criminal speech and behavior that gives cover
Speaker 1: and to people whose only desire is to cause pain
Speaker 1: and devastation and fear. There is no safer space or
Speaker 1: haven for queer people than queer spaces. For many people,
Speaker 1: particularly that are living inside of red states and redder counties,
Speaker 1: that one queer bar center gathering place is the only
Speaker 1: time when they can feel safe inside of their own skin,
Speaker 1: in their own bodies, because whether it's going into a
Speaker 1: grocery store, going into a place of worship, or a
Speaker 1: school as a queer person, and for folks who are
Speaker 1: visibly queer, meaning that there can be no assumption based
Speaker 1: on how people are looking at you. You walk around
Speaker 1: with a target on your back because of people like
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, Lauren Bobert, Marjorie Taylor Green, Mike Pence, and
Speaker 1: others that use religion as the shield for their bigotry
Speaker 1: and hate, who want to cape for those who want
Speaker 1: the ability to discriminate and to humanize, and then want
Speaker 1: to turn around and offer their thoughts and fucking prayers
Speaker 1: as if it does a damn thing or it fucking matters.
Speaker 1: I wish that those people knew what it was like
Speaker 1: to be the only one in a room in space
Speaker 1: and feel in fear of how other people are going
Speaker 1: to react to you, because I feel that if everyone
Speaker 1: experienced that level of fear, then maybe those that have
Speaker 1: the power to do something about it fucking would But
Speaker 1: what am I? I'm assuming that most human beings have empathy,
Speaker 1: and what I realize about the Republican Party is that
Speaker 1: they are void of that. When I posted on Twitter,
Speaker 1: which by the way, as you all know, has become
Speaker 1: increasingly a sewer, and I don't know how much longer
Speaker 1: I will choose to be on the platform. I don't
Speaker 1: want to seed ground to the far right, but I
Speaker 1: also don't want to expose myself to a level of
Speaker 1: toxicity and verbal abuse in order to prove a point
Speaker 1: and continue to make a vapid egomaniac richer. Nonetheless, when
Speaker 1: I posted about the shooting at Club Q, I had
Speaker 1: some asshole decide to comment and say, oh, well, you know,
Speaker 1: I like how you'll only come out on one side
Speaker 1: of gun violence, and I'm just like, the fuck up
Speaker 1: do you think that this is some type of fucking
Speaker 1: conversation like competition. People should feel safe. I don't give
Speaker 1: a fuck who you pray to, who you sleep with,
Speaker 1: how you identify. I don't care. You should be able
Speaker 1: to be in your home, leave your home, leave your community,
Speaker 1: ghost shopping, go get a drink, go to a movie theater,
Speaker 1: go to a synagogue, go to a temple, go to
Speaker 1: a mosque. You should be able to feel safe. That
Speaker 1: should be the marking of an industrialized society, of a democracy.
Speaker 1: That it isn't just the freedom to wield and take
Speaker 1: photos with your fucking cosplay bullshit aar fifteens, but that
Speaker 1: the rest of us should be able to feel safe
Speaker 1: in our own skin and the fact that we don't
Speaker 1: the fact that in this society we would rather teach
Speaker 1: children active shooter drills than do anything about actual active shooters.
Speaker 1: The fact that we want to put together policies on
Speaker 1: red flag laws that in the last two fucking shootings
Speaker 1: have done dick to prevent them. We're not a civilized country.
Speaker 1: I don't even know what that means when people want
Speaker 1: to talk about civilized or you know, developed. If anything,
Speaker 1: America is fucking developing, it is an underdeveloped society because
Speaker 1: it is not one that is marked with empathy. It
Speaker 1: is not one that is marked with love. It is
Speaker 1: not one that is marked with safety, not even for
Speaker 1: those that are carrying around the ar fifteens and the
Speaker 1: fucking bazookas to go to Starbucks, because that's how fucking
Speaker 1: small they are in their real lives that they need
Speaker 1: external validation. We refuse to have real conversations about where
Speaker 1: this shit is coming from. So let's all pretend and
Speaker 1: pause for the thoughts and fucking prayers that don't do shit.
Speaker 1: What I want I want a class action lawsuit from
Speaker 1: the people of these United States that are sick of
Speaker 1: the fucking NRA, that are sick of the politicians that
Speaker 1: are bolstered up and get rich off of their ignorance
Speaker 1: to the largest scope and problem because the mouths around
Speaker 1: their table are fed, overfed at that because apparently the
Speaker 1: only way that this is going to stop is that
Speaker 1: for those that are creating the policies to consistently be
Speaker 1: harmed and live in fear at the same level that
Speaker 1: the rest of us live, or to somehow we fucking
Speaker 1: held accountable and one of those motherfuckers to go in
Speaker 1: jail because their tweets and their statements that they're putting
Speaker 1: out can be directly linked to the violence that is
Speaker 1: escalating in this country. Because until those people are held responsible,
Speaker 1: none of this is going to change. It is just
Speaker 1: going to get worse. And I'm tired of trying to
Speaker 1: appeal to people's emotions when I realize that they are emotionless.
Speaker 1: They just don't give a fuck. So I want to
Speaker 1: go after the gun manufacturers. I want to go after
Speaker 1: the lobby sets. I want to go after the politicians.
Speaker 1: I want to pull up their social media, their voices,
Speaker 1: and you tell me that they don't matter because he
Speaker 1: said the same fucking people that are going into libraries
Speaker 1: and schools to ban books because they believe that those
Speaker 1: books and the acceptance and inclusion of people from marginalized
Speaker 1: communities is somehow going to shift people's thinking. Yeah, it will.
Speaker 1: It'll make them more inclusive, it'll make them more empathetic,
Speaker 1: it'll make them more loving. And God forbid we have that,
Speaker 1: because then you won't be able to capitalize on fucking fear.
Speaker 1: I'm sick to death of this country. I'm sick to
Speaker 1: death of inaction. I'm sick to death of the thoughts
Speaker 1: and prayers. And you will hear in the conversation coming
Speaker 1: up next with our friend doctor Jonathan Metzel, that our
Speaker 1: disassociation does not mean that we don't care. It is
Speaker 1: the place that we're moving to in order to have
Speaker 1: self preservation, because no one can exist in this cyclical
Speaker 1: state of grief on a regular basis. I don't know
Speaker 1: what else to say today, friends, except to take care
Speaker 1: of yourselves, take care of each other as you choose
Speaker 1: to gather with chosen family or blood family and friends,
Speaker 1: recognize that these moments are really fleeting. They are really fleeting,
Speaker 1: and there are too many people that are going to
Speaker 1: have too many empty seats around their table that could
Speaker 1: have been avoided if we gave a ship folks. You
Speaker 1: know that whenever I have the opportunity to sit down
Speaker 1: with our friend, our in house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel,
Speaker 1: I am always greatly appreciative. And Jonathan, you know, it
Speaker 1: seems that every week that we talk, it is on
Speaker 1: the heels of tragedy. I don't know what else to
Speaker 1: say about it. Folks were coming and recording this just
Speaker 1: days after the mass shooting at Club Q in Colorado
Speaker 1: that took the lives of five of the patrons at
Speaker 1: Club Q and Colorado Springs injuring I think roughly nineteen
Speaker 1: that we know of at this point. And Jonathan, you know,
Speaker 1: I just before we get into any of the specifics,
Speaker 1: I just want to get your reactions. You know, I'm assuming,
Speaker 1: like like me, your phone was buzzing the morning following
Speaker 1: the shooting with alerts from different outlets. So what was
Speaker 1: you What were your initial reactions? I mean, first of all,
Speaker 1: it's impossible to experience this outside the context of the
Speaker 1: anti queer, anti trans hate that is, you know, always
Speaker 1: been brewing in our country, but is now reached a
Speaker 1: truly fatal level. And so the context is important because
Speaker 1: I understand it has flashbacks for a lot of people
Speaker 1: to the Pulse shooting in Colorado, But this is a
Speaker 1: much more dangerous time, even though the fatality numbers were
Speaker 1: considerably less than the Pulse shooting. But in the context
Speaker 1: of what is really kind of acceptable hate right now,
Speaker 1: I feel like the implications, the kind of broader implications
Speaker 1: of this are are just incredible, right I mean, there
Speaker 1: are a lot of people with guns, There are a
Speaker 1: lot of very unstable people out there, and they're in
Speaker 1: a way being given a kind of carte blanche in
Speaker 1: a way. I mean, we don't know anything about the
Speaker 1: story here, and I'm sure it'll be a unique story
Speaker 1: the way it always is, and they'll also be remnants
Speaker 1: of other stories of histories of violence and misogyny and
Speaker 1: guns and stuff. But the context right now is just breathtaking,
Speaker 1: because even in the Pulse shooting, if you look back
Speaker 1: at what happened, then it wasn't just the outpouring of
Speaker 1: support we see, which is what we see now, but
Speaker 1: also a kind of mobilization of the system that should
Speaker 1: work to protect people, and particularly people who are most
Speaker 1: at risk by the system. And now this is in
Speaker 1: the context of a very unstable political environment that basically
Speaker 1: gains and monetizes anti queer, anti trans hat and can
Speaker 1: I mean the Colorado springs honestly has been an incredible
Speaker 1: response as far as I can tell, But it's in
Speaker 1: the context of a county that is a so called
Speaker 1: Second Amendment sanctuary zone where you can't enforce any gun
Speaker 1: laws whatsoever, and so all that support is in the
Speaker 1: context of a framework that really literally doesn't enable anybody
Speaker 1: to do anything about it. You know, I have to
Speaker 1: say that while the numbers to your point about the
Speaker 1: pulse shooting that happened in Florida that claimed forty nine lives,
Speaker 1: that when we think about it, just in the context
Speaker 1: of numbers, we think to ourselves, well, you know, it
Speaker 1: wasn't as bad. And I was speaking earlier, and the
Speaker 1: person I was speaking to said, the headline came across,
Speaker 1: and I didn't even allow myself to be sad. I
Speaker 1: was just in full on rage and anger because the
Speaker 1: very idea that five people being shot isn't as bad
Speaker 1: as forty nine or seventeen or nineteen children or eighteen
Speaker 1: children is just like a grappling that emotionally, spiritually we
Speaker 1: shouldn't have to do right that like that that you know,
Speaker 1: part and parceling out tragedy shouldn't be a part of
Speaker 1: our just normal existence in this country, and yet it is.
Speaker 1: And so Jonathan, I just want to I want to
Speaker 1: talk about that kind of the gaps that we're having
Speaker 1: in our emotional sentiments as we deal with one mass
Speaker 1: shooting after the next. What I realized as I was
Speaker 1: getting ready to share, you know, social media, my thoughts,
Speaker 1: this only comes six months after the Buffalo shooting. It
Speaker 1: only comes, you know, a handful of months after Uvaldi.
Speaker 1: In between that was a shooting that happened at the
Speaker 1: parade that you know, that picked off people on the
Speaker 1: Fourth of July holiday. Like, it's just the inundation and
Speaker 1: then our inability to actually grieve. Can you just speak
Speaker 1: to speak to that, because I think that it's it's important,
Speaker 1: and I think that we also beat ourselves up about
Speaker 1: the fact that, like there's just so much grief that
Speaker 1: we're not even really touching that emotion in the way
Speaker 1: that we used to. Post traumatic stress disorder is a
Speaker 1: framework that people often use to talk about these kind
Speaker 1: of things, and I feel like it's useful and it's
Speaker 1: also not useful. The idea of post traumatic stress disorder
Speaker 1: is that you have a repeated response to a threat
Speaker 1: of death or hearing news about about it, or being
Speaker 1: close to it. But the response in PTSD is a
Speaker 1: is a hyper vigilance, exaggerated startle response. You're like on edge.
Speaker 1: And really what we're seeing is post traumatic stress dissociation
Speaker 1: in a way that people are so numb that in
Speaker 1: a way, when it's coming at you so often, it's
Speaker 1: like exactly like who's whoever sent you that message said,
Speaker 1: you feel less in a way, And so we're having
Speaker 1: a kind of dissociation to the horror and trauma of
Speaker 1: all of this in a way that is not completely
Speaker 1: linked to what people do in war zones, but it
Speaker 1: is reminiscent of it in a way that in a way,
Speaker 1: if you've felt if you felt this all the time,
Speaker 1: you really couldn't function. And so in that sense, it's
Speaker 1: not PTSD because the trauma is ongoing and we're associating,
Speaker 1: and I think that's part of what's happening. But then
Speaker 1: the other issue is just you know, the initial PTSD
Speaker 1: studies were done in military theaters, right that people who
Speaker 1: were flying airplanes in Vietnam, if they flew five hours
Speaker 1: of sorties where they were facing anti aircraft fire and
Speaker 1: thought they were going to die. They had a five
Speaker 1: percent chance of getting PTSD. They flew fifty hours, they
Speaker 1: had a fifty percent chance of getting PTSD, and here
Speaker 1: and so basically the symptoms correlated with the amount of
Speaker 1: time you thought your life was at risk and then
Speaker 1: you flew back to the base and you could feel safe,
Speaker 1: and then you know that was like there's a beginning
Speaker 1: and end, and here people across America feel safe never
Speaker 1: They don't feel safe in a bus coming back from
Speaker 1: a field trip with their Virginia football team. They don't
Speaker 1: feel safe going to a parade in Chicago. They have
Speaker 1: to look over their shoulder in what should be the
Speaker 1: safest space, a queer bar where people are just there
Speaker 1: to celebrate and feel camaraderie and feel support across the community.
Speaker 1: So these really safe spaces, I mean, that's of course
Speaker 1: what gives mass shootings their horror and their power, their
Speaker 1: acts of you know, not not just violence, but their
Speaker 1: acts of a particular kind of violence that really rupture
Speaker 1: the safety of that kind of the safest spaces are
Speaker 1: the ones where you're the most vulnerable. But really that's
Speaker 1: the question, where can you feel safe because you never
Speaker 1: get to fly home to your base. I mean that
Speaker 1: just description and that articulation, like tears just came to
Speaker 1: my eyes, Jonathan, because I'm recognizing that that is really true,
Speaker 1: that what you're saying with regard to post traumatic stresses,
Speaker 1: is this a reaction that doesn't necessarily match the trauma
Speaker 1: in itself and the fact that we are consistently traumatized
Speaker 1: and consistently living on edge. That disassociation isn't us not
Speaker 1: wanting to care. It's the fact that we can't have
Speaker 1: a NonStop grief, right, And so I wondered them. My
Speaker 1: question to you is that if if we can't have
Speaker 1: NonStop grief and we have to disassociate as a way
Speaker 1: of self preservation, which is what it sounds like, then
Speaker 1: how do we I don't know, I guess the question
Speaker 1: is how do we move forward with the same type
Speaker 1: of organization and strategy to end gun violence when it
Speaker 1: just gets worse and gets more persistent, Like I, you know,
Speaker 1: I keep seeing all these headlines you and I have
Speaker 1: talked about on the show, like you know, children and
Speaker 1: their levels of anxiety and prescriptions that are being given
Speaker 1: out and because of these compacted tragedy. We've talked about this, honestly,
Speaker 1: and I just don't even know if we are disassociating
Speaker 1: to the point of just being able to make it through,
Speaker 1: what does that mean about our ability to actually muster
Speaker 1: the strength to stop this. It's interesting if you do
Speaker 1: what I do, right' I study gun policy, and enough
Speaker 1: these shootings, people will interview me and say, what about
Speaker 1: red flag laws? What about background checks? And I give
Speaker 1: the answer because I think they're important in there what
Speaker 1: we have. But it's so clear that there's no policy
Speaker 1: that's gonna stop this from happening right now. I mean,
Speaker 1: we have more guns than people by far. We have
Speaker 1: more mass shootings than days in the calendar year by
Speaker 1: a considerable amount, and so it's not like there's one policy.
Speaker 1: And in this shooting in particular, shows that because something
Speaker 1: like what's called a red flag law, people aren't enforcing it.
Speaker 1: They're not the law doesn't enforce it. People are reluctant
Speaker 1: to call authorities on their relatives. And so this is
Speaker 1: a particular sign to me that the policy interventions that
Speaker 1: we have, which were made out of compromise trying to
Speaker 1: create a middle ground, just don't work, and so the
Speaker 1: issue is why don't they work? Should we just enforce
Speaker 1: those policies? And I guess I just think of the
Speaker 1: places that have faced this kind of trauma, nothing on
Speaker 1: our scale, but this kind of trauma Australia, Scotland, etc. Etc.
Speaker 1: And really what those are marked by is not any
Speaker 1: particular policy. It's people on all sides coming to the
Speaker 1: table to negotiate and find some kind of middle ground
Speaker 1: where there's some compromise. And we just don't have that process.
Speaker 1: And so as much as we shout frustration about the
Speaker 1: fact that in this case, Colorado has a red flag law,
Speaker 1: it wasn't followed for whatever reason, but it's not going
Speaker 1: to be what at least let me just jump in
Speaker 1: for a second, because at least what I've heard right,
Speaker 1: And again we're still receiving details and trying to piece
Speaker 1: together the why. But I think you know, the why
Speaker 1: is to me obvious. But um is that in both
Speaker 1: the shooting in Virginia with the football team and both
Speaker 1: this Colorado spring shooting, there were flags right there was
Speaker 1: In the Virginia at the university, the shooter was flagged
Speaker 1: for having talked about guns and said that they owned
Speaker 1: a gun, and but because no violent action had been taken,
Speaker 1: the officers on the university's campus said there was nothing
Speaker 1: that we could do. Similarly, in Colorado Springs, it was
Speaker 1: like there was a flag there were potentially a connection
Speaker 1: with bomb that were made, you know, in previous years.
Speaker 1: And it's so it's like, I guess what is the
Speaker 1: purpose If red flags are literally to send up a
Speaker 1: flare this person is potentially dangerous, but then we're not
Speaker 1: actually going to take action until the violence occurs. Then
Speaker 1: what's the point of there being a red flag? You know?
Speaker 1: The Biden gun reform efforts are based on many things,
Speaker 1: but one is really bolstering red flag laws. I share
Speaker 1: your concern and your critique about them very deeply, right because,
Speaker 1: I mean, let's just be honest. You don't get to
Speaker 1: become a mass murderer overnight. There are concerning symptoms in
Speaker 1: everybody who gets to that stage. But the problem is
Speaker 1: in part a numbers game, right that for everybody who
Speaker 1: shows those symptoms and then becomes a mass shooter, you'll
Speaker 1: have a million people who have the exact same personality
Speaker 1: profile who never do anything, And so there's no predictive
Speaker 1: power for that, and then the other part is a
Speaker 1: lot of people have had these same symptoms for years,
Speaker 1: and so it's like, what's the day where they're going
Speaker 1: to snap. It's psychiatrists and judges and police don't have
Speaker 1: any idea, and so restricting somebody's guns for fourteen days
Speaker 1: or even six months, which never happens, is not going
Speaker 1: to change that. A lot of the issues here are
Speaker 1: long standing characterological personality issues, and so in that regard,
Speaker 1: it's just not effective in a way. And then you
Speaker 1: on top of that, put that places like El Paso
Speaker 1: County where this shooting happened, they basically have a stance
Speaker 1: against enforcing gun laws that's on the books, and so
Speaker 1: it's just the numbers make this impossible. And even if
Speaker 1: you look at how many red flag laws have been
Speaker 1: you know, it's like twelve over eight, you know, over
Speaker 1: the years in this county because they don't enforce them.
Speaker 1: And so it's just like the minute you start, I mean,
Speaker 1: any any one of these factors would have been devastating
Speaker 1: for this case, but when you add them all up,
Speaker 1: it's just the system is not going to work to
Speaker 1: prevent this kind of violence. And that's kind of where
Speaker 1: we're at right that that's kind of where we're at.
Speaker 1: So we're just gonna live with this like it's I mean,
Speaker 1: like we are. We're just I mean, this is a
Speaker 1: part of what it means to live in America. Is
Speaker 1: that any time that you leave your home, or even
Speaker 1: if you're in your home, you know, the probability of
Speaker 1: you being shot to death is pretty fucking high. Look,
Speaker 1: I I just I don't I'm at a I honestly,
Speaker 1: this doesn't usually happened to me interviewing you. I'm at
Speaker 1: a loss. I just I'm at a loss to figure
Speaker 1: out like the path forward if I don't know what
Speaker 1: I don't know what it is, Jonathan, I could answer
Speaker 1: that too, is I mean mass shootings obviously there are
Speaker 1: a reflection of our broken political system. Because of functioning
Speaker 1: society will come together across the table to say, man,
Speaker 1: our citizens are dying, and what can we do? We
Speaker 1: are dying, and what can we do to address this
Speaker 1: so that we can be more safe. A communal framework
Speaker 1: where people are saying, Okay, here are my rights, but
Speaker 1: here is your need for safety. Let's work it out.
Speaker 1: And there are so many other examples of societies that
Speaker 1: are not in wartime figuring that out. I don't think
Speaker 1: that's where we're at, because maybe we are gearing towards
Speaker 1: some more conflict, but in the meantime, our political system
Speaker 1: does not allow for that kind of negotiation. So mass
Speaker 1: shootings are symptoms a red flag law is not going
Speaker 1: to fix the structural problems of our country right now.
Speaker 1: And I think that's that's really kind you know, where
Speaker 1: we're at. I mean, again, there are so many models
Speaker 1: of countries that have gotten to this point and you know,
Speaker 1: taken another turn in a different direction. So it's not
Speaker 1: like there are no models for it, but it's just
Speaker 1: that part of that issue is that. And then I
Speaker 1: also just cannot help thinking if the tables are turned right,
Speaker 1: I mean, imagine transgender somebody in a drag show took
Speaker 1: an air fifteen and went into a country bar and
Speaker 1: killed a lot of people, Like, would we be saying, oh,
Speaker 1: this is just America. No. The fact that this is
Speaker 1: violent that's being done toward already at risk communities really
Speaker 1: is part of the level of helplessness that we're feeling.
Speaker 1: And I can just say, you know, I mean, I
Speaker 1: think there should be no subway crime, but if you
Speaker 1: turn the tables. You know, black person pushes someone on
Speaker 1: the subway. It's that racial categories are made so clear, right, Um,
Speaker 1: this is minoritized violence against the majority group. But when
Speaker 1: the tables are turned, as they so often are in
Speaker 1: these mass shootings, um it, then we get the helplessness narrative.
Speaker 1: So this plays out around the narratives of America right now.
Speaker 1: But it's like, I agree, right to some extent, But
Speaker 1: then I look at Parkland, and I look at Newtown,
Speaker 1: and I look at these places where mass shootings have
Speaker 1: entered into white suburbia, well off places, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: and if that is not the triggering if it's if,
Speaker 1: if if, if the narrative can persist that well, it's
Speaker 1: the crime that happens in the cities, it's it's these
Speaker 1: it's these marginalized communities that are the ones that are affected.
Speaker 1: So I don't have to care because it's not me.
Speaker 1: But that's not the case, Jonathan. It's like the mass
Speaker 1: shootings spread well far outside of what has been designated
Speaker 1: as okay for violence to occur in southside of Chicago.
Speaker 1: We don't give a fuck about, right, because oh, it's
Speaker 1: always there's always a shoot of up happening there. But
Speaker 1: this isn't the case anymore and hasn't been for so long.
Speaker 1: So my last question for you is that, like, if
Speaker 1: white suburban women continue to vote in mass with Republicans,
Speaker 1: and their numbers continue to increase with Republicans, and it's
Speaker 1: their kids that are going into the new towns and
Speaker 1: the parklands like and the UVA campus and all of
Speaker 1: these things, like, what is going to get these people
Speaker 1: to care? Well? As we know, as I know from
Speaker 1: my work in Dying of Whiteness, all roads lead back
Speaker 1: to more guns. I mean, people see guns as their protectors.
Speaker 1: So after mass shootings we see pretty predictable trends where
Speaker 1: people on the liberal side of the divide will support
Speaker 1: more regulation like we're talking about here, and people on
Speaker 1: the conservative side will say, well, this shows that you
Speaker 1: need more guns now. It's pretty laughable. I mean, imagine
Speaker 1: being in a dance club with the soundproof walls that's
Speaker 1: totally dark and strobe lights. Imagine everybody in that club
Speaker 1: having a gun when something like this breaks out, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's absurd, it's absurd and so but but again,
Speaker 1: there is a divide that is reinforced and reified every
Speaker 1: time something like this happens, and so part of the
Speaker 1: issue is we just have completely different experiences of this.
Speaker 1: But I would say just going back to my point
Speaker 1: before and not I mean, I agree there's so many
Speaker 1: mass shootings. Again, there's more than one mass shooting a day,
Speaker 1: But can you think of a mass shooting, and I'm
Speaker 1: sure there is, I'm just not thinking of every night
Speaker 1: now where somebody from a disadvantaged group kills a lot
Speaker 1: of people from the majority group. So I understand Parkland
Speaker 1: and Sandy Hook all those things. I mean, those led
Speaker 1: to more guns and more gun rights and ideas of
Speaker 1: what you can't be safe in your school, But I
Speaker 1: would also say again there's you can't really set any
Speaker 1: trend really, except to say that there is also a
Speaker 1: case of the kind of message of violence toward disadvantaged
Speaker 1: groups being held as a kind of logical extension of
Speaker 1: America and violence and gun culture. I guess you know.
Speaker 1: My feeling is that no one is held accountable, right,
Speaker 1: The gun manufacturers aren't held accountable. The politicians that stoke
Speaker 1: violence and say that Democrats are trying to kill us
Speaker 1: and call LGBTQ people pedophiles, and groomers, so the violence
Speaker 1: that's taken out against them is justified because you're trying
Speaker 1: to save the children. Like I just like somewhere at
Speaker 1: some point, the cyclical nature of this violence has to end.
Speaker 1: And yet we've been having this conversation for close to
Speaker 1: thirty years since Columbine, and it hasn't ended. It's just
Speaker 1: gotten worse. And so I'm like, at this point, I
Speaker 1: don't know how folks that are working like you have
Speaker 1: for your career to end gun violence and mass shootings, like,
Speaker 1: how you continue because I just don't red flag laws,
Speaker 1: ain't it right? And that's what everybody was pinning their
Speaker 1: hopes and prayers on, is that, Okay, well we'll compromise
Speaker 1: on this thing. And the last two shootings over the
Speaker 1: last two weeks have shown us that that's not the case.
Speaker 1: So I'm just confused about where we go chaos or
Speaker 1: community really, honestly, to think of Martin Luther King, I
Speaker 1: hope that I'm providing framework for by people. At some
Speaker 1: point we'll come to the table, and if not, that
Speaker 1: I'm chronicling demand. I mean, it's it's one of those
Speaker 1: two things. And defense, what do you ask me? You know?
Speaker 1: So yeah, caught chaos our community. I mean, that is
Speaker 1: the ultimate question that we need to face, that we
Speaker 1: need to ask, and I don't think enough people are
Speaker 1: asking it. As always, Jonathan, thank you so much for
Speaker 1: taking the time to join us on Woke a F.
Speaker 1: I don't know when we'll ever have a conversation that
Speaker 1: makes us feel like we are winning, but today is
Speaker 1: clearly not that day. But I appreciate you continuing to
Speaker 1: show up each and every week to provide contexts and
Speaker 1: value to our listeners. Thank you so much. And these
Speaker 1: are the conversations we really should be happening having after
Speaker 1: mess shootings, so I'm very grateful in return. Thanks Jonathan.
Speaker 1: That is it for me today, dear friends on wok
Speaker 1: F as always, power to the people and to all
Speaker 1: the people. Power, get woke and stay woke as fuck.