The Gun Control Halftime Show...

[SenorBeef]

@BobLibDem

The gun advocates bear a lot of similarity to Muslims reacting to any negative depiction of Mohammed.

Oh, this is going to be good.

They like to think that guns are what make freedom possible

Muslims believe that Mohammed is what makes freedom possible?

but apparently that freedom they pretend to love doesn’t include the freedom to disagree with them about guns.

So you feel that people feel that Costas should not have been legally allowed to say what he said? That he should be thrown in jail? They want to restrict his freedom of speech?

This is one of the of the most ridiculous straw men that people like to throw around. “You think what he said was wrong or inappropriate or tasteless, what, you don’t think he has the right freedom of speech!?”

I’m sure that if Costas had said something like “Of course we can’t use this tragedy to talk about gun control”, the gun advocates would be praising him, although this view would be no less political than the one he actually expressed.

Oh, well you’re sure. I guess that’s that, then, you’re point is proved. You’re right - the way I said that it was inappropriate for him to be using his sports journalism job to be taking political potshots is a lie - I totally would’ve loved for him to go on a 5 minute screed about how AMERICA FUCK YEAH! GUNS! and wouldn’t have thought it inappropriate at all. You got me. No gun rights advocate could possibly think his insertion of political advocacy into sports journalism was inappropriate. We’re all just liars that would cheer him on othewise. As you said, you’re sure.

It’s a good thing gun rights advocates are a big hive mind that you thoroughly understand, lest you actually have to consider the nuances of the issue. I mean, if we actually thought for ourselves rather than universally took the comically simplistic viewpoint you’ve given for all of us, it would be a more complex issue, wouldn’t it?

How is this analogous to mohamed again? People have issued death threats for him, right? Or worse, actually inflicted violence upon him? Or at the very least, they say that he should be jailed for daring to do what he did, right? Or, barring that, at least they feel that he should be prevented from broadcasting his heretical views, right?

[Scumpup]

@Marley23

BobLibDem wasn’t a mod last time I checked.

My mistake.

[Cheesesteak]

@Scumpup

Whether I agree with Costas, or not, all he has done is to instigate discussion of what is “appropriate” material for a sports broadcast.

Appropriate? He didn’t whip out his dick, or start telling kids to take up smoking. He talked (less than enthusiastically) about guns.

Every year, there are multiple gun related incidents that occur within the world of sports, whether it’s a gun going off in a night club, a limo driver getting killed by a shotgun, a gun being waved around in a locker room, a gun being in a carry-on bag, it happens all the time and is always big news. The idea that it’s not appropriate to talk about guns outside of dispassionately reporting facts, is a bit silly.

[RTFirefly]

@Airman_Doors_USAF

Except for one thing: that is the whole point of the thread, whether or not the forum was appropriate or not. Your caveat makes you nothing but a kibitzer. Instead, I chose to address the substance of your comment as if it were actually applicable. I didn’t expect you to bob and weave like you’re doing.

So, if you’d care to actually address the point, I’ll address your comment.

Then maybe you shouldn’t bring up peripheral points, okay? Because I’ll address the points you actually make in whatever way I damned well please. I will deal with them together with the main thrust of the thread if I want to, and I will take them on separately if I want to. Or I will deal with your peripheral point, and let that be my sole contribution to the thread.

You don’t get to make that choice. You only get to decide what you will say, not what I should say. And if you don’t want to defend your own words for some specious reason, that’s your business. I can’t make you defend them, any more than you can make me address issues I’m not ready to address at a particular time.

I wouldn’t have thought that needed saying.

[Scumpup]

@Cheesesteak

Appropriate? He didn’t whip out his dick, or start telling kids to take up smoking. He talked (less than enthusiastically) about guns.

Every year, there are multiple gun related incidents that occur within the world of sports, whether it’s a gun going off in a night club, a limo driver getting killed by a shotgun, a gun being waved around in a locker room, a gun being in a carry-on bag, it happens all the time and is always big news. The idea that it’s not appropriate to talk about guns outside of dispassionately reporting facts, is a bit silly.

Why are you lecturing me? My first post to this thread noted that he is entitled to his opinion.

[emoticorpse]

I think Cheesesteak interpreted your statement as saying that what Bob Costas did was NOT APPROPRIATE.

[XT]

@Scumpup

Why are you lecturing me? My first post to this thread noted that he is entitled to his opinion.

Everyone is. The point of the thread is, should people with access to large public venues (such as sports casters) be able to hijack those venues to spout their opinions? Obviously, most here think it’s perfectly acceptable, and as long as the folks paying the bills feel it’s ok then I guess it is. Perhaps next time it will be some TV Weather person giving their opinion about global warming or abortion or something…and that will be cool too, no doubt, since people should be able to express their opinions, and famous people should be able to hijack a venue to use as their soapbox if the whim takes them.

Glad we cleared all that up everyone…feel free to discuss whatever you like at this point (since folks are anyway :p…not directed at you, Scumpup).

[BobLibDem]

@SenorBeef

So you feel that people feel that Costas should not have been legally allowed to say what he said? That he should be thrown in jail? They want to restrict his freedom of speech?

As a matter of fact, they do. There are a lot of right winger calling for his scalp at the moment.

[XT]

@BobLibDem

As a matter of fact, they do. There are a lot of right winger calling for his scalp at the moment.

Do you have a cite for right wingers saying he should be thrown in jail? I mean, actual efforts to do this, not folks simply talking out of their ass? Thanks in advance for the cite.

[BobLibDem]

@SenorBeef

How is this analogous to mohamed again? People have issued death threats for him, right? Or worse, actually inflicted violence upon him? Or at the very least, they say that he should be jailed for daring to do what he did, right? Or, barring that, at least they feel that he should be prevented from broadcasting his heretical views, right?

It’s analogous in that gun advocates got their panties all twisted about a moment of commentary from a sportscaster and blew it all out of proportion and feel personally threatened by someone exercising their freedom of speech. There are many right wingers who want him off the air.

[emoticorpse]

Are you talking about gun advocates or Republicans? I would agree that Republicans do a lot of whining but I don’t happen to be one but I am a gun advocate and I’m not that upset about the fact that he said it on the air.

[Hentor_the_Barbarian]

Approximately 15,000 people commit suicide using a firearm every year. This is routinely about half the number of all suicides in a year. See the CDC WISQARS online fatality and injury surveillance data on this point. Year to year, that number (15K) is pretty consistent.

People who attempt suicide with a firearm have a success rate of about 85%. This is easily the most successful means to complete suicide. The next most successful method is suffocation, which is 69% successful, followed by a 31% success rate via falls.

Although the data are less comprehensive regarding murder-suicides, approximately 90% of murder-suicides involve a firearm.

Studies are fairly conclusive that firearms increase the risk for successful suicide completion:
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter/risk/index.html

When considering variations by age, the role of firearms in mortality is much higher among adolescents and young adults than among older adults (who are obviously more prone to disease and natural death as they age). Homicide is the second leading cause of death (behind accidents, particularly motor vehicles) among people between the ages of 10-24, and firearms are involved in 82% of those homicides.

The thing with firearm suicides, just like with homicides by firearm, we don’t care. It’s the butcher’s bill that we are (collectively) pretty content with. We know that approximately the same number of people (approximately 30,000, give or take) will die by firearms in America in the next year, and we accept that. Their deaths are the cost of our freedoms when it comes to firearms in the US.

I’ve come to accept that this level of loss is fine for most people.

What I wonder (like Matthew Modine’s character in the HBO film about the early days of the AIDS epidemic) is how many dead people it would take to change the narrative. Is there a number of dead people that would make the majority of people uncomfortable with the status quo, and if so, what is it?

What I don’t understand is why that level of loss is not sufficient to even make it okay for people to ask the question. I mean, I get that gun owners are disposed to be scared. One of the primary reasons to have a gun is because you feel vulnerable. Clearly, if the recent evidence regarding gun sales is to be believed, they are also easily scared into a fear that their gun rights will be taken away. If you want to hear shrieking, indeed, bring up the idea that there should be even the slightest change in gun control laws. (Look at the reaction to Costas, and this very thread.)

But come on, it’s gotten to the point that they are too scared to even hear people ask questions. Costas expressed an opinion. He didn’t “show his ass.” Nut up, gun nuts.

[SenorBeef]

@BobLibDem

As a matter of fact, they do. There are a lot of right winger calling for his scalp at the moment.

Calling Czarcasm, the hyperbole police are needed!

Certainly though “shrieking” to refer to “an immediate emotional response to call for public outrage” is a far more objectionable labelling of the other side of the debate than to say they’re equivelant to people who kill others over unflattering depictions of Mohamed.

[RTFirefly]

@Airman_Doors_USAF

I wasn’t aware that Sunday Night Football was spun off from Meet The Press. I watched a football game and politics broke out. Who knew?

As it turns out, I have given some thought to this remark since I posted here last night, so you’re in luck, Doors.

Neither sports nor politics is some isolated bubble in American life. Politics is how we set society’s rules, how we meet major needs and resolve conflicts. And the sports world routinely commits actions that are overtly political, whether it’s the threat to move a team unless a city coughs up a ton of money for a new stadium with plenty of luxury boxes, or when it forces prospective professional players in a particular sport to serve a four-year unpaid apprenticeship, or when a particular sport does its best to hide and gloss over the consequences of participation in its sport both from the general public and from the players themselves.

Going the other direction, it is our politics that is responsible for the far greater abundance of handguns here than in any other major developed country, and for the consequently much larger number of gun-related deaths. Murders like these are intrinsically connected to politics.

Costas was faced with the following alternatives:

a) He could have said nothing about Jovan Belcher.
b) He could have mentioned it, but murmured some polite words about what a tragedy it was, and left it at that.
c) He could have mentioned it, and mentioned the political connection.

It would have been hard to say nothing about what was the elephant in the room on this particular NFL Sunday. And treating it like an isolated individual tragedy would have been quite simply dishonest. A choice to say nothing rather than speak a simple truth is a moral choice. Deaths such as this are, as Costas pointed out, a consequence of our politics.

Politics didn’t ‘break out’ into your halftime report; it was inherently part of it. It may offend you that the political aspect wasn’t swept under the rug in this context, but it would have been a lie to do so. A comforting lie, apparently, for a lot of people, but a lie nonetheless.

[Airman_Doors_USAF]

You’re absolutely right, I don’t care about suicides. Not even a little bit. It’s a choice, and they made it. In fact, I’m glad guns make it easier, because at least then it’s relatively painless provided you do it right.

What I don’t understand is why that level of loss is not sufficient to even make it okay for people to ask the question. I mean, I get that gun owners are disposed to be scared. One of the primary reasons to have a gun is because you feel vulnerable. Clearly, if the recent evidence regarding gun sales is to be believed, they are also easily scared into a fear that their gun rights will be taken away. If you want to hear shrieking, indeed, bring up the idea that there should be even the slightest change in gun control laws. (Look at the reaction to Costas, and this very thread.)

Three pages and you didn’t read any of them, did you? Nobody gives a crap what Costas’ opinion is. Everybody has one. Hell, I read yours. But offering that opinion in the middle of a football game, one that someone else with no credibility originally offered to boot, is inappropriate. A football game is not a soapbox for unrelated topics.

[RTFirefly]

@XT

Do you have a cite for right wingers saying he should be thrown in jail? I mean, actual efforts to do this, not folks simply talking out of their ass? Thanks in advance for the cite.

It is common English usage to say that people are calling for someone’s scalp when what they’re really calling for is to have someone fired from their job.

Needless to say, plenty of pro-gun types are calling for Costas to be fired.

[Sitnam]

@Marley23

@Sitnam

Can we ditch the pink uniforms and let women hunt for funding for their lady parts cancer some other way.

This is so uninformed I will have to consider never complaining about breast cancer paraphernalia in NFL games again.

What armband color promotes sarcasm awareness, cause I have a Christmas gift idea for you.

[Scumpup]

@XT

Everyone is. The point of the thread is, should people with access to large public venues (such as sports casters) be able to hijack those venues to spout their opinions? Obviously, most here think it’s perfectly acceptable, and as long as the folks paying the bills feel it’s ok then I guess it is. Perhaps next time it will be some TV Weather person giving their opinion about global warming or abortion or something…and that will be cool too, no doubt, since people should be able to express their opinions, and famous people should be able to hijack a venue to use as their soapbox if the whim takes them.

Glad we cleared all that up everyone…feel free to discuss whatever you like at this point (since folks are anyway :p…not directed at you, Scumpup).

Pretty sure that I also noted that those who are critical of Costas were within their rights to bring their displeasure to the attention of his corporate bosses and sponsors. Same-same for your hypothetical weather person. Hitting them in the wallet is a perfectly honest and ethical way of dealing with the situation.

[Czarcasm]

@SenorBeef

Calling Czarcasm, the hyperbole police are needed!

Certainly though “shrieking” to refer to “an immediate emotional response to call for public outrage” is a far more objectionable labelling of the other side of the debate than to say they’re equivelant to people who kill others over unflattering depictions of Mohamed.

Sigh.
I’ll address this attempt to make this personal just once, then I’m done: I have no objection to hyperbole. Hyperbole has its conversational uses. What I object to exaggeration designed to put up roadblocks and stop reasoned debate. Okey dokey?

[XT]

@RTFirefly

It is common English usage to say that people are calling for someone’s scalp when what they’re really calling for is to have someone fired from their job.

Needless to say, plenty of pro-gun types are calling for Costas to be fired.

Yes? And? Who cares?

[QUOTE=Scumpup]
Pretty sure that I also noted that those who are critical of Costas were within their rights to bring their displeasure to the attention of his corporate bosses and sponsors. Same-same for your hypothetical weather person. Hitting them in the wallet is a perfectly honest and ethical way of dealing with the situation.
[/QUOTE]

Agreed.