I Heart Mike Moore
Apr. 9th, 2003 09:17 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deathpixieI got this forwarded to me by my dad this morning and couldn't resist sharing it with you. :)
My Oscar "Backlash": "Stupid White Men" Back At #1, "Bowling" Breaks New Records
April 7, 2003
Dear friends,
It appears that the Bush administration will have succeeded in colonizing Iraq sometime in the next few days. This is a blunder of such magnitude -- and we will pay for it for years to come. It was not worth the life of one single American kid in uniform, let alone the thousands of Iraqis who have died, and my condolences and prayers go out to all of them.
So, where are all those weapons of mass destruction that were the pretense for this war? Ha! There is so much to say about all this, but I will save it for later.
What I am most concerned about right now is that all of you -- the majority of Americans who did not support this war in the first place -- not go silent or be intimidated by what will be touted as some great military victory. Now, more than ever, the voices of peace and truth must be heard. I have received a lot of mail from people who are feeling a profound sense of despair and believe that their voices have been drowned out by the drums and bombs of false patriotism. Some are afraid of retaliation at work or at school or in their neighborhoods because they have been vocal proponents of peace. They have been told over and over that it is not "appropriate" to protest once the country is at war, and that your only duty now is to "support the troops."
Can I share with you what it's been like for me since I used my time on the Oscar stage two weeks ago to speak out against Bush and this war? I hope that, in reading what I'm about to tell you, you'll feel a bit more emboldened to make your voice heard in whatever way or forum that is open to you.
When "Bowling for Columbine" was announced as the Oscar winner for Best Documentary at the Academy Awards, the audience rose to its feet. It was a great moment, one that I will always cherish. They were standing and cheering for a film that says we Americans are a uniquely violent people, using our massive stash of guns to kill each other and to use them against many countries around the world. They were applauding a film that shows George W. Bush using fictitious fears to frighten the public into giving him whatever he wants. And they were honoring a film that states the following: The first Gulf War was an attempt to reinstall the dictator of Kuwait; Saddam Hussein was armed with weapons from the United States; and the American government is responsible for the deaths of a half-million children in Iraq over the past decade through its sanctions and bombing. That was the movie they were cheering, that was the movie they voted for, and so I decided that is what I should acknowledge in my speech.
And, thus, I said the following from the Oscar stage:
"On behalf of our producers Kathleen Glynn and Michael Donovan (from Canada), I would like to thank the Academy for this award. I have invited the other Documentary nominees on stage with me. They are here in solidarity because we like non-fiction. We like non-fiction because we live in fictitious times. We live in a time where fictitious election results give us a fictitious president. We are now fighting a war for fictitious reasons. Whether it's the fiction of duct tape or the fictitious 'Orange Alerts,' we are against this war, Mr. Bush. Shame on you, Mr. Bush, shame on you. And, whenever you've got the Pope and the Dixie Chicks against you, you're time is up."
Halfway through my remarks, some in the audience started to cheer. That immediately set off a group of people in the balcony who started to boo. Then those supporting my remarks started to shout down the booers. The L. A. Times reported that the director of the show started screaming at the orchestra "Music! Music!" in order to cut me off, so the band dutifully struck up a tune and my time was up. (For more on why I said what I said, you can read the op-ed I wrote for the L.A. Times, plus other reaction from around the country at my website www.michaelmoore.com)
The next day -- and in the two weeks since -- the right-wing pundits and radio shock jocks have been calling for my head. So, has all this ruckus hurt me? Have they succeeded in "silencing" me?
Well, take a look at my Oscar "backlash":
-- On the day after I criticized Bush and the war at the Academy Awards, attendance at "Bowling for Columbine" in theaters around the country went up 110% (source: DailyVariety/BoxOfficeMojo.com). The following weekend, the box office gross was up a whopping 73% (Variety). It is now the longest-running consecutive commercial release in America, 26 weeks in a row and still thriving. The number of theaters showing the film since the Oscars has INCREASED, and it has now bested the previous box office record for a documentary by nearly 300%.
-- Yesterday (April 6), "Stupid White Men" shot back to #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. This is my book's 50th week on the list, 8 of them at number one, and this marks its fourth return to the top position, something that virtually never happens.
-- In the week after the Oscars, my website was getting 10-20 million hits A DAY (one day we even got more hits than the White House!). The mail has been overwhelmingly positive and supportive (and the hate mail has been hilarious!).
-- In the two days following the Oscars, more people pre-ordered the video for "Bowling for Columbine" on Amazon.com than the video for the Oscar winner for Best Picture, "Chicago".
-- In the past week, I have obtained funding for my next documentary, and I have been offered a slot back on television to do an updated version of "TV Nation"/ "The Awful Truth."
I tell you all of this because I want to counteract a message that is told to us all the time -- that, if you take a chance to speak out politically, you will live to regret it. It will hurt you in some way, usually financially. You could lose your job. Others may not hire you. You will lose friends. And on and on and on.
Take the Dixie Chicks. I'm sure you've all heard by now that, because their lead singer mentioned how she was ashamed that Bush was from her home state of Texas, their record sales have "plummeted" and country stations are boycotting their music. The truth is that their sales are NOT down. This week, after all the attacks, their album is still at #1 on the Billboard country charts and, according to Entertainment Weekly, on the pop charts during all the brouhaha, they ROSE from #6 to #4. In the New York Times, Frank Rich reports that he tried to find a ticket to ANY of the Dixie Chicks' upcoming concerts but he couldn't because they were all sold out. (To read Rich's column from yesterday's Times, "Bowling for Kennebunkport," go here: http://www.michaelmoore.com/articles/index.php?article=20030406-nytimes. He does a pretty good job of laying it all out and talks about my next film and the impact it could potentially have.) Their song, "Travelin' Soldier" (a beautiful anti-war
ballad) was the most requested song on the internet last week. They have not been hurt at all -- but that is not what the media would have you believe. Why is that? Because there is nothing more important now than to keep the voices of dissent -- and those who would dare to ask a question -- SILENT. And what better way than to try and take a few well-known entertainers down with a pack of lies so that the average Joe or Jane gets the message loud and clear: "Wow, if they would do that to the Dixie Chicks or Michael Moore, what would they do to little ol' me?" In other words, shut the f--- up.
And that, my friends, is the real point of this film that I just got an Oscar for -- how those in charge use FEAR to manipulate the public into doing whatever they are told.
Well, the good news -- if there can be any good news this week -- is that not only have neither I nor others been silenced, we have been joined by millions of Americans who think the same way we do. Don't let the false patriots intimidate you by setting the agenda or the terms of the debate. Don't be defeated by polls that show 70% of the public in favor of the war. Remember that these Americans being polled are the same Americans whose kids (or neighbor's kids) have been sent over to Iraq. They are scared for the troops and they are being cowed into supporting a war they did not want -- and they want even less to see their friends, family, and neighbors come home dead. Everyone supports the troops returning home alive and all of us need to reach out and let their families know that.
Unfortunately, Bush and Co. are not through yet. This invasion and conquest will encourage them to do it again elsewhere. The real purpose of this war was to say to the rest of the world, "Don't Mess with Texas - If You Got What We Want, We're Coming to Get It!" This is not the time for the majority of us who believe in a peaceful America to be quiet. Make your voices heard. Despite what they have pulled off, it is still our country.
Yours,
Michael Moore
www.michaelmoore.com
My Oscar "Backlash": "Stupid White Men" Back At #1, "Bowling" Breaks New Records
April 7, 2003
Dear friends,
It appears that the Bush administration will have succeeded in colonizing Iraq sometime in the next few days. This is a blunder of such magnitude -- and we will pay for it for years to come. It was not worth the life of one single American kid in uniform, let alone the thousands of Iraqis who have died, and my condolences and prayers go out to all of them.
So, where are all those weapons of mass destruction that were the pretense for this war? Ha! There is so much to say about all this, but I will save it for later.
What I am most concerned about right now is that all of you -- the majority of Americans who did not support this war in the first place -- not go silent or be intimidated by what will be touted as some great military victory. Now, more than ever, the voices of peace and truth must be heard. I have received a lot of mail from people who are feeling a profound sense of despair and believe that their voices have been drowned out by the drums and bombs of false patriotism. Some are afraid of retaliation at work or at school or in their neighborhoods because they have been vocal proponents of peace. They have been told over and over that it is not "appropriate" to protest once the country is at war, and that your only duty now is to "support the troops."
Can I share with you what it's been like for me since I used my time on the Oscar stage two weeks ago to speak out against Bush and this war? I hope that, in reading what I'm about to tell you, you'll feel a bit more emboldened to make your voice heard in whatever way or forum that is open to you.
When "Bowling for Columbine" was announced as the Oscar winner for Best Documentary at the Academy Awards, the audience rose to its feet. It was a great moment, one that I will always cherish. They were standing and cheering for a film that says we Americans are a uniquely violent people, using our massive stash of guns to kill each other and to use them against many countries around the world. They were applauding a film that shows George W. Bush using fictitious fears to frighten the public into giving him whatever he wants. And they were honoring a film that states the following: The first Gulf War was an attempt to reinstall the dictator of Kuwait; Saddam Hussein was armed with weapons from the United States; and the American government is responsible for the deaths of a half-million children in Iraq over the past decade through its sanctions and bombing. That was the movie they were cheering, that was the movie they voted for, and so I decided that is what I should acknowledge in my speech.
And, thus, I said the following from the Oscar stage:
"On behalf of our producers Kathleen Glynn and Michael Donovan (from Canada), I would like to thank the Academy for this award. I have invited the other Documentary nominees on stage with me. They are here in solidarity because we like non-fiction. We like non-fiction because we live in fictitious times. We live in a time where fictitious election results give us a fictitious president. We are now fighting a war for fictitious reasons. Whether it's the fiction of duct tape or the fictitious 'Orange Alerts,' we are against this war, Mr. Bush. Shame on you, Mr. Bush, shame on you. And, whenever you've got the Pope and the Dixie Chicks against you, you're time is up."
Halfway through my remarks, some in the audience started to cheer. That immediately set off a group of people in the balcony who started to boo. Then those supporting my remarks started to shout down the booers. The L. A. Times reported that the director of the show started screaming at the orchestra "Music! Music!" in order to cut me off, so the band dutifully struck up a tune and my time was up. (For more on why I said what I said, you can read the op-ed I wrote for the L.A. Times, plus other reaction from around the country at my website www.michaelmoore.com)
The next day -- and in the two weeks since -- the right-wing pundits and radio shock jocks have been calling for my head. So, has all this ruckus hurt me? Have they succeeded in "silencing" me?
Well, take a look at my Oscar "backlash":
-- On the day after I criticized Bush and the war at the Academy Awards, attendance at "Bowling for Columbine" in theaters around the country went up 110% (source: DailyVariety/BoxOfficeMojo.com). The following weekend, the box office gross was up a whopping 73% (Variety). It is now the longest-running consecutive commercial release in America, 26 weeks in a row and still thriving. The number of theaters showing the film since the Oscars has INCREASED, and it has now bested the previous box office record for a documentary by nearly 300%.
-- Yesterday (April 6), "Stupid White Men" shot back to #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. This is my book's 50th week on the list, 8 of them at number one, and this marks its fourth return to the top position, something that virtually never happens.
-- In the week after the Oscars, my website was getting 10-20 million hits A DAY (one day we even got more hits than the White House!). The mail has been overwhelmingly positive and supportive (and the hate mail has been hilarious!).
-- In the two days following the Oscars, more people pre-ordered the video for "Bowling for Columbine" on Amazon.com than the video for the Oscar winner for Best Picture, "Chicago".
-- In the past week, I have obtained funding for my next documentary, and I have been offered a slot back on television to do an updated version of "TV Nation"/ "The Awful Truth."
I tell you all of this because I want to counteract a message that is told to us all the time -- that, if you take a chance to speak out politically, you will live to regret it. It will hurt you in some way, usually financially. You could lose your job. Others may not hire you. You will lose friends. And on and on and on.
Take the Dixie Chicks. I'm sure you've all heard by now that, because their lead singer mentioned how she was ashamed that Bush was from her home state of Texas, their record sales have "plummeted" and country stations are boycotting their music. The truth is that their sales are NOT down. This week, after all the attacks, their album is still at #1 on the Billboard country charts and, according to Entertainment Weekly, on the pop charts during all the brouhaha, they ROSE from #6 to #4. In the New York Times, Frank Rich reports that he tried to find a ticket to ANY of the Dixie Chicks' upcoming concerts but he couldn't because they were all sold out. (To read Rich's column from yesterday's Times, "Bowling for Kennebunkport," go here: http://www.michaelmoore.com/articles/index.php?article=20030406-nytimes. He does a pretty good job of laying it all out and talks about my next film and the impact it could potentially have.) Their song, "Travelin' Soldier" (a beautiful anti-war
ballad) was the most requested song on the internet last week. They have not been hurt at all -- but that is not what the media would have you believe. Why is that? Because there is nothing more important now than to keep the voices of dissent -- and those who would dare to ask a question -- SILENT. And what better way than to try and take a few well-known entertainers down with a pack of lies so that the average Joe or Jane gets the message loud and clear: "Wow, if they would do that to the Dixie Chicks or Michael Moore, what would they do to little ol' me?" In other words, shut the f--- up.
And that, my friends, is the real point of this film that I just got an Oscar for -- how those in charge use FEAR to manipulate the public into doing whatever they are told.
Well, the good news -- if there can be any good news this week -- is that not only have neither I nor others been silenced, we have been joined by millions of Americans who think the same way we do. Don't let the false patriots intimidate you by setting the agenda or the terms of the debate. Don't be defeated by polls that show 70% of the public in favor of the war. Remember that these Americans being polled are the same Americans whose kids (or neighbor's kids) have been sent over to Iraq. They are scared for the troops and they are being cowed into supporting a war they did not want -- and they want even less to see their friends, family, and neighbors come home dead. Everyone supports the troops returning home alive and all of us need to reach out and let their families know that.
Unfortunately, Bush and Co. are not through yet. This invasion and conquest will encourage them to do it again elsewhere. The real purpose of this war was to say to the rest of the world, "Don't Mess with Texas - If You Got What We Want, We're Coming to Get It!" This is not the time for the majority of us who believe in a peaceful America to be quiet. Make your voices heard. Despite what they have pulled off, it is still our country.
Yours,
Michael Moore
www.michaelmoore.com
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2003-04-08 05:38 pm (UTC)Added to that he urgently needs a press secretary.(grin) The quoted article can be very easily read to mean that both he and Dixie Chicks adopted a controversial viewpoint in order to enjoy a commercial windfall of increased publicity: - )
no subject
Date: 2003-04-10 02:07 am (UTC)And you have to admit that while not _every_ American citizen is pro-gun or owns one, a scary proportion of the population are/do. And the violent crime stats are unbelieveable for a country that considers itself an example to all.u
Re:
Date: 2003-04-10 06:16 am (UTC)As for the second part of your question.. umm... in 2001 US didn't even make the "top 10" list of industrialized nations whose citizens were victimized by crime. Australia topped, with more than 30% of its population victimized. Britain was second with 26%, And you know the kicker? US crime rate is falling while British and French, at least, is rising. In point of fact US is the only industrialized country that experienced the decline in crime rate since 1988.
Needless to say this does not exactly help gun-control. Now they get to do the nyah-nyah and say, 'guns don't matter.' In fact I am not even sure how it works, since it appears that the violent crime _increased_ after the legislation re gun controol in Austalia was passed in 1996. It's weird. Thanfully NRA jumped the gun (heh-heh, I am fuuunny) and decided to overblow the increase in crime rate, used in their ads and got slapped down. But while not as high as they said, it IS there.
If you want to check the statistics they are from
International Crime Victims Survey, conducted by Leiden University in Holland.
I have to wonder...
Date: 2003-04-10 06:28 am (UTC)Someone who is heavily for gun control could make a very good arguement that the limits that currently exist are the reason for the decline in crime in the US.
They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 06:39 am (UTC)Same for New York, very strict gun laws - very high rate of burglaries and armed robberies.
Among 15 states with the highest crime rate, 10 have very restrictive gun laws.
Hell, look at Canada. After they passed their gun laws in the '70s, the murder rate stayed the same - it didn't decline, while burglaries and armed robberies also climbed.
This is the main ammunition for NRA lobby these days - they say that guns prevent crime.
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 06:57 am (UTC)I'm more or less for gun control - not because of crime rates, I think that's more a social problem them a problem of weaponry - but simply to educate people on how to own and store a gun safely.
(I'm of the opinion that guns should be like cars - can't own one without a license, and they should require training and classes and tests and insurance to keep.)
--
So, America's crime rate is dropping, and its not due to gun control. So what -is- it due to?
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 07:02 am (UTC)Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 07:04 am (UTC)Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 07:22 am (UTC)Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 07:37 am (UTC)I see a great deal of criticism of that system in cases where the third and final strike is something "minor*" on generally-liberal sites like plastic.com and kuro5hin.org .
In a lot of cases, these are also sites where people believe very strongly in gun control, or gun licensing - and I have to wonder if the reports are being skewed or not reported unless one goes to dig for them.
I read the Washington Post, and more news sites than are probably healthy, and I was pretty unaware that the 3-strikes laws had been put into effect in a large number of states. On further thought, I am more or less aware that they're active in states other than California, but I had no idea that it was four fifths of the nation.
Admittedly, the sites I'm reading tend to a liberal slant....
* Minor in the sense of still a felony, just not assault, rape or bank robbery. Note the quotes.
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 07:45 am (UTC)I take that into account and my sympathy for the poor criminal drops sharply. He knew about the law and knew about the consequences. Moreover it pints toward the state of mind. If he was caught twice and punished and released and comitted yet another crime I am fairly certain that there is no chance of rehabilitation. The scale of the last crime doesn't really matter, it simply shows that he's locked in to a pattern. And come to that, i am an egoist and I much rather have that law in place than have some parolee make me a part of the statistics.
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 05:16 pm (UTC)We had a three-strikes law in the Northern Territory. A pretty harsh one too - you could get locked up for massive amounts of time for simple shoplifting. And the people who were jailed under it the most? Aboriginals, because they are targeted both by racial profiling ("everyone knows they're all drunks and crooks") and the fact that they are by large mostly homeless, and therefore _living_ in the public eye.
The other problem is that unless you have installed in your prisons a viable rehabilitation/re-education system, you _will_ get recidivism. Once a person has been to jail, that's permanently on their record. It affects their ability to get a job, get an education, get a place to live... So if you're a eighteen or nineteen year old kid, barely finished school, and you get into drugs and get arrested and jailed (because there's a War On Drugs, don't you know), and you spend nine months in jail... how do you think that's going to affect your life? You'll get out, apply for jobs... but you can't get anything more than the most menial work because you've got a record. You'll try and rent a place to live somewhere reasonable - and fail the personal history checks. You'll try to get a loan from the bank - and be turned down. So everywhere you go you're treated like scum because you made a mistake, and eventually you come to believe it. You fall back into drugs again (if you managed to get off them in the first place, since jails aren't known for their drug rehab successes), you wind up associating with other criminals, you start doing burglaries and robberies to support your habit, and hey, there you are back in jail again at the ripe old age of twenty-three, looking at a twenty-five year stretch. With no hope of things ever improving.
What a waste of human potential. What a waste of time, effort and _money_. It seems both our countries would prefer to throw people into the rubbish than actually do something about the reasons why they're committing crimes in the first place.
But yeah, that's the liberal looney leftie view. I knew there was a reason why I shouldn't be working for the Department of Justice.
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 05:42 pm (UTC)I am not sure what you're trying to argue re your example. that the drug use shoul be legalized? That it shouldn't be enforced? Those are all different debates. Personally i think by the time a person reaches legal majority - 18 and older, he knows the consequences of his actions. I did. The majority of the teens in US work summer jobs since they're 15. On every single application there is a question re criminal history. Only a complete idiot would not realize how his chances would be affected if the answer was yes. If the law is wrong - change it. Until then either don't break it, don't get caught or pay the piper.
Targeting of aboriginals and/or other minorities is not an effect of three strikes but rather a fairly unrelated social ill, whose repercussions, I'm sure, are also felt in the education and employment system. To attempt and redress such repercussions in the criminal system, in my view, is treating the symptom.
Yes, the large prison population is expensive to the tax-payers. It's more expensive to have repeated offenders free and comitt
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 07:46 pm (UTC)Response to point one: Sweden. AFAIK (and maybe [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] can help me out here), Sweden has a rehabilitative rather than punative approach to crime, and they have an extremely low per capita crime rate.
Response to point two: Apologies for the garbled-ness - I'm at work and trying to type a lot in a hurry and trying to put too many things into the pne sentence. My main point was that jail should always be the last resort, not the first, and mandatory sentencing harms more than it helps. And yeah, drug deriminalisation might be something to consider. To sum it up? Jail only when all else has failed, and intsitute rehabilitative programs in jail to break the cycle. Believe me, after six years working in the courts, you get sick of seeing the same people again and again. And jail does squat to change that.
Also, changing laws isn't that easy. Only the government can change a law, and they have to be convinced it's wrong before they will. The NT three strikes law was overturned when the conservative state government was voted out, but most of the time they're left on the books and legislated over. Makes for interesting research - old defunct laws that are clearly ridiculous, but managed to slip through the cracks because it was easier to stop enforcing them than to actually change them. US law might be different - I don't know the system that well.
Point three: Yes, targeting of minority groups occurred before three strikes laws. But until the system is changed to avoid that, they are going to be the ones who bear the brunt of it. And as the Royal Commission into Black Deaths in Custody showed, jailing Aboriginals is frequently effectively a death sentence due to cultural differences that mean they're more likely to commit suicide in custody than any other prisoner. So if you have a system that targets blacks, and then introduce a law that means they'll be locked up even more often, you're looking at genocide. And yes, the system should chnge. But bringing in legislation like the three strikes law that makes a bad situation worse... that's just insane troll logic.
Race might seem to be an "unrelated social ill", but the justice system is a reflection of the values of a particular society. It is not divorced from it. Just as it used to be an acceptable defence to rape to say the woman had a promiscuous history or was wearing 'provocative clothing', the colour of someone's skin or their mental health/intelligence affects their chances of arrest, being found guilty, and being jailed. Look at the proportion of blacks in US prisons compared to whites, especially in the Southern states. And yes, you might say that they're there because they've committed a crime, but _why_ did they commit the crime? Is it because blacks are inherently criminal? That kind of thinking went out with eugenics. Or maybe it's because proportionally black people are poorer, have less employment, less health care, and are more likely to be on welfare? Which, under a conservative government, is being shredded any way. Add to that the growing gulf between rich and poor, and you're cultivating a situation of anger and resentment. And if someone sees that someone else has what they don't, and won't have even if they work twelve hours a day in the local factory, then maybe one day they'll stop thinking and one day _do_. Especially when they're told that the only success that matters is financial success - if you can get only that success by dealing drugs, then so be it.
My point is, the justice system isn't separate from the rest of society. It's part of it. And to change one you have to change the other.
Last point: You got cut off so I'm not sure what it was. *grins*
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 08:05 pm (UTC)And that's it. A - I don't want to get you fired. B- at this point we'll start going around in circles because we are done with facts and down to opinions, I think. C - you know you talk too much when LJ cuts you off.
Also - heh, the benefits of hiding in academia from the real world. I can't get fired for sitting at the computer all day.
Quit, man. We'll get you a cushy teaching job somewhere in sunny Toronto U. Gravy train, Roz. Graaavy train.
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 05:10 pm (UTC)According to the Canadian Federation of Police Chiefs Murders, armed roberies and assults have all been consecutively lower every year in the past eight years.
I should also remind you that 95% of guns used in Canadian crimes came from the United States of America. This is mostly true for the rest of the western world.
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 05:26 pm (UTC)As for the second part of your post - US is the closest country to Canada, it's geographical location makes it the ideal trading partner, it's economy is several times that of both Canada and Mexico, it accounts for roughly 85% of Canadian total exports, 73% of total imports and 36% of GDP. Canda is US economic sattelit, Gerg. Like most of Canadian markets, legal or illegal, so yes, gun market is also dominated by American firms.
Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-11 03:36 pm (UTC)The fact of the matter is, the ready supply of Guns in the US spills over to the rest of the world. In the same way that the cheaply produced AK-47 has become the military weapon of choice for poorly funded militia's, the excruciatingly vast over supply of guns in the US, allows for the easy export of these weapons. If it was more difficult to obtain weapons in the US, they wouldn't be so readily available in the rest of the world.
no subject
Date: 2003-04-10 05:02 pm (UTC)And what about crime specifically gun-related? And the gun-related accidents? True Australia's crime rate might be going up (actually, that was news to me), but I'd be keen to see the specific breakdown. *makes mental note to Google that survey* I'd hazard a guess most of the jump in Australia's crime rates are due to a) property-type crime like burglary and theft, and drug-related stuff, owing to our growing unemployment rates and the disenfranchisement many people feel as a result, and b) fairly extreme incidents such as the Port Arthur massacre, which succeeded in increasing our murder rate 100-fold in one day. Statistics can be twisted to mean pretty much whatever they want to mean. *grins*
But yeah, I'm going to have to check that. Admittedly it's been a while since I was in the Criminology dept.
no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 06:59 am (UTC)If you're not convinced we did the right thing, just wait. The proof will be in the results.
--Hex
no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 04:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 10:49 am (UTC)Ah, well...;-)
DM
who doesn't (heart) Mike Moore.
no subject
Date: 2003-04-10 02:10 am (UTC)And I can't say how much that whole "If you're not with us, you're against us" mentality annoys me, mate. Just because someone doesn't parrot every opinion Dubya allegedly has doesn't mean they support terrorism or fascism. Just because I disagree with your opinions, does that make _me_ evil? I doubt you'd still be talking to me if that was the case.u
Re:
Date: 2003-04-10 04:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-10 05:27 pm (UTC)Apologies if I'm reading too much into it - I was watching the news at the same time and it was making me grumpy.
And no, I don't proclaim to be the Oracle of Anything. Or even right half the time. I'm just stating what I believe, and what I feel, like the rest of us are in our LJs, and if you post a comment, great, I get someone else's view, but I'm also free to respond to it as well, especially if I don't agree with what's said. That's the beauty of freedom of speech. And just because someone says _one_ thing doesn't mean they agree with the diametrically opposite. Calling Moore pro-terrorist is about as useful as him calling all Americans violent.
Re:
Date: 2003-04-10 09:25 pm (UTC)You are entitled to say what you believe, as am I. We don't happen to believe the same things about the war. Not nearly. You may be reading too much into it...but that's okay. Take care.
no subject
Date: 2003-04-10 02:00 pm (UTC)"Don't be defeated by polls that show 70% of the public in favor of the war. Remember that these Americans being polled are the same Americans whose kids (or neighbor's kids) have been sent over to Iraq."
Duey said:
*This* bothers me. "These Americans being polled"- oh my goodness, could he actually mean regular people who work 9 to 5 jobs and worry about where the next paycheck is coming from instead of celebrities or intellectual glitterati who know everything? Well, we must obviously discount their opinions, because they of course don't know their ass from a tree stump.
*deep breath*. Wrong. This blatantly assumes the same "if you're not from New York or Los Angles, then you're an ignorant bumpkin who obviously isn't informed and whose opinions do not matter" bullshit that I get so sick of hearing. It's paternalistic and demeaning, and totally unconscious (and that's the worst thing about it).
Anyway, don't interpret that as support for- or against- the war. I've kept my views on the war to myself, and I will continue to do so.
That thinking
Date: 2003-04-10 05:56 pm (UTC)The first group tends to judge the entire country through either their immidiate enviroment or the media. The second usually comes into contuct either with the youth culture of big cities or the upper crust of society - diplomats, politicians, socialites, etc.
The polls continualy proved that the United States is much more religious than Europe. About 70 percent of the people believe in God, and at least 90 percent of THAT is a Christian god. Nevertheless the Europeans and American intellegentsia freaked when Bush brought religion into White House. Now the American intellectuals were about evenly divided between surprise and distrust (separation of god and state). Europeans were just surprised.
They, and I really should stop using that word since more often than not i fall into the same trap, tend to judge the country by a fairly slim margin.
The overwhelming majority is Christian, somewhat serious about it and currently supports the war. Hell about when SanFran polls are in line with the rest of the country on something you just know that there is abroad consensus on the issue (grin)
On the other hand the urbanite-youth culture is the one that's most visible, the one that dominates the media. It's flashy, anarchic, loud and fun. And so is the anti-war movement, for the very simple reason that they MUST be loud if they want to balance out the majority.
I am not inviting a debate on war here btw:) I already hijacked Rossi's journal enough (grin)
I was watching an interview with Michael Moore.
Date: 2003-04-11 03:55 pm (UTC)I understand your sentiment, but according to Moore, his quote refers to the fact that people support the troops and their families and not necessarily the reasons that the president went to war or the moral right or wrong of the whole thing. He continued by saying that it was more a matter of the questions asked rather than the answers given and that the numbers were not reflective of the opinions of people.
I don't know if this is relevant to your opinion of Mr. Moore, but I thought I would throw it out.
(Sorry about the quote there, but I couldn't resist. *G*)