Monday, November 6, 2017

Enough with the Thoughts and Prayers: A Twitter Thread in Response to Texas Mass Shooting









I posted this thread on Twitter yesterday evening, and almost immediately, my cell phone began dinging constantly with retweets and replies and new folks following me, so that my Twitter followers rose in about an hour from around 918 people to 1,041 followers. People are fed up with the incessant gun violence, with our legislators worshiping and groveling at the feet of the NRA, with the sentimental, meaningless piety that drips from the lips of these same legislators every time a mass shooting like the one yesterday happens. 

I think, like me, a lot of us are tempted to feel helpless, as if our voices do not count, as if we are not important enough people for anyone to want to listen to us. Perhaps this is all the more reason for us to raise our voices and to do so together.

Yesterday, right after the news broke about the Texas shooting, I opened the Salt Lake Tribune and began leafing through the colored ads in the middle of the paper. This is the first thing my eyes saw; the ad was tucked right next to the funny papers:



We are a sick society. What better way to celebrate the birth of the Prince of Peace than with a new Springfield XD (M), full-size?

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