{"id":1024,"date":"2016-07-11T15:05:54","date_gmt":"2016-07-11T20:05:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gilcanrun.com\/?p=1024"},"modified":"2016-07-11T15:05:54","modified_gmt":"2016-07-11T20:05:54","slug":"its-going-to-be-a-hot-uncomfortable-summer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.gilcanrun.com\/?p=1024","title":{"rendered":"It’s going to be a hot, uncomfortable Summer"},"content":{"rendered":"

No doubt about it, and obviously, I’m not just talking physically. I ran today<\/a>, even though it was cooler, it’s still so humid here, it was like I was running in soup. A disgusting, mildly warm, sticky soup, that no one would like.
\nMeanwhile, I finally got to go to Red Bulls Arena last night, it was a 0-0 draw with the Timbers, so that was disappointing. But I had a nice drive and a nice time with my niece. Which is the point of the whole thing. Wednesday night Orlando comes to town so we will go back and watch that match.
\nMeanwhile, I’m increasingly troubled by some of the things happening, and some of the responses I see. I understand some of my friends, who earnestly just want peace, and don’t fully understand the nuance of what is happening today. Black Lives Matter. It may not be happening to you, or anyone you know, it doesn’t mean there isn’t rampant systemic racism in this world. Let’s be clear, racism isn’t prejudice. Racism is a system by which one group of people seeks to marginalize or oppress other groups of people, based solely on the other’s ethnicity. That is racism. Calling someone names, saying someone is lazy, or dumb, or dangerous, or smart, or any of this other shit based solely on what someone looks like may be a symptom of racism, when someone shows a clear pattern of these judgments and bases their interactions with others off them, that’s racism, but the name calling and shit like that in general is prejudice. Everyone has certain prejudices, they prejudge things all the time. It’s not always alright, but I know not to touch a hot stove, that’s a pre-judging. I know I will burn myself. When it comes to people, that’s a different story. I can’t tell anything about a person based on their skin color, eye color, hair color, jaw-line, weight, height, there is nothing I know about a person based on their inherent physical appearance.
\nAs far as people posting “All Lives Matter” things. Stop. Some of you are very well-meaning, but you don’t understand. There are a million memes out there explaining this fully. “If I go to the doctor with a broken arm, the doctor isn’t going to say “#AllBonesMatter”. Stuff like that. Talib Kweli probably had the best one, “If we say our house is on fire, but you say all houses matter, your house ain’t on fire now.” That’s the thing. It’s not about “complying”, it’s not about “respect”. There are hundreds of instances of white people not complying, not showing respect, not getting shot. Yes, overall, more white people are shot yearly by police than black people, but proportionally, the police shoot black people seven times more frequently. Seven times more frequently.
\nSo what’s happening? We are taught to view black people as violent, disrespectful, anti-social, criminal, dangerous, threatening, intimidating. We are told they aren’t “raised properly”, their “fathers aren’t around”, they’re “troubled youth”, or my favorite (thanks a certain presidential candidate) “super-predators”, or as the other one said that “laziness is a trait in blacks.” These prejudiced views, are ingrained by the educational system, by the news media, maybe even your parents, friends, and loved-ones! When someone who believes these things to be true becomes a police officer, how do you think they will react when confronted with someone fitting the description? You take someone trained to be aggressive, and be in “control” (which is another load of bullshit), you fill their head with these prejudices, because we have a system trying to keep certain people at the fringe of society, never giving them a full stake in the way things are, and what happens? When they don’t obey fully, when they don’t comply immediately, when they take a minute to even question, they are immediately an existential threat. This is the problem. If you take a white person and a black person, you have them do the same thing, either not commit a crime and be suspected of it, or have committed a crime doesn’t matter. You put them in the same situation, with the same actions, responses, and everything, statistically speaking, the black man is 7 times more likely to be going to a funeral home. 7 times more likely to be going to a funeral home. Doesn’t matter if both men are armed, unarmed, comply, don’t comply, guilty, innocent, respectful, disrespectful, single, married, orphaned, have both parents, rich, poor, whatever mitigating circumstance you want to apply. That’s the problem that is trying to be addressed. Simple as that.
\nThere’s more going on with proliferation of weapons and things like that too. I touched on that online today. A friend had posted about\u00a0open-carry. I of course oppose gun ownership and proliferation. Another friend of his said he was the guy I wanted to have a gun, and so I had to pen a response. This is all connected. So many times when you see these shootings, for years, they’ve said “He had a gun, I thought he had a gun” blah blah blah. Well, get rid of guns, end that excuse right? So he was saying I would want him to have a gun if something happened and here’s my response:<\/p>\n

I don’t want anyone to have one, period. I’m not saying you, yourself, are not responsible with it, I’m saying in general, I don’t want anyone to have one. It’s not like the “black market” are cobbling together guns to sell to ne’er-do-wells. All weapons on the street are legally manufactured, distributed, and sold at some point. It seems to me if we lowered the numbers being produced and sold, we’d lower the numbers of these things overall. Moreover, I fear not criminal, “terrorist”, or anything else. While not necessarily nihilistic, I actually care too much about my life, and those around me to live in fear of anyone or anything. Whatever will happen will happen. I, nor you, have any control over anybody else’s actions.
\nFurthermore, I believe that nobody has a right to decide who lives and dies at any time, under any circumstances. Nobody is perfect, all people are flawed, and therefore the chances that a decision of such magnitude may be flawed is highly likely. If we all learned that, then guns would be completely pointless, because let’s face it, no one’s going out and shooting a deer because they don’t have access to the supermarket*.
\nIn summary, no, I don’t want you or anyone else carrying anything. I neither sanction, nor want anyone killing anyone else in my name, even if it is to ostensibly “protect” me or those I care about (which here’s a list of people I care about: Literally everyone, even people who claim to hate me and would kill me on sight). I accept that life is inherently dangerous, a mountain lion could chew my ass up for a snack, a shark could bite me in half, a “terrorist” could blow me up, so be it. That we then make life more dangerous by introducing weapons made for the express purpose of taking lives is preposterous.
\nWhile I appreciate your desire to protect, I assure you I’m quite alright. I hope that our society can come to terms with, not only the negative consequences on our own homes from the dearth of firearms available, but also the strife caused overseas from the absolute overflow from our manufacturing and distribution of these weapons into the hands of warlords and dictators all over.
\nSorry if this is too long. I wanted to make sure I was very specific about my reasoning here. I get short-tempered having to answer a bunch of silly hypothetical situations, so I am trying to be as clear as possible.<\/p>\n

We have so much work to do. There is so much healing that needs to happen, there is a lot of heavy lifting. If you want a world of peace, even if you don’t understand it, even if bad things happen, don’t try to negate the #BlackLivesMatter movement. If you don’t understand, if you are scared, if you are unsure, sit down with someone and talk, but more than talk, listen. Listen to what is being said, listen to how other human beings, your brothers and sisters feel and are made to feel by the country they live in, the world they live in. Sometimes listening will be uncomfortable, make you feel defensive, it’s ok, just listen and then take what you have heard and see what you can do to make positive change. That’s what you need to do, that’s how things happen. Not by trying to say “well, it’s not important to me because it doesn’t include me”. This isn’t for you and it isn’t about you. It’s really ok.
\nSo lots of things to do, and many things may not be comfortable, we have to have a change of ideas.
\n