Welcome to DU, 12ZTR!

Good to have you with us! Funny - you're saying that. I find myself thinking that same thing. Remember that show that I think was on the History Channel or Nat GEO some such thing - something like "After Man" or some such. And it hypothesized about how the planet would fare if humans were wiped off the face of it. It saddened me to realize that deep down inside, I watched that show and thought about the many different reasons that might be a good thing. Sometimes it just makes me cringe to think what we and our reckless, shortsighted, cavalier attitudes are doing to this planet.

Whatever is bad for republi-CON prospects is what I'm for.

I want that party shrunk to grover norquist standards. So small you can drown it in the bathtub. That would be such sweet justice!

Love the by-lines! Clark Kent! Lois Lane! Brenda Starr! And Perry White!

This is GREAT! SUPERB!!!! A real keeper!!!! Thanks for posting this, kydo!

I suppose it's in the eye of the beholder.

So what would be wrong for the group in question bringing their smiles, flags, wives, and children - and protest signs instead of assault rifles? You certainly can stage a clear, obvious, and effective protest with protest signs. You certainly can send a message and/or make a statement using protest signs. And no one need feel physically threatened or menaced because there clearly and obviously would be no menace meant when one's opposition was armed with protest signs. The catch here, LittleBlue, is that there weren't ANY protest signs here - that might define or clarify the intention of their gathering.

But, LittleBlue, these folks were holding guns. Out in the open. And not just simple pistols, either. There was a reason, in my opinion anyway, why they chose for these visuals a slew of particularly fearsome and - uh - shall we say uber-efficient assault-type weapons. Weapons like these were the stars of the show for multiple massacres we've seen just in the last few years, including Newtown. We're coming up on the second anniversary of that one. As a matter of fact, as of this writing (11/15/13) we're almost precisely a month away. It'll be December 14th. I am only speaking for myself here, but I must confess I look at any of those shots of the assembly outside the restaurant, whether posing face-on or taken from a side angle and my gut reaction, from the first synapse whose chemicals or electrical impulses get shaken up into a reaction in the back of my head, the immediate reflex for me is one of abhorrence. I find myself immediately feeling a sense of dread.

Seeing those folks so armed to the extreme - with the kind of fire power that killed so many so quickly, in so many disparate incidents across the country - every one of those individuals posing with them, okay - moms and dads and friends and neighbors - was deeply troubling. Those pictured weren't just carrying different kinds of assault rifles. They were carrying big flashing neon hot buttons. Seems to me this was a physical demonstration, an outward sign as we Catholics would say, that was meant to convey certain meanings. As I said, they could have made the same statement with protest signs, instead of adding the emotional baggage of these egregiously serious and disturbingly famous guns. This was meant to tweak. To take that statement and underline by shooting a line across the paper the statement was written on. This was, in effect, a mind-fuck: "I'm gonna take what you're worried and fearful of, and shove it RIGHT IN YER FACE!!!!" It was, in effect, acknowledging the legitimate and understandable fears provoked by this subject with an avowed "Oh yeah? Well Fuck You."

May I delicately add that displays like this don't necessarily add luster or allure to the cause their proponents espouse. This is the kind of demonstration that pushes some of us farther away. This is really damaging to any case one could make in favor of walking around showing off extreme weapons like these out in public. Particularly when, as I understand it, this group hung around for two hours. Why? Waiting for the women to emerge? Waiting to pick a fight with them? Why stand there with showing off those guns so obviously for so long unless one wanted to make as high-impact a point as possible, especially when one knew the target of one's demonstration had gathered for a meeting just inside? How can that not be read as menacing? The women inside were afraid to leave. Wound up waiting them out because two hours later, as I understand it, the armed crowd outside decided to switch locations to a nearby Hooters.

I will certainly agree with you, LittleBlue, that these photos taken from different positions convey worlds of different subliminal meanings and signals and dog-whistle messaging. These photos pull people's chains. But so does having a group of people, armed to the teeth with some of the most fearsome and emotionally loaded weaponry currently easily accessible to the public, assembling out front of a small meeting of unarmed women wishing to talk about gun safety! Whether they were all smiling or not. Certainly pulled my chain! Both of them did. It was the guns. So many. Out in the open like that. In the context of the situation and the realization that they chose this spot at this time because they KNEW those moms would be meeting in there, and in fact one might even make the case that those moms were stalked on Facebook by gun enthusiasts who tipped off the folks in the photos about the meeting in the first place. So they could go there at that time and --- ? And do what? Besides subtly suggest making trouble? Context was everything here!!! The posing of the seemingly benign "family photo" outside that restaurant changed nothing about the wheres and whys and motivations of those in the photographs being there in the first place.

Of course no one was there "to begin a massacre." But to subtly suggest one, or remind of one, by showing those weapons in public? That's WAY different. And that's what was attempted and achieved here. This was a demonstration brutally obvious and hellbent on Sending A Message - Or Else. A warning. Pretty unmistakeable, at least to me. Made me think back to sharron angle who was most recently running to unseat Harry Reid in Nevada and her infamous reference to "Second Amendment Solutions" as a way to get one's way even if one loses the election.

Sorry I ran on so long. You're spot-on about something else, too, LittleBlue: it's ALWAYS smart to be very observant. ALWAYS!!! Notice the details. Notice what's pictured or said, what's implied or inferred, who's talking, how they talk and what word choices they say and how they add emphasis with pauses and gestures and eyebrow-gymnastics, who's unzipping themselves and hanging themselves out for the public to see, and why that might be. ALWAYS good to have that awareness! Because image manipulation in this day and age has been raised beyond a high art! LOTS of things telegraph other messages than just the obvious one. LOTS of signals and dog-whistles are sent! Whether it's a kind of facial cleanser, bathroom tissue, medicine for "Low T", cause, or politician. I would not discount the statements about intimidation, though, just because some people played fast and loose with photography. And please don't summarily condemn those who were intimidated. You condemn us all, then.

And I would still have a good friend - and her nephew.

Murder-suicide a few years ago. Stunned and shocked and horrified and confused us all, including my son who really looked up to her - they had a friendship of their own that meant a lot to him and she mentored him. Her family lived in the mountains and had a ranch and everybody there knew how to handle guns, and had grown up with them and understood clearly how you deal with them and use them intelligently.

Until one very bad day.

I like BOTH of these! The little girl video and the puppy-in-the-kiddie-pool video

in your sig line!

How about a simple honey-voiced "Fuck You!"?

I like that term you used here, Hoyt. "Compensators."

Seems to me that it sums things up quite well for some of the people involved.

If I were one of those moms inside, and I saw what was "making a statement" outside,

I would indeed feel under siege. I would indeed feel threatened. I would indeed regard it as an intimidation tactic. Especially after one learns that some in the gun group joined the moms' Facebook group to monitor what they were up to, saw the post about the meeting, and decided they needed to show up - "to make a statement." They could make that "statement" ANYWHERE. Why they chose a meeting of moms concerned about gun violence - tells me this was no simple mild-mannered gathering of harmless "statement-makers." Frickin' BULLSHIT. They were trying to intimidate - by their presence. They could also have amassed outside without showing off their precious little massacre machines, and make their "statement" with signs or something.

When you add guns in, out in plain sight, you up the ante. Sorry to those who disagree. But that IS how it is.

Welcome to DU, MythosMaster!

Glad you're here! If you need a big-ass gun to validate yourself like so many of these lovely folks seem to demonstrate, that tells me a lot about you. And none of it good.