Hispanic Fanatic

There are numerous disadvantages to arguing with crazy people.

It’s futile. It raises your blood pressure. And because this is America, there’s a good chance that the crazy person will shoot you.

But a frequently overlooked hazard of debating a lunatic is that, if you argue long enough, you’ll start to wonder if you’re the crazy one. Because the more the maniac digs in, the more you will call upon your rational brain and your desire to be open-minded, with the result that you’ll eventually ask yourself, “Is this guy right, and could the moon be a secret Martian base?”

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You really have to give a shout-out to the Founding Fathers. Yes, they were hypocritical slave owners who stole land from the Native Americans, and they routinely drank toilet water and thought mastodons roamed the Pacific Northwest. But they still had some pretty good ideas.

For example, they gave us the First Amendment (a definite highlight). And they also gave us the Second Amendment, a bizarrely worded clause that has defied simple interpretation for almost three centuries now, and which makes the United States the only industrialized nation in the world where it’s easier to get an assault rifle than preventative healthcare.

Now you might ask, “What’s so great about that?”

Well, the whole point of the Second Amendment, according to hardcore advocates of gun rights, is that it is bulwark against government tyranny. Americans are constantly told that if it weren’t for citizens packing heat, the U.S. government would herd us all into labor camps at gunpoint… although it’s unclear who would be doing the rounding up, or why, or how rednecks with shotguns could prevent that from happening, or why the citizens of Japan or Great Britain or Canada don’t require this kind of protection.

Yeah, the details are a little fuzzy. But the point is that we have to guard against tyranny. 

Well, I have good news for all those militia types who have spent their lives hoarding AR-15s and shrieking about government oppression.

This is your chance. The tyranny is here.

You see, we now have a president who is in office only through a constitutional fluke and who has never been the American people’s choice. And this president has spent his entire term undermining our democratic norms and using the White House for personal gain. He has sold out to foreign dictators, ignored the murder of our troops, and dismissed any calls for accountability or transparency. And to top it off, his incompetence and hubris in the face of a pandemic has led to needless death and economic turmoil.

Doesn’t all that send a chill down your freedom-lovin’ spine? It should. But ok, maybe you gun-toting patriots out there believe that this is not enough to take up arms against the government. 

Well, how about the fact that, just last week, the president deployed federal law enforcement officers in “unmarked vehicles to drive around downtown Portland and detain protesters”? These government shock troops are “driving up to people, detaining individuals with no explanation about why they are being arrested, and driving off.”

I mean, heavily armed government agents with no ID are grabbing citizens and shoving them into cars, with no respect for law and order. These brazen violations of civil rights “are more reflective of tactics of a government led by a dictator, not from the government of our constitutional democratic republic.”

Come on, all you Clive Bundy clones. There are literally jackbooted thugs marching around Portland! Unarmed moms are putting up more of a fight than you are! What are you waiting for?

OK, maybe I’m a little confused.

You showed up, armed and ready, when governors asked you wear a mask. But you don’t issue a peep when unidentifiable storm troopers are breaking the bones of veterans.

And perhaps you missed our president’s latest executive order, which is in direct violation of the Constitution? Or maybe you didn’t notice when he implied that he might ignore the results of an election and stay in office illegally?

I mean, all that is Despotism 101. And yet you do nothing.

Do you really want to prove that liberals are right when they say that threatening to fight your own government is paranoid delusion? Do you actually want progressives to point out that despite your tough talk, you are happy to fall into line behind a wannabe fascist prone to Orwellian doublespeak?

If so, maybe you can go ahead now and admit that your problem isn’t “government oppression.” It’s the fear of change, of an evolving country, of people who don’t look like you gaining more respect and power.

So the next time you feel the urge to issue a manifesto or proclaim your supposed principles, do the rest of us a favor.

As you stand there clutching your gun, just consider, for a moment, that nobody believes you. Because it’s all nothing but lies.

I’ve written before about gun control and our nation’s status as the shoot-em’-up capital of the industrialized world.

Seventeen people in Florida are dead because one angry man believed the AR-15 was the solution to all this problems. This uniquely American mindset apparently never manifests itself in the youth of, say, Belgium or Australia or Japan.

It’s a mystery — right?

Now, I’m certainly not going to get into all the defenses of the Second Amendment that we hear from conservatives every time there’s a mass shooting. These arguments range from the semi-principled to the clearly illogical to the completely bat-shit insane. So why put ourselves through it again?

I also don’t want to discuss the shooter. There are conflicting reports about whether he is a Latino, or a white supremacist, or some oddball combination of both. But ultimately, let’s skip it, because the less said about this pathetic loser, the better.

Instead, I want to dwell on the tiniest shred, the thinnest shard, of hope that this latest mass shooting might be a catalyst toward sanity.

Many of us feel that way, primarily because of the activism of teens and young people who are fed up with being viewed as target practice and/or acceptable losses in the fight for “freedom” or battle against “tyranny” or whatever vague, paranoid rationale gets tossed around as justification for allowing bloodbaths to occur with regularity on American soil.

Yes, there is already rumbling that “Hey, these kids aren’t as anti-gun as you think.” And even if every millennial demanded more gun control tomorrow, the political and cultural barriers to real, lasting change are daunting.

But we do know that one of the leaders of this youth drive is Emma Gonzalez, whose powerful speech has become both viral sensation and rallying cry.

This once again proves that if you want something done, turn to a Latina.

So maybe, possibly, we have turned a corner on this madness? Do we dare hope?

So the United States has resumed its wild, impetuous stab at having a functioning government. After this latest farce, internet sites are alive with comments along the lines of the following:

“We need to kick out every member of Congress and start fresh.”

I know we live in a country where nearly half the citizens people can’t name the vice president, but I find it hard to believe anybody is so ignorant of the political process that he or she thinks voting out all 535 members of Congress is a realistic option.

We’ll start with the fact that elections are staggered (hence the term “midterm election”). As such, I doubt anybody’s rage is going to last another five years or so, which is how long it would take to excise all the offending congressmen and women. And we’ll add on the stat that while most people hate Congress, they tend to like their own reps, so we will likely see most of these supposedly toxic incumbents return.

This idea is even less practical and more insane than the delusional belief, which I’ve written about before, that we can easily deport 11 million undocumented immigrants.

In the interest of saving time, here are some other political ideas I’ve heard recently that appear just as likely to happen.

“We need to separate into two different countries. Red states and blue states.” (I’m pretty sure we fought a war about this, and the outcome was rather conclusive. We appear to be stuck with one another for the foreseeable future.)

“We need a task force of really smart leaders who will come up with bipartisan solutions to our problems.” (That’s what Congress is supposed to be.)

“We need to mandate IQ tests to make sure people are smart enough to vote.” (Anyone who thinks an IQ test accurately measures political acumen probably doesn’t have a very high IQ.)

“We need to confiscate every gun in America that’s not in the hands of the police or military.” (It amazes me how liberals think that Second Amendment advocates—many of whom are paranoid and all of whom are armed—will somehow go along with this idea.)

“We need to use Jurassic Park-type technology to reanimate the Founding Fathers so they can tell us their original intent regarding the Constitution.” (OK, I made this one up, but wouldn’t that be cool?)

I must admit that I thought, ok, surely this man will be found guilty of something. Maybe not first-degree murder, but certainly a guy who defies police orders, grabs a gun, leaves the safety of his surroundings, and accosts a total stranger who is minding his own business — ultimately gunning that stranger down — well, he clearly did something wrong.

But not in Florida.

I’m not saying the jurors were morons, or the prosecution botched the case, or the law is messed up. It might be all or none of those things. I’m saying that somewhere along society’s sutures, there is a fundamental flaw that allows things like this to happen.

As for Zimmerman supporters, well, it’s one thing to say that legally the guy should not have been convicted. Perhaps you can make a case.

It’s another to smugly prance around with a sign saying, “Self-defense is a basic human right,” while completely (and shockingly) ignoring the fact that this principle should apply to Trayvon Martin just as much, if not more so, than to the adult packing heat who goes out of his way to provoke confrontation.

It’s worth remembering that Zimmerman’s family intentionally played down his Hispanic roots. That’s ok. I doubt many Latinos were insulted, as few of us really want to be associated with him.

Of course, Zimmerman will get his gun back. And now he’s learned he can use it on whomever he wants (especially unarmed teenagers) without fear of legal consequences. It’s apparently his right as an American.

So there I was, blasting away at the bull’s-eye with a .22 rifle. When I was done, I handed the gun back to its owner and wondered if I should feel exhilarated or manly or something. But I just felt indifferent.

I was fourteen, and that’s the only time I’ve ever fired a gun. In the decades since, I’ve had no desire to repeat the experience.

I don’t own a gun, a fact that aligns with a larger statistic. We Latinos are the ethnic group least likely to own a firearm. Just 18 percent of us are packing heat. In contrast, more than one-third of white people (and a sky-high 61 percent of Southern white men) are armed.

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Recently, I wrote about America’s love affair with guns. One argument that Second Amendment proponents use, to great effect, is that an armed citizenry prevents government tyranny.

Indeed, there are many Americans who believe that a “disarmed society is an obedient society…in which, at the extreme, people obey their own government’s orders to follow the line into the gas chambers.”

Well, that certainly is an unpleasant image.

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A few weeks ago, the head of the NYPD criticized Latinos and blacks for tolerating gun violence. Commissioner Ray Kelly’s timing could not have been more exquisite, for as we all know, some nut in Colorado has decided to take part in that most American of activities: the mass shooting of strangers.

Although it’s true that “America’s Hispanic population suffers from firearm violence at rates far greater than the U.S. population overall,” the idea that Latinos are more accepting of violence is darkly hilarious. After all, most of the mass shootings that grab headlines have taken place in predominately white small towns and suburbs.

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Just to be clear, nobody should yell “Nazi” at people unless there are, you know, actual Nazis present.

I make this clarification not just because it’s the truth, but because so many people have had their sensibilities offended during the arduous debate over immigration.

Judging from reader comments to several of my posts, it is not illegal immigrants and their supporters who have been slandered. No, this coalition of liberals and minimum-wage workers — outnumbered by at least two to one in many opinion polls — are the aggressors.

Yes, the “Nazi” label has apparently been tossed at people who support laws such as SB 1070. Now, even if you’re in a privileged position of economic power and numerical supremacy, and the person yelling it is near society’s bottom rung, that’s got to sting (although it would be nice to acknowledge that dynamic).

For the sake of argument, let’s call it even, and forget about all the racial slurs and threatening vitriol aimed at illegal immigrants. We’ll also let it go that much of people’s defensiveness (“I am not a fascist!”) is just the attempt to counter-attack uncomfortable accusations of racism.

It’s impossible to measure how many individuals on each side are acting like lunatics and to what degree. So let’s just call it unsightly all around.

However, I would ask that if you send me hyperbolic emails detailing crazed behavior by illegal immigrants, as one person did, that you at least keep it timely.

You see, I recently received a forward about the Montebello flag-raising incident. If you don’t recall, some Latino teenagers in California got out of hand during a demonstration. They raised the Mexican flag, and hung the American flag beneath it, upside-down.

It’s certainly a striking image. Perhaps that’s why it’s still flying around the internet as proof of a Latino insurrection, despite the fact that it happened in 2006.

Now, it would seem to me that if nothing more egregious than raising a flag has happened in the last four years, then the Hispanic overthrow of our government is not quite the threat the right wing is presenting.

At the risk of becoming defensive myself, I’d like to bring up an image from a demonstration that resonated with me. Granted, the protest was about healthcare, not immigration, but it at least occurred within the last year or so.

You may have seen this gentleman, and others like him. They believed it was a good idea to carry assault rifles to venues where President Obama was speaking.

The response from conservatives was praise and the usual pontificating about Second Amendment rights.

So if we’re keeping track: A bunch of unruly teenagers come up with a tacky way to protest, and it becomes a horrifying sign of revolution. However, grown men show up with firearms in a clear attempt to terrify their political foes, and it is a sign of patriotism.

The kids were disciplined for their idiotic prank. The guys with guns, however, went about their lives just fine, with the biggest burden probably the hassle of digging through the fan mail they received.

I could also point out that many of those teens have been told, sometimes overtly, that they are subhumans who have no rights. This is contrast to the adults with guns, who tend to be at the top of the American pecking order. They should also be – and let me phrase this delicately – old enough to know better.

So by all means, if the emotional response of teenagers is more of a threat to you than the aggressive tactics of adults, make your case. The odds are, however, that you will lose that competition.