I’m not here to argue with anyone. I’ve learned a long time ago that there are certain things you just can’t discuss with certain people. Politics is one of them. Especially online. People are bullheaded and close-minded enough in person. Trying to reason with someone like that over the internet is the equivalent to trying to toss a quarter into a shot glass that’s spinning on a record player while you’re riding a unicycle on tightrope blindfolded and you’re using the other hand trying to thread a needle.
I can always respect a person’s right to protest. Even if I don’t agree with the cause itself, it’s a right to every American to protest. That doesn’t mean I DON’T agree with the “No Bill, No Break” sit-in taking place right now, because I very much do. Let me just get that out of the way. I love the fact that they’re doing this.
What I find interesting are the responses from those who don’t agree. Now of course, since these folks are part of the Democratic party, most of those who are not democrats will find some issue with it. It doesn’t matter what it is or how clever they try to be in expressing it. If their party did the exact same thing, they would be singing praises to the heavens. However, since it isn’t this time, it’s a “problem.”
Some folks are flat-out whining about it. Nothing much to say about that. Others have an issue with how they are protesting. But again, if you aren’t a democrat, then it really doesn’t matter how they do it, because you’re going to find a problem with it either way, despite how clever you try to be in disguising it. Some have said that this is “undignified” and “unconstitutional.”
How so? You don’t have like the way they’re doing it. How many times has something worked out in our favor, even if it happened in the ugliest fashion? Sports fans, how many times has our team won a game when it was about the ugliest game they could have played? It won’t be pretty all the time.
But the job got done. As what’s happening here.
Again, protesting is a right of all Americans. The same ones who are raising hell about the “government trying to take everyone’s guns away” (yes, people are still saying that one) are the ones who find a problem with this. So having a gun is your “right,” but the right to protest shouldn’t be allowed because it goes against that belief?
Some of you need history lessons.
It’s just like people who like to yap about “Freedom of Speech,” totally ignorant to what it means. Freedom of Speech means you cannot be jailed for your beliefs or what you say. That does NOT mean you can say what you want and people aren’t allowed to respond to it in the way they see fit. Because guess what? Just like you have Freedom of Speech, so do they, even if you don’t agree with it. The rights don’t disappear just because you don’t like how someone else exercises theirs. You cannot cuss your boss out and not expect to be fired. Somehow, I have to KEEP explaining THAT one as well.
The tricky thing about rights (especially in this country) is that sometimes, the effects of one’s person or group’s rights may contradict with another. That does not diminish those rights for either side. I know some of you may think so, but it’s really simple. Again, back to the example of being a sports fan; one team or athlete wanting to win doesn’t take away the other team or athlete’s “right” (figuratively speaking in this case) to want to do the same.
I’ve already written about this recently, so I won’t beat up on it too much more. There are a lot of gun owners and supporters who have what I feel is the right mindset in not being afraid to have gun regulations. They have nothing to hide and they understand its importance. However, there are MANY others (way too damn many) who do not. They feel that no rules should exist whatsoever when it comes to guns.
That is scary. I’m honestly more afraid of those people than I am any terrorist. If you don’t understand that, then let me explain it like this.
I am a black man. If I encounter a man who is straight up racist and he makes it clear, I am honestly less afraid of him than I would be if I walked into a room of 50 people and I knew 10 of them were racist, but I didn’t know which ones. The acts, as horrible as they are, to me, are less of a problem (to an extent) than the mindset. The mindsets tend to last much longer than the acts themselves, if that makes sense.
Anyway, I commend these folks so much. I’m one of MANY out there saying it, so I’d understand if this was lost in the shuffle. But they believe in something and they are standing up for it. Especially what I feel is a great cause. If I were there, I would do the same.
It’s really a shame that so many folks out there are so paranoid in believing the government is merely trying to “take all your guns away.” I still have yet to see a SINGLE statement that expresses this. To regulate something does not mean to take it away. Hell, our DRIVING is regulated, but I don’t hear anyone saying that the government is “trying to take our cars away.”
You have every right to feel the way you do about your guns. The beauty of living in this country is that it’s your right. However, these folks also have the right to protest in this manner if they see fit.
Here’s something else I find interesting. There are so many so-called “patriots” out there who figure that if they spout off this or that, it makes them look better, or “more” American than others. But here’s the problem with that. When you raise hell or object to your fellow Americans exercising their rights just as you would yours, that doesn’t speak to you being a patriot or a lover of America. You’re trying to take something away from someone else that we are all granted. You feel that you can use it, but they can’t.
I don’t care how you spin it. That is NO patriot. That’s a BULLY.
The bottom line is, these folks have my support. Even if they were fighting for a cause I did not believe in, you know what? I would respect that also. Because we have rights and they are exercising them. I am NOT the approving authority over which rights people are allowed to exercise and which ones they can’t.
No…I’m just one of the few hundred thousand Army soldiers who, for the past almost 19 years, has done my part in fighting for those rights. So I’ll be damned if I try to tell anyone that they cannot exercise them. Especially when I raised my hand back in 1997 and swore that I would never do so.
But to you all up there at the House…keep “sitting.” Your voices ARE being “heard;” even if those “listening” don’t want to hear it.
People's Court 