Dylan Roof arrested in church shooting

[Backroads]

Man arrested in shooting at historic black church

[Guest MormonGator]

May God bless the victims. Awful, just awful. 

[pam]

It's just horrible.  And to think he sat with them for about an hour before he started shooting.  

[Roseslipper]

Yes another terrible hate crime.

[David13]

I don't know so much hate, as insanity.  I don't mean insanity he didn't know it was wrong.  I mean demented as to think he could do that.

Twisted thinking.

They say he was taking some type of 'psychotropic' prescription drug, I suppose for his head being out of whack.  Little did they know how far out of whack it was.

dc

[Palerider]

Mental Health issue

[Guest]

I'm just ready for Jesus to come and free us of this world.

[NeuroTypical]

An earlier BBC story had some coverage of statements made by some family members:

 

-----

"I forgive you" said one victim's daughter, fighting back tears.

 

A woman who identified herself as the daughter of Ethel Lance said: "You took something very precious from me. I will never talk to her ever again. I will never be able to hold her again, but I forgive you. And have mercy on your soul."

 

Anthony Thompson, a relative of Myra Thompson, [said]  "I forgive you and my family forgives you," he said.

----- 

 

I don't have any experience with murderers, but I do have experience with rapists, child molestors, and parents who fail to protect their children from evil.  The people being quoted really are on to something here.

 

Forgiveness blesses the people hurt.  It may or it may not help the person who did the wrong, but it always blesses those who have been hurt.

[Bini]

I haven't followed this, other than what's flashed on the news for a brief moment. Don't know what to say, no words can really say anything that makes it better.

[Just_A_Guy]

On the reaction:

 

"The people of Charleston are handling this tragedy with much more grace and poise than those determined to rescue them".

 

And, further, from another commenter at the same link:

 

"It isn’t that the past was a time filled with moral giants, rather that the present is occupied by so very many moral pygmies."

[Leah]

On the reaction:

 

"The people of Charleston are handling this tragedy with much more grace and poise than those determined to rescue them".

 

And, further, from another commenter at the same link:

 

"It isn’t that the past was a time filled with moral giants, rather that the present is occupied by so very many moral pygmies."

 

A friend posted a quote on FaceBook from Samuel L. Jackson (the actor) that I think was a good take on the situation.

 

I am not intending to start a gun control debate, but he talked about growing up in the South and everyone had guns but people weren't running around shooting each other like they are today.  His take on it was that it's not about guns or gun laws, but it is about those who don't value human life.   That that is what we need to address.

[Blackmarch]

on the other hand at least he didn't try to go out in a blaze of glory and try to take as many with him as possible.

[NeuroTypical]

Yep, there's a difference between a dead-ender trying to go out with a bang, and a terrorist attempting to push his ideology and usher in a race war.  In this case, the short term difference is that probably fewer people were murdered in the church that day.  Not sure what the long-term difference will be.

[prisonchaplain]

Ironically, this shooting has given many conservatives the courage to tackle those within the ranks who are racist.  The Confederate flag is being removed from one state's government properties.  Those who used to utter the occasional racist slang, because friends and colleagues would tolerate, and now more likely to check themselves.  My hope is that the murderer will become so distraught over his evil act, that he'll repent.  On a personal level, I hope he encounters an anointed prison chaplain to guide him in that direction. 

[yjacket]

The Confederate flag is being removed from one state's government properties.  Those who used to utter the occasional racist slang, because friends and colleagues would tolerate, and now more likely to check themselves.

 

I grew up in the south and the Confederate flag was not a racist symbol . . . personally, I think the rest of the country should just but out of trying to tell the south how to run its business. It became a meme, individuals didn't like the confederate flag and used the actions of bad actors to make the claim the flag was racist.  Tell a lie long enough and enough people believe it.  Perception becomes reality.

 

"Occasional racist slang" . . . I don't think people understand what racist is anymore.  Racism is the believe that one race is better than another (which is wrong). Calling someone a name isn't racist, it's being rude and uncouth (and shouldn't be done).  Calling a redhead a "carrot-top" is being rude, slang such as "red-headed step-child" could be considered rude.  But to claim that one believes inherently that redheads are lesser human beings over slang and insulting remarks is over the top.

 

Words matter and definitions matter-unfortunately, the english language has been hijacked so that things don't mean the same thing.

 

1984, 1984 . . . .

[prisonchaplain]

yjacket, Perceptions run both ways.  White southerners may not see the Confederate flag as racist, but what of Black southerners?  What was that war over anyway?  Well, as you say, to some in the South it was Northerners "butting in."  Of course, the Chinese tell us the same thing when we raise the matter of human rights, religious rights, etc.

 

And again, perceptions...to use a name-call that invokes racial ill well (or hair color ill will) is racist.  Why say something derogatory, related to race?  To hurt that person on a matter they have no control over.  You protest, but I don't think I'm better because I'm white, so it's not racist!

 

This isn't PC baloney, and it's not speech-control, so government can manipulate the masses.  The South is not a separate country, and there is some historic sins that continue to haunt.  We'll continue "butt in," because we are commanded to be salt and light, and speak prophetically to the generations. 

[Just_A_Guy]

I grew up in the south and the Confederate flag was not a racist symbol . . .

 

Pardon the apparent glibness of this question, but . . . were you black?

 

I incline towards thinking much as you do--the actual rebellion was conceived in evil and the political leaders of the Confederacy were in the pockets of slave interests; but a lot (maybe most) of the grunts doing the actual fighting and dying, just wanted to be left alone and were fighting because--the war having already begun--they didn't like the prospect of armies of out-of-staters marching across their farms, burning their houses, and raping their wives and sisters.  Under ordinary circumstances I have no problem with the flag they died under being a part of any memorial to their sacrifice for what they believed to be right; even if that memorial is state-sponsored in some way.

 

But, I tell ya--I lurk on some blogs/discussion groups that I consider to be pretty mainstream conservative; and some of the stuff I've been seeing over the past week or so leaves me absolutely flummoxed--that slavery was only a trivial issue in the run-up to the Civil War; that the Confederacy would have been happy to abandon slavery at some point, that it would have been worth maintaining slavery on US soil for another generation or two if it meant we could have been spared the costs we paid in the Civil War, and even that Lincoln was a shill for Northern railroad interests who wanted war.  Given the antics of a vocal portion of the battle flag's apologists, it would seem that the left's horror at this emblem is better grounded than I ever thought possible.

 

I still think that the campaign against the battle flag--particularly in the private sector--amounts to a Thoughtcrime campaign; and these retailers that are refusing to carry battle flag merchandise whilst still selling communist flags, Che Guevara t-shirts, etc, are making buffoons of themselves.  But, from a state-sponsored speech aspect--I am now inclined to think it's time that state entities wishing to honor their Confederate dead, pick a less divisive emblem.

Edited June 25, 2015 by Just_A_Guy

[Just_A_Guy]

I would also add that, as Mormons, we ourselves have had to abandon certain symbols as evolving social views made them more offensive (or at least odd) to the societies in which we find ourselves.  Architecturally, for example, we've abandoned the use of the pentagram and a plethora of other graphical representations that are present in early LDS temples but absent from more recent structures.  And our temple rites have been modified repeatedly over the years.

Edited June 25, 2015 by Just_A_Guy

[Guest]

Are we discussing the flag now?

As a Filipino, I'm still wierded out on how the Civil War is taught in US Schools with Northerners as the good guy heroes saving the black people and the Southerners the racist pig villains.

The war was fought over Federal versus State Rights. Slavery was just the vehicle by which it was waged. Just as there are northern slave owners and northern anti-slavery, so did the south. But the south did not want the Feds to butt into their business. They want to solve their own problems. The heros and villains depend on whether you are pro-Fed or pro-State.

There are many Southerners defending the Confederate Flag for the plain and simple reason that they are tired of being painted as racist villains in the Civil War and that taking down the flag is blatantly admitting the South were racist pigs.

I see their point just like I see the black's point... and when they try to compare the Confederate Flag to the Nazi flag... that really just brings home this point - they don't even realize they just compared the Southerners to Nazis.

Edited June 25, 2015 by anatess

[Just_A_Guy]

The war was fought over Federal versus State Rights.

 

Right.  Specifically, the southern states' rights to enforce slavery within their borders, to spread it into the territories acquired in the Mexican war, to re-introduce it into portions of the Louisiana Purchase which had been closed to slavery via the Missouri Compromise of 1820, to compel the northern states to permit it within their borders via the Dred Scott decision, and ultimately to drag the Northern states into wars with Spain, Mexico, Nicaragua, and every other Latin American power until a "slave empire" was created stretching throughout the Caribbean and--in the dreams of some--all the way to Tierra del Fuego.

 

I agree that there's a lot of uncalled-for demonization of everything Southern, and I think a lot of the soldiers were simply doing the right as they saw the right.  But the political ringleaders--Ruffin, Stephens, Davis, Cobb and all the rest--richly deserved the squishing they got, and many of them frankly should have gotten worse. 

 

And, more to the point:  to make the CIvil War some kind of retroactive extension of the modern debates about the role of nationalism versus federalism is just not correct.  "States' rights" was just an excuse, used by the South to try to get what it wanted and happily cast aside when it came to--say--the Fugitive Slave Act, Dred Scott, or the Confederate Constitution's explicitly forbidding its member states from abolishing slavery. 

 

Modern "states' rights" advocates need to find some other heroes than the Secessionists of '61.  It's not exactly difficult, what with that whole American Revolution thing in our past.  Let the racists keep the Confederate battle flag.  As conservatives, the Gadsden Flag or the First Navy Jack are more than sufficient to our purposes.

Edited June 25, 2015 by Just_A_Guy

[Vort]

The early Utah Saints saw the Civil War as the wrath of God poured out upon the country that rejected the kingdom of God and persecuted its members. Frankly, I see more than a little merit in that viewpoint.

[NightSG]

Are we discussing the flag now?

As a Filipino, I'm still wierded out on how the Civil War is taught in US Schools with Northerners as the good guy heroes saving the black people and the Southerners the racist pig villains.

 

Yup; those people never address Missouri, Maryland, Delaware and Kentucky, where the Union allowed slavery to continue.

[Just_A_Guy]

The thing is:  Missouri, Maryland, Delaware and Kentucky did not start a freakin' war against other Americans for the express purpose of keeping their slaves.

Edited June 26, 2015 by Just_A_Guy

[Guest]

Right.  Specifically, the southern states' rights to enforce slavery within their borders, to spread it into the territories acquired in the Mexican war, to re-introduce it into portions of the Louisiana Purchase which had been closed to slavery via the Missouri Compromise of 1820, to compel the northern states to permit it within their borders via the Dred Scott decision, and ultimately to drag the Northern states into wars with Spain, Mexico, Nicaragua, and every other Latin American power until a "slave empire" was created stretching throughout the Caribbean and--in the dreams of some--all the way to Tierra del Fuego.

 

I agree that there's a lot of uncalled-for demonization of everything Southern, and I think a lot of the soldiers were simply doing the right as they saw the right.  But the political ringleaders--Ruffin, Stephens, Davis, Cobb and all the rest--richly deserved the squishing they got, and many of them frankly should have gotten worse. 

 

And, more to the point:  to make the CIvil War some kind of retroactive extension of the modern debates about the role of nationalism versus federalism is just not correct.  "States' rights" was just an excuse, used by the South to try to get what it wanted and happily cast aside when it came to--say--the Fugitive Slave Act, Dred Scott, or the Confederate Constitution's explicitly forbidding its member states from abolishing slavery. 

 

Modern "states' rights" advocates need to find some other heroes than the Secessionists of '61.  It's not exactly difficult, what with that whole American Revolution thing in our past.  Let the racists keep the Confederate battle flag.  As conservatives, the Gadsden Flag or the First Navy Jack are more than sufficient to our purposes.

Robert E. Lee did not fight the Civil War because he wants slavers to keep their slaves. Lee flew the Confederate Battle Flag - each element of which symbolizes the Confederacy - to secede from the overreaching power of the Union - Lincoln cannot afford for the Confederates to secede because then there wouldn't be enough money to keep the Union.

Let's put this in another scenario. The Spanish National Combat Flag was flown by Spain on the Filipino-Spanish war in the 1890's with the colors and the royal crest representing a national identity. Spain left a legacy of over 300 years of oppression against the Filipino people. Spain lost the war. The Spanish Flag today still resembles that National Combat Flag. The Spain National Soccer Team has that flag on their team jerseys. Should the Filipinos demand Spain to stop flying that flag and ban the soccer team from playing in the Philippines unless they change their jerseys?

We don't. The Flag represents Spain - even though they have done many many atrocities against the Filipinos in the name of Spain, that Flag represents the sum total of their history and national identity. We, as a people, are not so thin skinned that we go ape over things that hold no meaning today unless some media personality keeps on insisting and convincing us that the Spanish Flag is racist.

[prisonchaplain]

I'll know we're heading "south" when a poster starts referring to "The War of Northern Aggression."