AND ANOTHER THING.

[kebechet]

As I told my friend Meghan, it would do my heart some good if all the cowboys out there would shut the fuck up. The self-congratulatory, faux-messiah, would-be hero bullshit is truly insulting to real human beings who were really there and who are really fucking suffering. Your Wyatt Earp nonsense diminishes legitimate grief and pain.

AND ONE MORE FUCKING THING, and I promise I'll shut the hell up.

As Kate put it: 'It doesn't matter why the kids were at the movies in CO. Stop. Blaming. Victims.'

So fucking what if some parents took their kids to a midnight movie? Somehow it makes it /their/ fault that a lunatic gunman went berserk and shot at them? I reckon a movie theatre ranks pretty high up there in the list of Reasonably Safe Places to Take Your Children No Matter What Time It Is. Stop blaming victims.

Comments

[agameofthree.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I'm as horrified as anyone about what happened in Colorado, especially since I lived there and have friends there. The judgmental people, though, are really pissing me off. Not everyone has family and/or babysitters that they are near and/or trust. Going to the movies is expensive; hiring a babysitter on top of that even more so. Does that mean parent(s) that don't have money, family, friends and/or a babysitter shouldn't be allowed to go to the movies and enjoy a night out, even if it is with kid(s) in tow? I makes more sense to bring your infant to a midnight showing than, say, a 5PM showing. Most kids sleep then, and very young kids usually can sleep through anything. I know my daughter could, and did.

Also, every parent knows their child best, and what they can and can't handle. I wouldn't take my 9 year-old to this particular movie, but I've taken her to/let her watch movies that would probably make other people question my judgment. Fuck that. I know her and what she can handle, and it's not based (entirely) on her age, but who she is as a person.

This isn't about babies and/or children crying in a theater. Yeah, that's rude of the parents not to do something about it. But it's also rude to text or use your cell. So is kicking the back of someone's seat. So is talking loudly and/or to the screen. These are all things that adults do, though, yet no one paints all adults with that particular brush, or criticize adults being in movie theaters/on airplanes/in restaurants.

It's just another way of taking focus away from the sheer horror of what happened, and the underlying reasons of why it happened. It's also, IMO, just another fucking attack on women, as when we say "bad parenting choices," what we really mean are "bad mothering choices." Women and children are treated like second-class citizens in this country, and it's appalling. We are such a family-unfriendly country, when it really comes down to it, no matter what the rhetoric preaches.

Sorry. Obviously a sore spot.

I wish healing to everyone touched by this, and hope against hope it won't just throw us into more divisiveness, although that's looking less and less likely. :(