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It’s not exactly like we gave her much in life, is it?
I haven’t written about Angie Zapata, which is particularly unforgivable since she was killed in my city. I find myself having trouble articulating anything that hasn’t already been said.
It might be that it’s too close, that those things made clear by her murder seem [...]

Not bad for a gun-hater.
So. A homophobic terrorist shoots up a Unitarian Universalist church, which is pretty much the mass murdering equivalent of kicking puppies. The usual suspects on both sides come out of the woodwork to claim that more guns or fewer guns, respectively, would have prevented this tragedy from occurring.
On the NRA side, [...]

My computer stopped turning on over the weekend. (* cue sound of sobbing children *)
I push the power button. Nothing! I unplug her, wait a minute, plug her back in and push the power button. Nothing! I pray whilst pushing the power button. I am struck by lightning*, but my computer does not turn on.
So, [...]

Mounties use tasers to sexually assault an aboriginal child. And get away with it.
Predictably, the article doesn’t call it sexual assault. But what does this sound like to you?

The girl, who was 16 at the time of the incident, said she was held down by four officers, one for each limb, while a taser was [...]

I think I may have mentioned in a few previous posts, in passing, that my childhood and adolescence were perhaps unfortunate from both a socioeconomic perspective and from a family dysfunctionality perspective. I tend to not go into much more detail than that and when I do, it is usually both very sparsely presented [...]

I am leery of the death penalty for two reasons, one philosophical, one brutally concrete.
The philosophical reason is that I object to the State, that amorphous and unaccountable collection of legislation, having the absolute power of life and death over any individual. The State already has a fair amount of control [...]

A Massachusetts politician and defense attorney has touched off a firestorm with his shocking public vow to torment and “rip apart” child rape victims who take the witness stand if the state legislature passed stiff mandatory sentences for child sex offenders.
Rep. James Fagan, a Democrat, made the comments during debate last month on the state [...]

Whatever side one falls on in the gun control debate, most people agree that handguns should not be in schools. It’s just a bad mix—volatile, trapped kids and deadly firearms. Any sane person ought to feel a bit uncomfortable at the thought of guns in a high school.
Unfortunately, sane people aren’t in charge in my [...]

And I’m not a big fan of capital punishment in general.
But can I still wish he was dead?
Child rapists can’t be executed, Supreme Court rules
The ruling stemmed from the case of Patrick Kennedy, who has been on Louisiana’s death row since 2003, when he was sentenced to be executed for raping his 8-year-old stepdaughter.
Kennedy [...]

Well, there are two nouns you don’t often see together. At least I haven’t much.
Our recent mild infestation of MRAs inspired the twinned thought above–it does seem odd at first, because other than the fact that they are both violent crimes committed by one person against another, they don’t appear to have much else [...]

Here’s one, from the Canadian Union of Public Employees, that should put a smile on your face:

Of course, we here in Canada recognize this as satire. I’m not sure that it reads that way to Americans. What do you think?
Hat tip: Audra Williams
And here’s one that really won’t put a smile on your face: American [...]

Is this more sad or more outrageous? I’m leaning towards infuriating:

“The police officer said if you call us one more time on him, I’m going to arrest you both,” Sherry Hall said. “So, the day she died, she knew she couldn’t talk to police. So, she handled it herself.”
Michele Karpowicz said everyone noticed the warning [...]