By David Futrelle
On Gab — the “free speech” social media site that has become something of a haven for the internet’s worst people — some of the regulars have come up with a rather inventive explanation for the Parkland, Florida school shooting yesterday that left 17 dead. It’s all the fault of the Jews.
Never mind that an explicitly fascist group claims the accused shooter, 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz, as a member, and says he participated in their paramilitary training exercises. As some of the best minds on Gab see it, Cruz is actually the puppet of a vast Jewish conspiracy — and probably a Jew himself.
Their evidence? The fact that Cruz is such a well-known Jewish surname.
Wait, what?
While Cruz isn’t probably the first surname one thinks of when one thinks about Jewish surnames, there were some Spanish Jews who adopted the name to hide their Jewishness from the authorities … during the Spanish Inquisition. 500 years ago.
That of course isn’t proof that Cruz himself was Jewish.
Also, he was adopted.
But more than a few on Gab have something of a vested interest in trying to blame yesterday’s horrific carnage on a Jew or the Jews. See if you can figure out what the hidden agenda is as you scroll through these lightly censored comments from a fellow who calls himself DrGasChamber.
A Gabber called stevec, meanwhile, isn’t completely sure there even was a shooting yesterday. But whatever happened, he’s pretty sure Jews are to blame.
One commenter, the not-so-accurately named @NameTheJew, even made a little meme.
And no, there is no evidence that Elliot Rodger — that’s him on the left — was Jewish either.
Needless to say, not everyone on Gab blames the Jews for whatever they think happened in Parkland Florida yesterday. A fellow called Pho Chan, for example, had a rather different take on the Jewish Question.
Lovely.
For more on Nikolas Cruz, a possible incel who has been hailed by incels online as an Elliot Rodger style hero, see my post yesterday.
Shadowplay, I saw that yesterday, and that woman is my hero.
@ kupo
Cheers for that Kupo. That’s a,really interesting study; although I’ll probably have to ask Scildfreja to explain some of the bigger words to me.
It’s cheering that people are working to provide solutions for children so affected. It’s depressing that there’s a large enough pool of children that have experienced this to make the study statistically robust.
It’s not just you.
seconding you on Scild as well
Aw, thank you all <3 I'm not going anywhere! I just try to avoid writing in anger, and these threads are turning more and more into sniping and arguing amongst ourselves lately. So I consider a reply, realize it's just angry, and then decide against it.
On the PTSD that these kids are certainly getting – ain't a snowball in hell that these kids are going to get any resources for this. The day of the shooting, the congress tore down disability rights. Getting them help will require the same hard work as getting gun control. An excellent idea though, and I haven't seen anything like that out there! US peeps, that sounds like something you could call your local representatives about! Both state and federal reps might like that idea. Try calling them and see if they'd support the idea? It's worth it, at the very least it'd be doing something. Try it!
@WWTH, you very much are the watchdog of the community, and I can’t appreciate you enough for it <3 You are the momma duck and we are all the ducklings, it seems sometimes. And it's not very fair to you! Quite a strain, and I'm sure it makes it hard to post sometimes.
On that note,
I want the argument dropped too, @mrex. But not with that conditional. Not with the "go ahead and be unfair to me" condition. I've got a bit of a reply that might help you understand why you're running into so much flak for what is essentially agreement, if you want, but I won’t unless you ask me to. That sort of examination can be painful after all.
Something I haven’t seen mentioned here:
Trump and friends always say, “Nothing to do with guns; the shooter was mentally ill.” But the first piece of legislation he passed made it easier for mentally ill people to get guns.
Now I don’t think mental illness has anything to do with this, but Trump says it does and still made it easier for them to get guns.
@Schild
Don’t mind criticism, and I’ve always listened to you, even if you turned out to be wrong. Sometimes you seem to be eggshell walking around me. I have *no* desire to hurt you.
The anger and defensivness really only come if I feel that someone is intending to hurt me, or someone else, or if I can’t tell what someone’s intent is. I actually don’t feel that I’m being treated unfairly here, just feel frustrated and sad.
But maybe another place is the place to have this conversation?
@Sheila, that, exactly! The GOP’s thoughts and prayers ring so hollow when they don’t even pay lip service to the thing they’re blaming the shootings on. They’re basically telling Americans that they have to get used to it, ’cause they won’t be doing anything about it. I really hope you guys down there show’em that you won’t take that for an answer.
@mrex, I’ll be a bit more blunt in this one. I do walk on eggshells around you – many do I think. It isn’t because I’m afraid you’ll hurt me. It’s because I believe you’ll attack me. I self-censor to avoid conflict, ’cause I don’t got time for that.
I’m not sure how you want me to communicate this stuff to you; let me know how and I’ll do my best. It’s a workday for me, though, so I can’t do much more than occasional checking for posts.
Why? You create a hostile environment here; why would somewhere else be better to discuss that?
Thanks to all who had kind words.
Good point. There’s also the fact that there’s no way in hell Republicans will ever do anything to help people actually access high quality and effective mental health services. Undermining the ACA and CHIP is sure not a good start. I’d like to stress the effective part too, because even middle class people with health insurance can’t afford everything they or their dependents need.
This has nothing to do with shootings since eating disorders are not among the illnesses blamed for them, but I’ll use ED treatment as an example because it’s something I know a bit about. For inpatient services, insurance companies usually quit paying when a patient’s vitals get good and their weight goes back up into a BMI considered healthy. Or when they can be persuaded to eat a certain amount. But when a person is malnourished, their brain is just not going to be working well enough to really properly do intensive therapy. So patients get kicked out of treatment centers before they’re ready to go. So they just end up relapsing. I have a book of essays written by people with eating disorders and one of the authors had to fake a suicide threat because she knew she desperately needed inpatient care but the insurance companies said otherwise and going to the ER and saying she wanted to kill herself was the only way she was going to get it covered. Tl;dr it’s not just a matter of offering something threadbare because that doesn’t work. A mental illness is not something that can be fixed with 10 counseling sessions or whatever.
Serious reform of the US’ mental health care system is needed. Not because of mass shootings but because people just aren’t getting the care they need. If anyone thinks the GOP will be willing and able to anything even approaching that reform, they haven’t been paying attention. It’s just so insulting that they’re selling the improvement of mental health care as a solution to violent crime when we all know that they aren’t even going to follow through with their deflection. I wish they would, because we need that. But I know they won’t.
@Schild
Thought about it and I’m not opening my computer up. Just post here at your convenience.
I’m not as nice or as tactful as Scild and WWTH, so I’ll just say that I despise Mrex’s rotten guts so fucking much.
@Sheila Crosby,
Damn. Well said.
@WWTH,
It’s not good that you’re carrying so much weight on this when we’re all involved. What can we do to help?
Your efforts here are always appreciated, by the way, especially over the last couple of months, when you’ve done so much to keep this place going.
This appears to be an example of the broken clock rule. Cruz actually IS Jewish by biological ancestry (he was adopted). He had remarked on Instagram that he never wanted to meet his birth mother because she was Jewish.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/16/us/exclusive-school-shooter-instagram-group/index.html
So there appears to be a lot of self-loathing and internalized bigotry at play here, much as was the case with Chris Harper-Mercer and Elliot Rodger.
I’ve written this out a few ways, mostly to try to parse the social dynamic in my head. It’s gone through a few transformations since earlier today. I’ll keep it slim. It’s also just my perception, so take with salt.
You’re really aggressive, mrex. That’s the heart of the issue I think. In an argument you’re vociferous, but even in agreeing you’re still aggressive. I feel like there’s a dose of one-upsmanship in there as well, as if there’s a competition to be more right. It can almost feel like targetless aggression, disembodied. I’m never quite sure what’ll earn aggression from you in conversation, so I comment less.
More theoretical social dynamic stuff: aggression amongst friends, or in non-hostile or unsure social contexts, is a dominance display. It’s about asserting authority, carving out a niche. In a hostile social context it’s still a hierarchy thing, but much more about forcing out the opposing elements instead of just shaking out social positions.
Dominance displays and hierarchy aren’t bad in and of themselves! Heck, I’m engaged in one right now. Mediation is also an assertion of dominance, it’s placing oneself as a central figure in a social group. Excessive aggression fractures group cohesion, though. I feel that’s the issue.
When you first started commenting, I recall you saying that you liked causing a bit of chaos, or something of the sort. That you’ve been in other commentariats and were ejected. I suggest that maybe it’s your aggression that caused it.
I hope you can understand why you get a negative reaction, and that my external perception can help you figure things out!
Fuck, someone even shot at republican congressmen and they still won’t pass some fucking gun control.
They literally give no fucks about controlling guns, because apparently that NRA paycheck is so fucking good.
That’s really the thing, the paycheque isn’t even all that great. Have you seen some of the payouts? Pathetically small for a political campaign. Like, “down payment on a sensible mortgage” scale.
Nah, I figure that they’re all afraid of negative smear campaigns. The NRA has smeared a number of politicians very successfully in the past, and basically hold that over the heads of every other representative. They’re all too chicken to stand up against it – probably because they all have way too much legitimate dirty laundry for the NRA to air.
They really do need to grow some ovaries and f’n stand up already. Cowards.
My opinion at least!
Yep.
I’m really sick of the “I’m more right than everyone else” attitude.
Yep. In addition to that, I’m tired of the intentional digs at people and the attitude that other people’s feelings aren’t important but hers are.
And the whole “be unfair to me” BS.
WWTH, I should have been in here supporting you from the start and I’m sorry I haven’t been.
I am little bit tired that what I written is ingored even if i say it many times and try to write in different ways. and I am annoyed when words put in my mouth to make me look like the bad guy. ? and I’m annoyed that generally I am afraid to say this or say what I really think, or look angry – because again I will be made to look like I am the bad guy.
@Schild
“When you first started commenting, I recall you saying that you liked causing a bit of chaos, or something of the sort.” Not chaos, but dissenting opinions. At the time, I had been hanging out with skeptics™, which didn’t do me any favors. That was also a couple of years ago, I honestly thought that I was pulling away from that.
“It can almost feel like targetless aggression, disembodied. I’m never quite sure what’ll earn aggression from you in conversation, so I comment less.”
A lot of the times it is targetless rage.
I guess it never sunk in that I could be intimidating people away from commenting though, or coming off as dominating them. That’s a huge problem, and 100% me. Thanks for sharing. 🙁
Maybe because, like Valya just pointed out, you often ignore people. We’ve told you this before.
Mish, Hippodameia,
No worries!
It doesn’t usually stress me out too much to actually be the meanie pants one who pushes back against BS. It does seem to stress others out. So I don’t mind doing it. It’s even good for me to do it because it’s easier for me to stand up for myself or others online than off so it’s kind of good practice.
I just worry sometimes that I’m upsetting others by being so quick to push back. So I do hope you all will let me know if I go too far.
Absolutely not.
Yes. This.