Around the anniversary of the Sandy Hook shooting, I saw this cartoon from the immediate shooting aftermath on Twitter:
It's a reminder of the gun community's specific tunnel vision, but it's also a reminder of the overarching narcissism of the American right. Within days of the Sandy Hook deaths, we were expected to put aside our concerns for the victims (and future victims) and start worrying about whether we'd bruised the tender feelings of right-wing gun owners by daring to recommend a few speed bumps on their road to obtaining more and more guns. By means of threats, recall elections, scored votes, and the usual arsenal of hardball tactics, the gunners not only won the political battle but made it clear that Sandy Hook was all about them. It was about their desire to acquire weapons, not everyone else's safety. It was about keeping them safe from a strongly worded statement by Piers Morgan on CNN. All that needed to be the nation's #1 priority, not working to prevent the deaths of more schoolchildren.
And now we have a TV star who's equated homosexuality and bestiality, asserted that black people got along fine with whites in America before there was welfare, and blamed the Japanese involvement in World War II on the fact that the Japanese aren't Christian -- and who are the real victims? Right-wingers again. Phil Robertson, as I keep telling you, hasn't been fired, and Entertainment Weekly now confirms that A&E very much wants to keep him on the air:
A source close to the situation confirmed that when the network resumes airing new episodes of Duck Dynasty starting Jan. 15, footage featuring the Robertson patriarch will indeed remain intact. The network also hopes the media and fan furor will cool down over the holidays and that tensions over shooting future episodes can then be resolved.And yet we're talking about the threat to Phil Robertson, not the crude attack on gays, blacks, Japanese people, and other non-Christians. The right has made this all about the victimization of right-wingers -- again.
The right does this all the time. A vigilante cop-wannabe shoots an unarmed black youth in Florida, and the real victims are right-wingers who cry "reverse racism" when they're criticozed for defending the shooter. Right-wingers are victimized by a Congress in which Democrats approve nominees using the majority they've earned in legitimate elections. Right-wingers tell us their goal is to "take our country back" -- as if the country belongs only to them, not to the duly registered voters who outvoted them. The word "our" in that phrase is like the shout of a bratty kid grabbing every toy in sight: "Mine!"
No interest outweighs the interests of the right. The right's interests dominate in all things. Ignore the right, and tantrums will be thrown.
