Fucking Guns

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Comments

  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    Big mistake. Peep through the peephole or ask "Who is it, please?" Never open the door to someone unknown.
    He might well have looked through, seen a cop and opened it because it was a cop. Not being an American, he mightn't have realised that is not a safe thing to do for a black man.

    Indeed. His mother, the poor woman, sounded like she had a Caribbean accent. (How those people have been mistreated in Britain!) That Australian white woman who was shot dead in Minneapolis did what many of us would do when we call the cops: go outside to meet them so we can give the cops the info they need. (They went that way, occifer)
  • I don't know about Australia, but American police training is less than the non-firearm carrying UK police. And yet they still carry weapons. It typically gets worse the smaller the police departments. And, in general, the attitude of the police is more adversarial and authoritarian in the US.
    So these incidents will happen, even beyond the rate of chance. And the rate of these incidents is higher when the civilian is not white, even when every other factor is balanced.
    The problem is compounded by not knowing exactly what behaviour is desired by a particular officer.
    Anything can be seen as suspicious. Pick an action, and someone has been shot doing it. And the courts will most often side with the police, even if the evidence calls them liars. And again, the odds that one will be shot and the police believed, increase proportionately to the melanin in one's skin.
    Colour is a factor in the UK as well, but an unarmed force means fewer people die as a result.
  • To clarify, before someone comes by to clarify, UK force is mostly unarmed. And those that are allowed to carry must take additional training.
  • I hate to be practical at a time like this, but (1) The door was unlocked? (2) She didn't recognize that the furnishings/decor/layout/etc. weren't hers?

    I've never done it with an apartment, but on more than one occasion I've spent 30 seconds or so sitting in someone else's car wondering why my key won't start it before I've figured it out.
  • Alan Cresswell Alan Cresswell Admin, 8th Day Host
    Twilight wrote: »
    Today's news says our police shooter of the moment did not use her key (or fob) to enter the man's apartment. He heard her fumbling and opened the door to her.
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    Big mistake. Peep through the peephole or ask "Who is it, please?" Never open the door to someone unknown.
    He might well have looked through, seen a cop and opened it because it was a cop. Not being an American, he mightn't have realised that is not a safe thing to do for a black man.
    On the other hand, one would expect that someone opening the door shouldn't have
    escalated the situation. It would be an unusual intruder who answers a knock on the door.
  • And unless he answered the door with a gun in his hand that he pointed at her, her instinctive response should not have been to draw her weapon and fire.

    At any rate, the latest news is that she's been arrested and is out on bond.
  • jedijudyjedijudy Heaven Host
    Ruth wrote: »
    What I want to know is why she was in uniform when she wasn't on duty. Cops leave their uniforms in lockers at work; they don't wear them home.

    I know different places have different rules, but when my son-in-law was working for the sheriff's department here, all his uniforms were at home. He went to work in uniform, and came home the same way.
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    I don't know about Australia, but American police training is less than the non-firearm carrying UK police. And yet they still carry weapons. It typically gets worse the smaller the police departments. And, in general, the attitude of the police is more adversarial and authoritarian in the US.
    So these incidents will happen, even beyond the rate of chance. And the rate of these incidents is higher when the civilian is not white, even when every other factor is balanced.
    The problem is compounded by not knowing exactly what behaviour is desired by a particular officer.
    Anything can be seen as suspicious. Pick an action, and someone has been shot doing it. And the courts will most often side with the police, even if the evidence calls them liars. And again, the odds that one will be shot and the police believed, increase proportionately to the melanin in one's skin.
    Colour is a factor in the UK as well, but an unarmed force means fewer people die as a result.

    Australian cops are not angels, I hasten to add. There is racism, especially against Aborigines and the most recently arrived migrant group. I reckon Islanders probably cop it too, but they are not a group targeted by the gutter press. So there is a check your privilege situation happening. I like to think our police training is good, but they do tend to use OTT physical force especially when arresting people with a history of mental illness.
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    Ruth wrote: »
    What I want to know is why she was in uniform when she wasn't on duty ...
    ... not to mention why she was carrying her gun when she wasn't on duty.

    I saw a fairly detailed article (can't remember the source) that suggested that a tiny amount of marijuana was found when the gentleman's flat was searched*, but that he was a member of a Christian denomination that frowned on drinking and dancing, let alone illegal drugs. The words "planted" and "evidence" spring to mind. Not that it would justify killing him.

    * Their resources might have been better spent searching the policewoman's flat.
  • RooKRooK Shipmate
    edited September 2018
    Piglet wrote: »
    ... not to mention why she was carrying her gun when she wasn't on duty.
    Yeah, that's adorable. Most the police I know here in 'Merika carry all the time. And the ones I'm not sure about probably just have something better concealed.
  • Piglet wrote: »
    I saw a fairly detailed article (can't remember the source) that suggested that a tiny amount of marijuana was found when the gentleman's flat was searched*, but that he was a member of a Christian denomination that frowned on drinking and dancing, let alone illegal drugs. The words "planted" and "evidence" spring to mind. Not that it would justify killing him.

    * Their resources might have been better spent searching the policewoman's flat.

    I would think that if the police force wanted to plant evidence they would have done a better job of it than to plant a small amount of marijuana, because it wouldn't make a bit of difference to the case if he had a meth lab in the back bedroom. He was shot in his doorway, the policewoman would have had no opportunity to see any drugs. If someone had wanted to plant evidence to help her get away with murder, a gun by the victim's hand would have made more sense.

    The woman had a history of shooting quickly. It sounds to me like she was far too fearful and nervous to ever make a good policewoman, plus she may have also been a racist, but I see no reason to accuse her entire police force of corruption.
  • Twilight wrote: »
    The woman had a history of shooting quickly. It sounds to me like she was far too fearful and nervous to ever make a good policewoman, plus she may have also been a racist, but I see no reason to accuse her entire police force of corruption.

    I would argue that there's a different sort of corruption at work. As you point out the presence of marijuana has no bearing on the shooting. On the other hand a lot of police-involved shootings involve the "he was no angel" defense, with police forces making public various details about the victim's life that are both unsavory to the general public and irrelevant to the case. The idea is to sway public opinion to the idea that the victim had it coming and was no great loss anyway. So while the marijuana may not have been planted (people do occasionally do things contrary to their denomination's teachings) making a point to put that irrelevant information before the public seems corrupt.
  • Crœsos wrote: »

    I would argue that there's a different sort of corruption at work. As you point out the presence of marijuana has no bearing on the shooting. On the other hand a lot of police-involved shootings involve the "he was no angel" defense, with police forces making public various details about the victim's life that are both unsavory to the general public and irrelevant to the case. The idea is to sway public opinion to the idea that the victim had it coming and was no great loss anyway. So while the marijuana may not have been planted (people do occasionally do things contrary to their denomination's teachings) making a point to put that irrelevant information before the public seems corrupt.

    I agree, with your whole post, insofar as the police's effort to sway public opinion with the "he was no angel," stories. We saw that in the case last winter where a man was shot by police while he was holding a cell phone. The police let it be known that he was an ex-,out on parole, with a history of burglary and that the police had been called with reports of a man breaking in cars and they released sky-cam film of him looking in cars. All to let us know "he was no angel." It shouldn't matter! They shot an unarmed man!

    On the other hand, the press (at least the liberal press I read) invariably tries to sway public opinion toward the victims, with it's headlines.They reported that same case like this: "Unarmed father of three, shot in his grandmother's backyard." It also shouldn't matter that he was in his grandmother's back yard or how many babies he has fathered. The police had no way of knowing whose yard he was in and the life a father has no more value than the life of a childless man.

    The press portrayed Travon Martin as someone several years younger and much smaller than he actually was, constantly mentioning the fact that he had just purchased candy at the store (to make him seem younger) and never mentioning the fact that he was currently suspended from school for beating up the bus driver.


    I think It's our job to read all these reports carefully when trying to get to the truth of the incidents and not allow ourselves to be swayed by our personal prejudices.

    In this latest, "She went to the wrong door" case, I think it's pretty clear that nothing will justify her actions and that Mr. Jean truly was a model citizen, pinch of marijuana or not.


  • Pointing out the family connections of the victims isn't to imply it somehow makes it worse, or shouldn't be. It does serve however as counter to the "no angel" line which seeks to reduce people to their crimes, and pretend that these aren't people like everyone else with families and all the rest of it. No-one is simply "a criminal".
  • Twilight wrote: »
    The press portrayed Travon Martin as someone several years younger and much smaller than he actually was, constantly mentioning the fact that he had just purchased candy at the store (to make him seem younger) and never mentioning the fact that he was currently suspended from school for beating up the bus driver.
    That seems very odd, doesn't it? You'd think that "beating up the bus driver" would merit action a little stronger than a school suspension, wouldn't you? The Wikipedia article on Trayvon Martin says the suspension was for marijuana.
    I think It's our job to read all these reports carefully when trying to get to the truth of the incidents and not allow ourselves to be swayed by our personal prejudices.
    Sure, that's "our" job.
  • Twilight wrote: »
    I agree, with your whole post, insofar as the police's effort to sway public opinion with the "he was no angel," stories. . . .

    On the other hand, the press (at least the liberal press I read) invariably tries to sway public opinion toward the victims, with it's headlines. . . .

    This seems like a false equivalence. "The press", of whatever political stripe, is usually understood to be able to express opinions and support or deride individuals as it sees fit. Their main limits are avoiding libelous statements. I'm not sure it's understood to be part of policing to perform public character assassinations of the people they're investigating for faults beyond the scope of the investigation. This would seem to be doubly the case when the police are investigating alleged misconduct by one of their own.
  • edited September 2018
    Crœsos wrote: »
    "The press", of whatever political stripe, is usually understood to be able to express opinions.
    Which is not the same as reporting the news.
  • Crœsos wrote: »
    "The press", of whatever political stripe, is usually understood to be able to express opinions.
    Which is not the same as reporting the news.

    Very few news items come without opinion attached. Usually this is uncontroversial. For example, the recent series of gas explosions in Massachusetts are treated as "bad" by the news agencies reporting on them. The fact that they caused one death is also regarded as "bad", while the fact that they didn't kill the potentially larger number of people they potentially could have killed if they had occurred at a different time of day is treated as "good". Very few people other than @Amanda B Reckondwyth would regard these positions as disqualifying something from being considered "reporting the news".
  • Good journalism makes a clear distinction between news and opinion. Witness PBSNewshour, which does both, but its clear what you're getting.

    I understand Fox does a good job with that distiction too, but I find it difficult to judge because I can't find their nightly news broadcast on Youtube. What do they call it?
  • KarlLB wrote: »
    Pointing out the family connections of the victims isn't to imply it somehow makes it worse, or shouldn't be. It does serve however as counter to the "no angel" line which seeks to reduce people to their crimes, and pretend that these aren't people like everyone else with families and all the rest of it. No-one is simply "a criminal".

    Thank you for this, Karl. I really hadn't looked at it that way and now I can see a purpose beyond playing up to it's audience (talking to you NPR.) Still, most recently the first the general public knows about these incidents is when it's reported in the media with headlines like "Police arrest men in Starbucks for sitting while black." Only later does the chief of police show up , usually only locally, to give a little more information about why the police did what they did.
  • Dave W wrote: »
    Twilight wrote: »
    Wikipedia article on Trayvon Martin says the suspension was for marijuana.

    The Wikipedia article also mentions that the judge in the case decided to rule out inclusion of Trayvon's twitter account where his brother says " "Yu ain't tell me you swung on a bus driver," and implies he was suspended for punching him and marijuana possession. I shouldn't have said "beat him up," because all I've read in the last few minutes makes it seem like only one punch.

    I believe Zimmerman was wrong all along. He shouldn't have been carrying a gun on Neighborhood Watch. He shouldn't have questioned Trayvon at all, and he definitely shouldn't have shot Trayvon no matter how badly he was losing the fight. I just don't think we needed to be told Trayvon was an angel when he was, like many 17 year-old boys the world over, going through a phase where fighting was an exciting part of his life, he was bragging to his girlfriend about it, some of his friends said he was obsessed with it, and he was describing himself as "gangsta." Maybe we could have had a national conversation about fight culture as well as the importance of keeping guns out of the hands of pretend cops. Instead it just turned into the usual protests about race, which it was never about.
  • Alan Cresswell Alan Cresswell Admin, 8th Day Host
    In an ideal world it would simply be wrong to kill anyone, especially anyone who at that moment posed no danger to anyone. Previous criminal history would not be relevant, even if someone was known to have murdered someone should not be killed if they don't pose a threat at that time. Race most definitely shouldn't be a factor.
  • Crœsos wrote: »
    Very few news items come without opinion attached. . . . Very few people other than @Amanda B Reckondwyth would regard these positions as disqualifying something from being considered "reporting the news".
    Which is a sad, sad comment on the depths to which contemporary journalism has sunk.
  • In an ideal world it would simply be wrong to kill anyone, especially anyone who at that moment posed no danger to anyone. Previous criminal history would not be relevant, even if someone was known to have murdered someone should not be killed if they don't pose a threat at that time. Race most definitely shouldn't be a factor.

    I agree. I think "previous criminal history" usually just comes up in the news to offset the, "and he was such a perfect little angel," stories or else to try and explain some of the police actions. If the police stop a car and their information tells them that the person they've just stopped has a history of violent crime, that sometimes makes them more fearful and so more likely to use their guns. That doesn't make it right but more understandable.

    I agree, though, that killing someone except in clear self-defense or defense of another is wrong in any example I can think of. Race should never be a factor, nor appearance, criminal history, mental health, size, manners, tone of voice...

  • Twilight wrote: »
    Dave W wrote: »
    Wikipedia article on Trayvon Martin says the suspension was for marijuana.

    The Wikipedia article also mentions that the judge in the case decided to rule out inclusion of Trayvon's twitter account where his brother says " "Yu ain't tell me you swung on a bus driver," and implies he was suspended for punching him and marijuana possession. I shouldn't have said "beat him up," because all I've read in the last few minutes makes it seem like only one punch.
    Oh for fuck's sake. The reason for his suspension is hardly going to be a secret hidden in something his brother said on Twitter.

    Why don't you stop pretending you "think It's our job to read all these reports carefully when trying to get to the truth of the incidents and not allow ourselves to be swayed by our personal prejudices" and do something to make yourself a little less annoying, like learning to use the quote function properly.
  • Twilight wrote: »
    Still, most recently the first the general public knows about these incidents is when it's reported in the media with headlines like "Police arrest men in Starbucks for sitting while black." Only later does the chief of police show up , usually only locally, to give a little more information about why the police did what they did.

    Over at the Washington Post Radley Balko has compiled a fairly extensive collection of studies illustrating the systematic racism of American law enforcement. Contrary to Twilight's assertion this often exists beyond the explicit intentions of individual actors.
    A couple years ago, Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) gave a powerful speech on the floor of the U.S. Senate. Scott talked about how he had been repeatedly pulled over by police officers who seemed to be suspicious of a black man driving a nice car. He added that a black senior-level staffer had experienced the same thing and had even downgraded his car in the hope of avoiding the problem. Given that Scott otherwise has pretty conservative politics, there was little objection or protest from the right. No one rose up to say that he was lying about getting pulled over.

    The thing is, most people of color have a similar story or know someone who does. Yet, there’s a deep skepticism on the right of any assertion that the criminal-justice system is racially biased.

    <snip>

    Of particular concern to some on the right is the term “systemic racism,” often wrongly interpreted as an accusation that everyone in the system is racist. In fact, systemic racism means almost the opposite. It means that we have systems and institutions that produce racially disparate outcomes, regardless of the intentions of the people who work within them. When you consider that much of the criminal-justice system was built, honed and firmly established during the Jim Crow era — an era almost everyone, conservatives included, will concede rife with racism — this is pretty intuitive. The modern criminal-justice system helped preserve racial order — it kept black people in their place. For much of the early 20th century, in some parts of the country, that was its primary function. That it might retain some of those proclivities today shouldn’t be all that surprising.

    It's fairly lengthy, but the numerous links speak for themselves if you've got the time and inclination.
  • Crœsos wrote: »
    Twilight wrote: »
    Still, most recently the first the general public knows about these incidents is when it's reported in the media with headlines like "Police arrest men in Starbucks for sitting while black." Only later does the chief of police show up , usually only locally, to give a little more information about why the police did what they did.

    Over at the Washington Post Radley Balko has compiled a fairly extensive collection of studies illustrating the systematic racism of American law enforcement. Contrary to Twilight's assertion this often exists beyond the explicit intentions of individual actors.

    What assertions are those? I've been talking about the news and its headlines that tend to slant sympathy toward the victims and away from the police before the whole story is barely out. Sometimes that slant is deserved and sometimes it isn't.

    I have never "asserted" that police brutality doesn't exist or that police profiling doesn't exist or that racism doesn't exist in the police force.

    My son has been stopped by police many times, he's been arrested and jailed for loitering, he's been stopped and questioned by police while walking, empty handed, on country roads. One of the police in this town was sent to prison for raping eleven young teen boys over the course of his career. I don't have an entirely rosy picture of the police.

    On the other hand, I've seen the police be extremely kind and gentle in some tricky situations with the mentally ill and disabled in this town. All police are not the same.

    If you want to argue with a white supremacist I suggest you go to one of their sites. I'm not volunteering for the role and you can quit trying to turn me into one with your false inferences.
  • Twilight wrote: »
    I've been talking about the news and its headlines that tend to slant sympathy toward the victims and away from the police before the whole story is barely out. Sometimes that slant is deserved and sometimes it isn't.
    I don't think the slant actually exists. Where did you hear about Martin's past? Or, indeed, about any police shooting victim. The same press that you claim is slanted towards the victim.
  • I think you're just making the point for me, Lilbuddha. The press reports cases like the men arrested in Starbucks precisely because it looks like either police overstepping or police profiling. I doubt if that case would have made even local news if two white men had been asked to leave Starbucks. Without the "sitting while black" line it just wouldn't make compelling news.

    The Travon Martin case would probably have made the national news because of the rarity of someone being shot by an idiot on "neighborhood watch" who was carrying a gun. But I think it became such a huge riot causing national event because of the press fanning the flames. The place I heard about Travon's past was on YouTube right after the event. Schoolmates posted short films from their cellphones showing him in fights and telling about how he was caught up in fight culture. Those things didn't stay on YouTube very long and I can just imagine the push back those kids got from their community, because Travon became a national hero in a very short time. It's also on YouTube that I saw the full story of what happened in Starbucks and the Chief of police ( a black man) explaining the police's side of it.

    To get pack on track. I think the Dallas policewoman will at least do time for manslaughter, if not murder, as well she should. There's no reason to blame the police for searching the scene of a crime, as that is procedure, and I think if they wanted to "plant evidence" to exonerate their own it wouldn't have been a pointless pinch of marijuana which would have had no bearing on the case at all. It would have been a gun by the victim's body. In a country where marijuana is legal in more and more states a little bit in a man's home would hardly be damaging to his reputation let alone pertinent to the case.
  • I read things about Martin’s past in the regular media.
    The typical routine is publish fast, then, if the story has legs, publish whatever keeps it going.
    So, in a case like this, they publish things that work in different directions, but people remember what agrees with their preconceptions.
  • I came across this on Twitter yesterday. I find it hauntingly beautiful and horrific at the same time. And knowing that it was made by one of the Parkland fathers... there are no words. It is a wonderful piece of art and a horrific reality.

    [Mascara warning]

    AFZ
  • I came across this on Twitter yesterday. AFZ

    The comments were upsetting, too. One seven year-old girl told her mother they were taught to take cover like that and throw scissors at the shooter. What the heck? If the shooter doesn't get the child from the front, the wildly thrown scissors will get him from the back.

  • I came across this on Twitter yesterday. AFZ
    That's the consecration of the gifts at the black mass of the gun isn't it?
  • BoogieBoogie Heaven Host
    Twilight wrote: »
    I came across this on Twitter yesterday. AFZ

    The comments were upsetting, too. One seven year-old girl told her mother they were taught to take cover like that and throw scissors at the shooter. What the heck? If the shooter doesn't get the child from the front, the wildly thrown scissors will get him from the back.

    Aside from the utter lunacy of expecting a child to fight against a gunman (wtf?), school scissors are pretty blunt.

  • Good point.
  • I came across this on Twitter yesterday. AFZ
    That's the consecration of the gifts at the black mass of the gun isn't it?

    Sorry, I don't know what you mean? Am I being thick?

    AFZ
  • Alan Cresswell Alan Cresswell Admin, 8th Day Host
    Twilight wrote: »
    Good point.

    Or not, since the ends are rounded rather than pointed.
  • I came across this on Twitter yesterday. AFZ
    That's the consecration of the gifts at the black mass of the gun isn't it?

    Sorry, I don't know what you mean? Am I being thick?

    AFZ
    No, you're not thick.

    I think it is Good Art, which doesn't mean that I like it. It means that it provokes strong response in the viewer. I don't like it actually.

    My first reaction to the sculpture picture was the same as others': that it is terrible, sickening, awful. That it would have to exist as a representation of something that actually happens and happened and will happen again.

    I then thought of a lamb led to the slaughter, and the gun as the ritual instrument of the sacrifice of the lamb. The child is the lamb, the scapegoat, the focus of our loathing, paying for the sin. Very Old Testament. God loved (I suppose) Isaac, but we actually hate the child, or at least the child is loved less than the Constitution and the Second Amendment. And at the same time the gun itself is the sin. We don't worship the Cross and the nails. But in this black mass of the gun, the gun is worshipped. If there was a second sculpture, if it was a series, it would be of bullets going into the child, the cathartic killing of the child. Which is the point. The children must be sacrificed to the sacred gun and the sacred document. Then the children's blood is drunk by the explainers who exclaim sorrow and that the answer is more guns.

    Taking some Bruce Cockburn lines out of context:
    Sinister cynical instrument
    Who makes the gun into a sacrament.


    -from Call it Democracy, 1985, and I call this good art, because it provokes me to understand something I didn't before I saw it. I still don't like it.
  • More striking is that one of the biggest drivers of the group’s falling revenue is dwindling dues from NRA members, which fell from more than $163 million in 2016 to $128 million in 2017.
    NRA dues down

    Do you see this trend continuing? That is quite a drop. Does it, do you think, equate to a drop in support, or is it just donors tightening belts?
  • Alan Cresswell Alan Cresswell Admin, 8th Day Host
    Political parties tend to gain support when there is something to campaign for, and lose them when it's seen that the campaign is done - either won, or no chance at the moment. As an example I'm familiar with, Scottish political parties (the pro-indy SNP and Greens in particular) gained a massive boost in membership in 2014, which has been gradually eroded after the referendum as it was recognised that there wouldn't be another chance for a generation.

    I'd expect the same to apply to the NRA - while people think that there's no risk of any changes in gun laws there's nothing to get them worried enough to join (or renew membership). The challenge is get those members back when circumstances change.
  • Shooting at a synagogue today. Multiple deaths, the shooter in custody.
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    And the idiot-in-chief thinks the answer is to have armed guards in synagogues and churches. God help you.
  • Alan Cresswell Alan Cresswell Admin, 8th Day Host
    He's just aping the lunacy of the NRA. He's incapable of original thought.
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    He's incapable full stop.
  • RuthRuth Shipmate
    The synagogue may have had an armed guard. The one closest to me does.
  • Seriously? (I know you are ... I'm just shocked).

    Do you think there is a general feeling of security with such things? I feel an armed guard at church would make me less likely to go, but then I am not American.
  • Climacus wrote: »
    Seriously? (I know you are ... I'm just shocked).

    Do you think there is a general feeling of security with such things? I feel an armed guard at church would make me less likely to go, but then I am not American.

    I would refuse. And I am an American.
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    Piglet wrote: »
    And the idiot-in-chief thinks the answer is to have armed guards in synagogues and churches. God help you.

    I didn't hear about that bit. But he did say it was "anti-semitic". Duh!!! And that it's shocking it would happen in this day and age. It's a horrible thing. But hardly new for synagogues and/or their members to be attacked.
  • BoogieBoogie Heaven Host
    edited October 2018
    Piglet wrote: »
    And the idiot-in-chief thinks the answer is to have armed guards in synagogues and churches. God help you.

    Wouldn’t a gunman just stop his car and shoot the guard first? 🤔

    Lots more ‘thoughts and prayers’ going round again. 🙄
  • Synagogues in Melbourne all have guards who are probably armed. Temple Beth Israel which I visited about a decade ago has a great big gate and multiple guards with walkie talkies. They take their security very seriously, and were the regular targets of threats. I think we are at one of those check your privilege moments, my fellow gentiles.
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