'OMG, the shooter looks to be gay,' isn't the shocker or kicker a lot of people suppose
...I get that a regressive pack of right wing homophobes in the WH are making a big deal out of this as if being gay or trans automatically translates into a threat, just because this one shooter appears to have a non traditional relationship.
I also get that there is a sliver of America that has bought into this fear of trans or gay individuals to the extent that they're willing to believe there's a 'trans or gay war' directed against republicans.
But, coming back down to planet Earth, most Americans know well that our sexual differences aren't a threat; recognize that the dark-skinned folks they work with or live around aren't looking to knock them off for their political beliefs.
Hell, most Americans don't like to be overtly political, eschew political debates; and mostly keep their politics to themselves. The interactions we have in most of our communities don't bear any resemblance at all to the teevee news or the talk shows where pols and others shout back and forth to get people to send them money to do more shouting.
It's easy to get all anxious about the country and the world, believing the racial or social battle they describe is right outside of all of our doors. Yet, most of us strive to get along throughout all of the appeals for us to divide amongst our selves into political boxes.
Most of our lives are not a mere political debate over some objected word or phrase; some changing more; or some difference with the way someone else loves like the media so breathlessly reports out when they want to pretend they care about how Americans really live outside of these talking heads' own privileged, well-moneyed bubbles.
In my immediate world, there's not going to be any prevaricating activist speaking where I am, baiting me into anger or dupedom; nor is there very likely to be a disgruntled shooter. It's that way for the vast majority of us, but the media makes it seem as if all of these privileged people arguing over politics are right here in our faces, or just around the next corner, ready to pounce.
It's just not how most of us live. Most of us are living through this martydom performance by the republican cabal without a minute to spare for the grief or the fear.
I'm suggesting these republicans should be left to manage their own paranoia, without the rest of us taking the little time we all have for ourselves to be fearful about what a boy in Utah has done; or worrying a wit about what conservative weaknesses and frailty might produce next.
We have real concerns about our basic survival under this deliberately weakened economy, and no performative anger from republicans intends to assuage any of that. Republicans are threatening to allow the government to to shut down rather than address Democratic concerns about their health care cuts and other benefit reductions.
There's much more to do than just defend ourselves against orchestrated, faux political outrage.
Besides, just pointing at trans or gay people and trying to scare or distract Americans from where we all live is only going to get as much attention as we give them; and the people who subscribe to this demagoguery are counting on us, improbably, to behave just as fearfully and afraid of our fellow Americans as they are.
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