Pattern Ghost

So, I went to bed. Then I fell asleep, and dreamed that I was having trouble getting to sleep because of noises outside. Then I realized that it was a dream because a) I don't have a window over my bed and b) the construction work is on the other side of our building. So, I got super annoyed and decided to wake myself up. I tried turning on the light on my nightstand, which didn't work. Then all the stuff on my nightstand disappeared. Then I tried annoying my wife who was lying beside me into waking up (she wasn't, really, just in my dream, so it didn't work), then got out of bed and had some random doctor walk into my dream bedroom. So I grabbed him by the collar and yelled at him to wake me up. Which came out as a squeaky yell like the kind you do when you're half woken and your mind is waking up faster than your body . . . only I didn't, really. But it managed to finally wake me up. Now I don't want to go back to sleep and dream that I can't sleep again. Worse. Dream. Ever.

From the article above: People really need to learn that emotional hijacking* is a real, tangible phenomena, and that even otherwise intelligent people are ripe for manipulation of their lower-level thought processes. Most people calm down and start reasoning even after a strong stimulus, but the social media, easy internet access, and smart phones make a constant, unhealthy level of negative stimulation possible. Trump supporters, conspiracy theorists, etc. are not all idiots. This makes them all the more terrifying, IMO. *https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amygdala_hijack

https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/no-warp-bubble/

Wish I'd thought of that.

Didn't think they'd find my secret base so soon. Sigh. Time to pack up, I guess. The self-destruct should take out the rover at least. So, some satisfaction in that.

So, I got my brain tickled on Tuesday, returned to work on Wednesday and Thursday, got my booster shot on Thursday after work, was down for four days (counting today) with shot reaction, required to get my brain tickled again for those symptoms . . . I'm starting to lose count of my COVID swabs. Probably pushing ten at this point.

That's actually been an ongoing public health problem in rural India for years. 2015: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/india-rejects-the-toilet-how-government-sanitation-drives-have-failed-to-sway-those-who-believe-going-outdoors-is-more-wholesome-10466041.html 2020: https://www.cnet.com/features/in-india-an-indestructible-toilet-may-be-the-key-to-saving-lives/

I gave up on expecting common sense a long time ago.

Also mandatory, due to working in a hospital. Good news, it came back negative last night, so I returned to work today (er, Wednesday, since it's past midnight now). Feeling a lot better. I think my niece just discovered a virus that wasn't in this year's flu mix. She's uncannily good at it.

TBH, I'm frequently surprised that people don't know things I consider pretty obvious. 🤷‍♂️

The answer is C.

Cancer actually won the war on Christmas in 1998. All holiday sale proceeds since then have gone directly to his offshore bank accounts.

So, I was talking to this 20 year old co-worker one night, and told her I was stationed in Berlin when the wall fell. She said, "Berlin had a wall?" I think most people of our generation have heard of Josephine Baker. She's pretty iconic, IMO. But people can't remember a wall that came down in 1989. They're not going to remember much about anyone famous for WW II exploits (and a solid career prior). Most people would be stumped at the mention of Audie Murphy, too, and he was about as white bread as it gets.

House-flipping sounds like more of a Hulk gig.

Well, something has knocked me and the wife on our behinds over the weekend. Onset jibes with exposure to our unvaccinated niece on Thanksgiving. (She's nine.) Hoping we don't have it, but I'm getting tested tomorrow.

Various groups, including the NRA, do aggregate individual stories of self defense with a firearm that are found in media reports. Getting the information to a wider audience is the problem, I suppose. I typically listen to the local radio "news" talk station on my way to work. Typically, one or two defensive gun uses hit the airwaves. The rest (like the one cited from earlier this month) are usually brief reports you'd have to devote enerty to digging for, if they make it into the press at all. Here's a site that has a map of defensive gun uses in the US. The top has options to filter for year, or for last 90 days data. If you click on a blue dot, the event is summarized immediately below the map, including a link to the media report of the event: https://datavisualizations.heritage.org/firearms/defensive-gun-uses-in-the-us/ Note that the data is incomplete, as it relies on someone finding and submitting a media report to be updated. For example, you won't find that defensive shooting in Seattle from September 3rd that I linked above. I think the last time the board hive mind went down that particular rabbit hole, the general consensus was that it's hard to find unbiased and conclusive data. This table on Wikipedia of 2015 FBI data may be useful, though, because it actually defines specific crimes. It's also sortable by column. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence_in_the_United_States_by_state I found this plot, which compares gun ownership rates to gun murder rates at the bottom of that same page:

The hook for the videos is the roleplaying, not the system. So, while these kinds of videos may attract people to the hobby, they may not be a great tool for selling a non-D&D system to new players.

Seconded.

Thank you. And to your point, "sucks to be you" isn't exactly eloquent, I just didn't want to go into describing outcomes. I have a few minutes, so I'll do so with a couple of personal (not GSW) examples: Back in 2010-2011, I had an abscess drained that left a narrow 10" (~25 cm) tunnel through muscle tissue. This kind of wound is about the best outcome someone is going to see if they get shot. My case was treated poorly and took a long time to heal, plus it was in the largest muscle in the human body. So, my healing time was longer than, say, someone getting shot in an extremity. However, even though I'm all healed up and have been for a while, that wound still aches from time to time, sometimes extremely so. Having a tract of scar tissue running through a muscle you use constantly just sucks. I also have about a quarter to half inch or so tear in a muscle directly behind my shoulder blade that I got being stupid and blowing it out back in 1989 or 1990. That also still hurts, almost constantly. Earlier this year, back in March, I had thoracic surgery by the best surgeon for such surgery in the area. There was no other significant tissue damage other than what was required to open me up, spread my ribs, and cut out a benign tumor. So, I have a much better outcome than a thoracic shooting victim, who may have damaged organs, shattered bones and other serious tissue trauma. The entire sheet of muscle around my back and side that was cut into still hurts, frequently contracts around the scar tissue, and the bottom of my rib cage still gives me serious spikes of pain. If I exert myself in the slightest, I end up walking around like a movie mummy for a couple days. Getting out of bed sucks. I randomly double up in pain at least every other day. And I wasn't shot. So, if someone gets shot it's going to suck, even if it doesn't kill them. The vast majority of GSW injuries in the US are from handguns, and they tend to be of the first type, so relatively minor if they don't drill a hole in something important like an artery or organ. But that's all to support a side comment on the issue that was at hand: Intent. You don't use lethal force with the intent of killing an aggressor, you use it with the intent of stopping their attack. If you take up arms to defend yourself, you should be well-versed in their capabilities, and the levels of harm they can inflict. You should know your own limitations. You should act with the safety of your neighbors and the general public in mind. You should be cognizant of the range of reactions people will have both to being threatened with a firearm (ranging from, "I'm going to shove that thing up your ..." to "Oh crap! Ruuun!") and to being shot with a firearm (ranging from basically ignoring the wound and continuing the assault to running for the hills from a near miss). You should know that fights are chaotic and unpredictable in their outcomes. You should be aware that whatever the outcome, your life will be changed forever from the event. This isn't possible to do with anything, whether it's weapons, vehicles, or spreading lies on the Internet. I agree that it would be the most desirable result. That doesn't mean you ignore the issues, though. When I think about it, I start by considering two factors (from a US perspective): People have the right to self defense. This is so fundamental, that it's natural law territory. In the US Constitution, this is encapsulated in the 2nd Amendment right to bear arms. "Arms," are generally things that allow one to apply lethal or potentially lethal force. Your right to swing your fist ends at the other guy's nose. When a situation arises where the exercise of one's rights interferes or infringes on the rights or well-being of another person, then it's reasonable to enact laws that address the issue equitably. Ideally, we balance the two concepts, and do so without denying large numbers of people their fundamental right. So, we could then start asking questions, like, "Do you need firearms to defend yourself?" or "What kind of firearms do you need to defend yourself?" or "If we allow people to have firearms to defend themselves, then should we limit what type of firearm is allowed to be taken to what location?" It's awkwardly phrased, but that last one is where my thoughts have been lately. AR-15 style rifles are actually one of the best tools for defending yourself, if not the best. There are a number of reasons, and among them are ease of use and lethality. These also, not coincidentally, make the things great for offensive purposes. And when people read "lethality," their first thought will be, "Well, if the intent isn't to kill someone, why do you need one of those?" or "Well, clearly if you choose a high-lethality device for defense, your intent is to kill." Prosecutors frequently ask the same questions. The answer is that when you want to stop someone else from killing you, the time frame you want it done in is "as soon as possible." There's a large gap in power between the most powerful handgun rounds and the least powerful rifle rounds (which the 5.56 mostly falls under), barring a few uncommon examples. For commonly-used handgun rounds (which is to say, "service" calibers adopted originally for police/military use, not for hunting big game), the gap is even wider. So, the choice comes down to "might stop someone if you get lucky" or "likely to immediately stop hostilities." So, defense with a rifle round is reasonable. But how do we limit offense? What is the acceptable level of infringement into one's right to have the best tool available to defend themselves, that protects the general public from bad actors, unintended consequences, and irresponsible people? I think it's reasonable to simply not allow weapons that chamber centerfire long gun calibers be carried in public, barring sporting use (hunting, mostly, which happens away from crowds) or transport in a locked container to and from other sporting activities. This makes it very simple to enforce: Police see a person walking around a riot with a long gun? Pick them up. They see someone walking around town with a long gun? Talk to them. Not just taking it to your vehicle to transport? Charge them. This leaves lots of issues on the table for both the "preserve rights" and "protect the public" sides of the equation: On the one hand, you're not allowing people to carry the most effective tool possible for the job of self defense in public. I care less, honestly. Most people only arm up with long guns to go to demonstrations, or to try to "educate" the public on gun rights. They're a bunch of morons who don't need to be catered to. The mindset of a responsible gun owner is not to take on the role of the police in any situation, it's to protect your person and any family you may be with from an immediate threat. Handguns are the most commonly-faced such threat and very commonly used to stop such a threat. They're also a lot more discrete. On the other hand, you can still harm neighbors if you miss indoors with a more powerful weapon that penetrates walls. In this case, the AR or the shotgun are actually better choices than a handgun for protecting neighbors from over penetration of building materials. While there is always some risk, it seems relatively low. This also doesn't address controlling handguns, but requiring training before allowing one to carry a handgun in public already has passed muster as constitutionally acceptable. I think even most gun rights advocates would accept a national concealed carry license, with a training requirement and extensive background check requirement, if it meant full transferability to all states. But it won't happen, because states want to reserve the right to regulate this for themselves. And that's not a horrible status quo from my perspective. This doesn't preclude someone from taking their lawfully-owned rifle, breaking it down, transporting it to a location, then committing an atrocity. Or doing the same with a lawfully-owned handgun they're not supposed to be carrying in the first place. So, that's the best I've come up with for a starting point. There are probably countless minutiae to examine, even though I'm presenting this as a simple method of mitigation. I've already thought of several arguments for this being both insufficient and overly-restrictive. IMO, it'd be worth discussion and debate. It happens. As you say, there's no great way to see data for events that nobody was charged in, outside of the news. I found an article about a local shooting in Seattle on September 3rd, where someone was shot and killed while attempting to rob someone at gun point, and that took a lot of digging through articles debating gun control to find. It never hit broadcast news here to my knowledge. Pointing out the number of criminals stopped by armed citizens isn't something a local government is going to go out of their way to do, either. It's simply bad publicity. At the end of the day, it will be difficult to address the matter of public safety vs the rights of the individual. These days, I'm leaning more toward public safety considerations having more weight.

I believe you "forgot" the context for the quote you pulled: If you are attacking someone with lethal force and sustain a horrific injury, then yes, it sucks to be you. Remind me again, who was Brady attacking with lethal force when he was shot? That's right: Nobody.

Just stopping by to say that I really like your summaries, Death Tribble. They've led me to watch more than one thing that I wouldn't have otherwise discovered.

Did you see the "sucks to be them" part?

Pretty much sums it up IMO.

I guess I'm saying that that particular bit of stupidity lies more on the other side of the fence. But that doesn't really invalidate your point, I suppose. I guess I just wish the world wasn't filled with the level of stupid that it is.

[sarcasm reduction edit] The goal is to stop the attack. That's a statement of intent and mindset, and mindset is very relevant in self defense claims. I never said "won't result in death or great bodily harm." I didn't say it because it's a given. However, most defensive gun uses don't result in any death or great bodily harm. Many attacks are stopped without a shot being fired. Also, guns aren't death rays. The vast majority of people who get shot survive. Sucks to be them, but they tend to survive. Not much time at the moment to dig up data, but came across this from 2001: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11571950/ ------------------------------- Unrelated response that was mashed together starts below this line ---------------------------------- Actually, yes. But that doesn't detract from your analogy to a great degree, so carry on. ----------- 2nd unrelated yet magically smashed together post below ------------------------------------------------------- No. I usually hear that crap from untrained non-gun owners.