Daily Ramblings:
Go Get Me My Pistol, Babe ...12/07/2004
07:56:11 pm
Amazing. On NBC Nightly News
tonight (with Brian Williams) a clip was played from
a surveillance video in a convenience store, taken as
it was being robbed. The robber had said he had a
gun, but didn't display it. The clerk, a female,
handed over money from the register. The robber then
asked her to step back from the register. She said
later that she felt particularly threatened by that
instruction, so she pulled out a gun from under the
counter and blasted the guy. An excellent piece of
shooting, by the way, especially given the
circumstances. As he writhed on the floor she
apparently told him to stay put while she called the
police.
What's amazing is how Williams
introducted the piece: (roughly) "Now a clip
from a surveillance tape that should make all
convenience store robbers think twice."
That's it. Afterwards, he came back
on to say that the guy had been arrested and charged
with robbery or whatever.
Again, that's it. What the
hell is happening here? Where was the gratuitous and
obligatory commentary raising questions as to whether
the woman should have shot him, seeing has how he
didn't actually point a gun at her? Where was the
citation of some fallacious statistic or other saying
that guns in convenience stores are more likely to
cause innocent deaths than to save lives? Where were
any of the flights away from common sense that we
have come to depend on the network news to provide?
At the very least, they could have
just ignored the story. I mean, people defend
themselves successfully with guns every day in
America, and it generally gets consigned to the
Police Blotter section of the local newspaper. But
let one psychopath misuse an illegally owned weapon
and it leads the news on all channels.
I'm willing to admit it - this kind
of coverage from the NBC Nightly News completely
flummoxes me. Just what is the idea of showing a
thing like that as it happened - a good citizen
having her life threatened and defending herself
successfully with a firearm - and not warning
impressionable viewers that this kind of thing is
terribly dangerous and under no circumstances is to
be taken as an example? Instead, Williams introduced
the piece with a warning to robbers! For Pete's sake,
people are going to think they have a right to
disobey the orders of criminals, and use guns to
defend themselves, instead of waiting for the police
to come and remove their bodies according to the
correct evidentiary procedures. There's no telling
where something like this could end!
Is this just a terrible mistake on
the part of some newbies at the Nightly News, or has
some kind of line been crossed here?
I don't know, but I think I'm going
to fix myself a drink and retire early.
When I met you, baby,
You didn't show no visible scars.
You could ride like Annie Oakley,
You could shoot like Belle Starr.
(with thanks to Clint Eastwood)
Addendum: Too much could be
read into this, but, hmmm ...
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