Massachusetts

Some vandalism and a look at the MAGA mindset 3   Recently updated !

This entry was posted in Commentary Personal and tagged liberty Massachusetts on by

My rear windshield has a decal with the text, “My cat is smarter than your president.” On Monday I noticed that several letters were no longer on the windshield. Some were still on the car, in the gap between the windshield and the trunk lid. Given that so many letters came off at once, It was most likely vandalism. I don’t think any of my neighbors did it. The day before, I parked in a large public lot in Massachusetts for several hours. Most likely it happened then, and I didn’t notice till the next day.

Windshield sticker with missing letters indicated by brackets: "My [c]a[t] is sm[art]e[r] than your president"
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Vigilante violence for tolerance?

This entry was posted in Commentary and tagged ethics liberty Massachusetts on by

Lately I’ve been dealing with some people on Bluesky who advocate violence against people whose ideas are sufficiently repugnant. One of them, a supposed “libertarian,” cited Popper’s “paradox of tolerance” at me, then descended into outright trolling when I linked to my article on the topic in response. I immediately blocked him, of course.

Laws restricting which ideas may be freely expressed are bad enough. Direct violence by individuals or mobs won’t have so broad an effect, but the outcomes in individual cases may be worse. Let’s look at the threats allegedly made by John Reardon of Millis, Massachusetts. According to the DoJ release, called a Jewish synagogue and reportedly said: “You do realize that by supporting genocide that means it’s ok for people to commit genocide against you.” “With supporting the killing of innocent little children, that means it’s OK to kill your children.” “End the genocide, or it is time to end Israel and all the Jews.”
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Peer Gynt at Symphony Hall

This entry was posted in Music and tagged Massachusetts music on by

What’s a concert review doing in this blog on writing? Well, it’s increasingly become a blog on whatever I think people will enjoy reading about, so why not? I’ve blogged about accompanying silent movies, and incidental music for a play isn’t that far removed.

Symphony Hall in Boston has been the site of a lot of great experiences for me. Some are faded in my memory. It’s likely that there’s one which, if you could remind me of it, would make me say, “Of course! Nothing could top that!” Right now, though, I can’t name one that was more breathtaking than last night’s presentation of Peer Gynt.
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How (not) to cover police shootings

This entry was posted in Commentary News and tagged journalism Massachusetts police on by

On June 26, 2021, a police officer in Massachusetts fatally shot Nathan Allen. Too many killings by police have been unjustified, and some were frankly murder, so it’s necessary to look carefully into each one. Investigators found that this one was justified. Allen had just shot and killed two people without provocation, apparently just because they had dark skin. Just before that, he had shot into an unoccupied car and stolen and crashed a truck. Allen then advanced on the officer while holding a gun. After telling Allen to put the gun down and being ignored, the officer shot him. After handcuffing Allen, the officer tried to treat his wounds, but Allen died.

Assuming everything happened as described, I’d have to say the officer acted properly. He had to shoot because Allen was an ongoing threat to his life and the lives of others in the vicinity. This is miles removed from, for example, Daniel Pantaleo’s killing Eric Garner for illegally selling cigarettes. (Pantaleo was punished by being fired and losing his pension, which he claimed was a horribly excessive punishment.)
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The Dedham Library Christmas tree incident 2

This entry was posted in Commentary News and tagged libraries Massachusetts on by

A branch of the Dedham, Massachusetts library decided not to put up a Christmas tree this year because it made some people “uncomfortable.” This has led to an acrimonious controversy which several news outlets have covered.

The situation goes to show how violently hostile people become over minor issues. More specific to this blog, it shows the kind of pressure libraries come under with increasing frequency.
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