Florida Lawmakers Are Working Hard to Bring Back Racist Poll Taxes
Aiming to mitigate the impact of a new felon enfranchisement measure, Republican lawmakers are turning to Jim Crow like policies. Republicans typically don't like taxes, unless they’re poll taxes. Last week a bill passed the Republican state house panel in
Gun Violence and Toxic Masculinity: What Happened in Florida is No Anomaly
Society must be answerable to the lives of those lost to the ramifications of toxic masculinity, in both the moral and physical sense.
By Olivia Ahn [TW/CW: discussions about gun violence, murder, domestic violence and misogyny.] On Wednesday, at least 17 people were killed when 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz opened fire using a semiautomatic rifle at his former high school in Parkland, Florida. 14 other students were wounded, with five suffering from life-threatening injuries according to NBC news. The Boston Globe reported that Cruz had shown violent tendencies, was abusive to his ex-girlfriend, and his expulsions were related to a fight in regards to her new boyfriend. Since the shooting, authorities arrested Cruz in Coral Springs. He has been charged with 17 counts of premeditated murder. [caption id="attachment_49393" align="aligncenter" width="660"]
Nikolas Cruz[/caption]
Since the beginning of 2018, there have been 1,827 gun-related deaths in the U.S.. In 2017, The Gun Violence Archive reported 15,590 gun-related homicide deaths, domestically and climbing. Approximately 20 of these deaths received widespread national-level media attention. Of the 20 nationally-covered gun-related homicides last year, 100% of the gunmen were male, with 40% of the motives classified as an extension or direct act of domestic violence, intimate partner violence, and/or sexual assault or harassment.
The Violence Policy Center (VPC) reported from 2001-2012 that approximately 11,766 women were killed by their current or ex boyfriends or husbands. Over half of these women were killed using a gun. If we are to critically address the issue of gun violence in the U.S., we must confront toxic masculinity’s foundational role in influencing and perpetuating these outcomes, especially in regards to its explicit impacts on the behavioral and mental health of men that proportionately affect the survival of women.
The data above was featured in the 2015 documentary “The Mask You Live In”, which focused on the effects of toxic masculinity on young and adult men in The U.S.. The term toxic masculinity has been attributed to the cumulative work of psychologists and sociologists since the early 1980’s, stemming out of the Mythopoetic Men’s Movement. These men commonly defined toxic masculinity as the harmful, detrimental, and even destructive effects of high, demanding, and narrow cultural expectations of masculinity in society. Examples include socially acceptable male traits, such as dominance, emotional repression, the devaluation and subjugation of women, homophobia, extreme self-reliance, and most importantly, violence.
Related: IT ISN’T ENOUGH TO TALK ABOUT GUN CONTROL, THE ROOTS ARE DEEPER.
With DAPL’s Access Denied, We Need To Fight The Sabal Trail Pipeline Threatening Florida’s Water
Do we truly believe that "injustice anywhere is a threat to everywhere," regardless of how homely and plain the injustice? News is sinking in about the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe's victory over the formidable forces of capitalism (the Dakota Access Pipeline): the U.S.