Happy Fourth of July!

[RainbowsandUnicorns]

People that commit these random acts of violence are people with mental health problems seeking attention. Stop giving it to them

Right. Because ignoring it/them will make the problem go away.
I'm surprised you're not telling us we should stop paying attention to them BEFORE they commit random acts of violence too.
Which is exactly why some/many of these people act out.

When the media/society glorifies and obsesses with these things. It increases the chances of it happening again. Pretty simple to figure that one out

Don't disagree but..... The day the media ignores and doesn't report about "these things" is the day the media becomes worthless.

[randylahey]

The media is already worthless. Its basically a manipulation tool at this point

[randylahey]

Used to be the news would tell you what happened, and you figure out what to think about a situation. Nowadays the media tells you what to think, then you have to figure out what actually happened

[ousdahl]

[RainbowsandUnicorns]

The media is already worthless. Its basically a manipulation tool at this point

Opinionated "media" - yes, I agree "worthless".
Factual "news" - no, I don't agree worthless and I feel is extremely important and necessary.
Problem is we live in a country where way too many people are too stupid to know the difference/s between the two.

[RainbowsandUnicorns]

Used to be the news would tell you what happened, and you figure out what to think about a situation. Nowadays the media tells you what to think, then you have to figure out what actually happened

Shocker alert!!!!!
I 100% agree with you.
I assume you realize how you used the word "news" in the 1st sentence and the word "media" in the 2nd.
Some people interchange those words and yet they can have two vastly different meanings.

[RainbowsandUnicorns]

Sound on. I admit I laughed and it's not really that funny.

[jhawks99]

Oops

[randylahey]

Its sad when the one bipartisan thing we can all agree on is that that "they" are consistently trying to manipulate and dupe us all

[zsn]

This is not even remotely true. There’s one predominantly “conservative” outfit which unfortunately has a critical mass of followers has been doing the opposite of what it claims as its motto. The Illys of the world claim “both sides do it”.

As the saying goes “truth has a liberal bias”

[Cascadia]

Media outlets provide 3 things:

News
Facts
Opinions

If you’re not smart enough to know the difference, that’s a you problem.

[KUTradition]

Media outlets provide 3 things:

News
Facts
Opinions

If you’re not smart enough to know the difference, that’s a you problem.

^^^^^

[pdub]

Happy America all.

[MICHHAWK]

Greatest country on earth. by a wide margin.

[Shirley]

Yet more evidence it's the most patriotic state in the nation!

This holiday weekend, skiers are getting the rare chance to rep their best stars and stripes on the slopes:

[TDub]

Where is 4th of July on the list oh Holidays? gotta be near the bottom right? Though 10 years ago I probably would've had it mich higher.

[Shirley]

Where is 4th of July on the list oh Holidays? gotta be near the bottom right? Though 10 years ago I probably would've had it mich higher.

What's always amazed me is how eager people seem to be to gleefully let their $ go up in smoke.

I liked firecrackers and bottle rockets, M-80s and cherry bombs, too, but decided at a young age I'd rather have the $ than the momentary thrill.

I married into a family where the patriarch lived on the edge of Lake Quivira on the W side of KC, and the entire extended clan would meet there July 4th and that night explode massive amounts of fireworks for what seemed like hours. Fun and nice to watch, but I was always glad they were paying for it, and not me.

[RainbowsandUnicorns]

Greatest country on earth. by a wide margin.

How many other countries have you been to and lived in?

You say that as a semi successful white person living in a nice community in Michigan - forgetting many of the rest of the people living in the USA who deal with......

Huge crime problems.
Huge drug problems.
Huge mental health problems.
Huge medical care problems.
Huge educational problems.
Huge religious problems.
Huge media problems.
Huge homelessness problems.
Huge lack of acceptance problems.
Huge environmental problems.
Huge political problems.

GBA!

[defixione]

Where is 4th of July on the list oh Holidays? gotta be near the bottom right? Though 10 years ago I probably would've had it mich higher.

Freudian slip?

[defixione]

In the early 2000s a friend would fly in from SF and spend the week prior to 4th of July helping me build a Rube Goldberg panel of various fireworks. We used everything from sparklers and flashers to Roman candles, spinners, fountains, rolls of firecrackers, and aerial bombs. The whole display lasted about 40 minutes and the grand finale was pretty impressive. My friend was so excited to be able to ignite fireworks, and he knew that I was in graduate school, so he paid for everything . Sometime around 2008 or 2009, Lawrence banned most fireworks within the city limits. We stopped making the display but I have some pretty cool videos from our efforts.