I saw these two tweets, one by Vox and the other by Politico, trying to downplay terrorism in NYC.
These tweets are practically the definition of surrender. Don’t try and convince me that I should accept regular acts of terrorism in NYC as the new normal.
As a Florida native, let me tell you how I interpret these tweets.
I am a veteran of Hurricane Andrew. If Terrorism is to NYC as Hurricanes are to Miami, than Hurricane Andrew was our 9/11. It was a watershed moment in South Florida history that changed the way people thought and acted. Even people who were born in or moved to Miami after Andrew know about Andrew.
We didn’t just accept our city being wiped of the map as the new normal. We changed all of our building codes. We put in all new breakwaters and canals. Most importantly, the people got prepared.
When hurricane season approaches, people start storing gallons of bottled water in their homes. Nobody lets their tank get to less than half full. Generators are tested. Big trees get cut down. Hurricane shutters go up. Stores start to run low on batteries and flashlights as everybody starts stockpiling.
It doesn’t matter how small the chance is that another Andrew with blow through South Florida, we will be ready when it does. We’re not freaking out. We’re just prepared.
So if I extrapolate that to NYC and terrorism, what I know is that I should:
- Have a fighting pistol on me at all times, with at least two reloads.
- Bug out bag with an AR, spare rifle mags, knife, flashlight, first aid/trauma kit, and maybe even some AR500 plate armor stashed at both my work and in my car.
- When the terror watch list goes to Orange, burn up my carry ammo at the range to check for zero, clean my gun, oil it, and load it up with fresh carry ammo.
- Always have a fighting pistol on me at all times.
That’s not freaking out, that’s being prepared.
But for some reason, I think being equipped like that, would freak out the Quislings over at Vox and Politico.
Update: my post wasn’t to list what I’d carry in NYC. I know NYC is a lost cause of forced government depentcy and learned helplessness (you are banned from being self reliant even if you want to be). My was we are seeing attacks across the country in that used to happen only in NYC, e.g., Orlando, Minneapolis, Arkansas, etc. If nation wide domestic terrorism is the new normal I will respond with being a prepper as my new normal. I don’t live where we have CCTVZ cameras on every corner. Just because I move out of Miami doesn’t mean I’ve stopped storing a weeks worth of water and batteries.
Nonlethal terrorism? Really?
They make it sound like someone went on a rampage with a taser. It was only through a miracle of timing that no one was injured at the Jersey Marine charity run.
Unfortunately the analogy you propose could cut both ways – after Andrew, we instituted new building codes, etc. It’s a stretch but someone could use that as a justification for more gun control laws…
It’d be hard to get more gun control laws in NYC, but another analogy could be rolling some of them back a bit, so that you’ll have more people on-site able to deal with the problem.
New building codes work.
New gun control laws don’t.
That is a pretty fundamental difference.
Your preparedness list for people in NYC is sadly something that none of them can accomplish because of the city’s abominable gun laws. People can’t have a handgun. People can’t have an AR. Almost everything a person could do to take their safety into their own hands has been outlawed. To use your Florida comparison, it would be like the government saying “No, you can’t board up windows, you can’t buy water, and you only get one gallon of gasoline for your car. Generators are not allowed.”
What’s amazing is how NYC is being run like a fiefdom. Your list can be accomplished in upstate New York, and legally at that.
I currently live part-time in NYC, and here are my takeaways:
1) No one in NYC really gave a shit. People were more pissed off that their cabs weren’t coming or had to go around a lot of traffic.
2) It is so difficult to legally own any of the weapons you described that I don’t even bother. If something happens, my plan is to just bug out as fast as I can, I have the good stuff at my other residence. You have a better chance of getting a belt-fed machine gun anywhere else in the country than you do of getting a carry permit in NYC.
3) This guy was quite possibly the worst terrorist of all time. Its almost like he was trying to get himself caught. Read about him and his carelessness in these attacks, he is a true moron.
4) To elaborate on the above, at this point, every single street and avenue in Manhattan has a camera watching every part of it. Given all the facial recognition software out there, and the amount of manpower watching these streets, unless you’re James Bond, your chances of getting away with a terrorist attack are very close to zilch. If these idiots had half a brain, they’d be on the next flight to Pakistan as soon as they planted a bomb.
Sooner or later they will realize this and look for softer targets in different cities.
If I may play devil’s advocate for a moment…
One could also interpret that attitude as saying “We’re not gonna cower about your terrorism, we’re gonna keep being us no matter how much you try to terrorize us. You’ll never terrorize us, you’ll never win.”
I have little sympathy for the victims of Katrina in New Orleans. It was predicted that if Andrew hit NOLA as hard as it hit Miami, it would have flooded. After Andrew, when Miami rebuilt itself, NOLA said “good thing that missed us” and never updated its hurricane infrastructure. When Katrina hit and NOLA went under, everybody that survived Andrew said “told ya so.”
If anger at cabs being slow is the response to a near miss attack where nobody was killed, hot to you expect people to respond to say… a gas bomb in a subway like what happened in Japan? People are going to die unnecessarily.
The day after the Palestinians go on a stabbing bender in a market in Israel, the market is open. But there are Israelis in the market carrying guns. There is resolve in the face of terrorism, and there is just plain head-in-the-sand stupidity.
Amen.
I’ve read what you just wrote in reply 3 times now and I can’t find a single thing that’s even related to my comment.
The “refuse to be prepared” aspect was something you interpreted from their attitude. My response was basically saying “there are interpretations of that attitude that have nothing to do with supporting unpreparedness”…to which you respond with statements about how wrong it is to not be prepared…. ??
I read both articles. I am trying to wrap my brain around the attitude “another day, another bombing” and it’s just not fitting.
“On my way to work today, I could get run over by a cab, or there is the ever increasing chance that I’ll get blown up by some guy’s pressure cooker. I’m not going to worry about it.”
I just cannot fathom that. Hurricanes are an act of nature. You move to Florida and you know that inevitably you’ll live through one. Bombings are not acts of nature. Under no circumstances should someone have the thought “This is New York. Some times you see Robert de Niro or Woody Allen walking down the street. Sometimes you get your legs blown off by a pipe bomb in a trash can. That’s life in the Big Apple for you.”
Trying to downplay terrorism like it is some normal inevitable is not show of resolve. There is something hopeless in the Vox way of thinking “today, a bomb might go off an kill someone, but that happens around here and I won’t let it bother me.”
Well, like I said, I’m not necessarily sure that’s the correct interpretation of their statements.
Think of what terrorism is: the goal is to get us to change our ways through fear/terror. Hurricanes don’t have a goal…they’re just acts of nature. Terrorism does. Taking an attitude of “We’re gonna stay who we are and no amount of your terror tactics will ever change us” (which is one possible interpretation of their statements) is not a bad thing. It doesn’t mean you’re accepting the terrorism, it means you’re refusing to be cowed by it…and that might be an effective tool (among others, like preparedness/fighting) in stopping it. Fruitless tactics are not long employed.