Today is the anniversary of the day in 2007 when Boston was under attack by cartoon terrorists.
On this day, we ought to reflect and remember the victims. I don’t mean the mooninites’ usual victims Master Shake, Frylock, and Meatwad; on January 31st, 2007, they struck further and wider. On this day, remember our fear based policies, our hostility to quirkiness, our collective political sickness of panic and xenophobia. Although the Mooninites temporarily turned it all into a farce, their job is not yet done.
So today, I’m reposting something I wrote for Blue Mass Group shortly after the cartoon terrorist scare of 2007:
What Does Random Panic Protect Us From?
Comments seem to be closed on old BMG posts, but my LiveJournal post will allow comments for years, and I’ve also added some new material. Please read it today, and share it, and link it.
“The mooninite adventure was like MA telling me that they don’t want my creativity.”
-A brilliant and talented person of the sort our state should want to attract.
Update: Sean Stevens and Peter Berdovsky (Zebbler), who made and put up the Mooninites, will appear on a streaming Internet interview show called “The Latest With” tonight at 8pm eastern. Stream and live chat at: http://www.thelatestwith.com/
hrs-kevin says
joets says
I thought we were remembering 2007-01-31, not 2002-01-31….
cos says
What’s the point of this comment? That the million+ people who use LiveJournal regularly ought to all leave it because it’s been around for a while? Or that nobody else ought to look at posts there because it’s been around for a while? What about Wikipedia – it’s been around for almost as long. Stop looking!
joets says
to lay off your Xanga.
galoob says
This was Martha’s revealing moment, when people paying attention realized what an authoritarian twit she is.
jimc says
A flashing, electronic device placed in high-traffic locations, giving the finger.
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p>So what if they didn’t recognize it? It would have been safer if they did recognize it?
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p>I flew last weekend and had to remove my shoes — and my belt, which I think was a first. A bomb-sniffing dog came by and sniffed my bag (and everyone else’s).
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p>If these things reappear tomorrow, I hope the cops act with caution again.
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stomv says
they acted with foolish overreaction.
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p>P.S. If giving the finger is relevant, than it’s an issue of taste, not safety.
P.P.S. Is it the finger when the hand has something other than four fingers and a thumb?
cos says
You may have missed the portion of my post where I rather explicitly said that trying to focus on the police officers, and whether or not they’re to blame, is not the right approach.
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p>Your reaction – defend the cops – seems like an emotional one, rather than a reasoned one. In doing so, you avoid the core objection: “A flashing, electronic device placed in high-traffic locations, giving the finger” is in fact much less likely to be a bomb that a large number of unobtrusive objects present all over the city every day. Are all those objects somehow “safer” because we don’t freak out about them? No, they were safe all along, just as those Mooninites were safe all along.
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p>Why you refer to “recognizing” them, I don’t understand. None of my post spoke about a failure to recognize them. It’s not relevant to what I had to say. You write “so what if they didn’t recognize it?” as if I had claimed that they should have recognized these things, and you’re objecting. But I made no reference to that, so I don’t understand why you’re bringing it up.
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p>I also don’t understand why you cite airport security theater as if it’s a justification for this. For the record, though, the things airports make you do such as removing your shoes don’t contribute anything whatsoever to your or our safety, either. But even if they did, that wouldn’t address anything I said about the Mooninite incident in that post.
jimc says
Yes, people overreacted. But you know what? People do that.
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p>http://bostonist.com/2007/01/3…
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p>I put “bombing” in Google news. Here are the first four results. The oldest one is from yesterday.
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p>http://www.thenews.com.pk/Toda…
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p>http://www.theage.com.au/world…
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p>http://tripolipost.com/article…
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p>http://www.christianpost.com/a…
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stomv says
jimc says
What is your point? My point is, stuff happens, in both likely and unlikely places, every day.
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p>”Flashing” may be a movie technique, but are you seriously arguing that you would ignore a flashing device because of that? Are you seriously arguing that devices shouldn’t be examined? What are you arguing? The reaction turned out to be an overreaction because the devices were harmless, but I assert that you have no way of knowing that in advance, so I’m grateful that officials reacted.
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p>We’re not talking about free speech here, or locking people up in Gitmo because we “suspect them of being terrorists.” We’re talking about protecting the public from explosives.
cos says
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p>Uhh, what “stuff” happens every day in unlikely places? Do you seriously think terrorist bombs in Boston happen every day? Even in likely places, whatever those are? We’ve had a small handful of hoaxes (the mooninites do not count) and no actual terrorist bombs in all my decades living here.
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p>> are you seriously arguing that you would ignore a flashing device because of that? Are you seriously arguing that devices shouldn’t be examined?
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p>You might’ve noticed that I said quite directly in my post that examining them would’ve been the right response. However, your attitude seems to completely deny the reality that it was almost completely certain that these devices posed no threat. Now, examining them even though they’re almost certainly nothing is not a big deal. But treating them as if they are bombs until proven otherwise, was utterly crazy.
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p>Again: The fact that someone reported a device because it looks weird, inherently means it is far less likely to be a bomb than millions of other items lying around the city. Somehow you don’t seem to follow your own logical conclusion: If this response was appropriate, why on earth is it even slightly appropriate for us not to consider the city under major threat this very instant? Why aren’t our roads closed right now? Why aren’t police fanning out today examining every bag, box, crate, parked car, or other item that might possibly contain explosive?
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p>ALL OF THOSE are more likely to be terrorist bombs, then the mooninites were.
jimc says
n/t
galoob says
Bombs only have flashing lights in the movies. Overreacting and closing roads is one thing, but Martha also arrested and charged the guys who put the light boards up. Ridiculous, prosecuting people for flashing light cartoons. And disrespectful to free expression.
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cannoneo says
Boston has always attracted the kind of creative people who are resilient, pioneering, and broad-minded enough to understand the perspectives of their boring working and middle class family neighbors. If the Mooninite overreaction scared off the more high-strung kind of talent, then good.
galoob says
In every sense of the word, class had nothing to do with it. It was about fostering fear, promoting the police state, and Martha’s inability to admit there was an overreaction.
Common sense and a sense of humor are found in all social classes. By prosecuting these guys, Martha showed she had neither common sense nor a sense of humor. No class there.
cannoneo says
I’m not trying to assert some big social divide, I’m just responding to Cos’s “creative class” argument. I really think that a young creative person who was turned off the city by this incident, is not the type of creative person who is likely to enrich the city anyway. They are looking for a place where everyone is just like them.
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p>If a city is very friendly to quirky people … then those people aren’t really quirky anymore. See Brooklyn, New York.