Mom had a moment; Mom had a gun. Her kids – two very promising people, the daughter a journalism student at Boston University – were dispatched with ease. Give Mom (who killed herself after killing her kids) a knife, or any other weapon, and these two strong life-loving young people might have been able to fight back, to overpower her, to defend themselves.
There’s nothing like a gun to give your psychotic impulsivity episode full scope.
Did no one at all have the slightest inkling this woman was… troubled? Excessively vengeful toward her ex? Was her medical supply company being investigated? Did she have a substance abuse problem? Why did this troubled woman have a gun at home? For safety in her ultra-safe gated community? Did it occur to anyone to think about the safety of her children?
Oh, and kudos to the mayor of Atlanta, who offers us this: The peace of God… surpasses all understanding. Really?
August 23rd, 2019 at 4:05PM
Was it George Bernard Shaw that said a belief in god was childish? To that point, invoking the peace from a god who will send you to eternal torture and suffering because he loves you is the creation of an imbecile. No shortage of that among politicians…
August 24th, 2019 at 12:34PM
He might have. He did write this though:
https://youtu.be/RH_qGZodZRI?t=2012
August 24th, 2019 at 1:03PM
Sorry, closed caption doesn’t work on that clip…
August 24th, 2019 at 1:29PM
Ravi: I love Shaw; most of all I love Heartbreak House. But after HH, I love Major Barbara. Thanks for the link.
August 24th, 2019 at 1:29PM
charlie: LOL. You’re right that the accents are challenging…
August 24th, 2019 at 3:59PM
UD: I’ve enjoyed HH but for me it drags for stretches. I’d like to see a full-up Man and Superman someday.
charlie: via https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3790/3790-h/3790-h.htm
JENNY [her eyes lighting up] … [To Price] Did you have a piece of bread?
PRICE [with unction] Yes, miss; but I’ve got the piece that I value more; and that’s the peace that passeth hall hannerstennin. [sic]
RUMMY [fervently] Glory Hallelujah!
August 24th, 2019 at 4:52PM
Ravi: HH is indeed the ultimate too-much-talk Shaw play; it even boasts an endless introduction, etc. Yet I love its theme of heedless Europe before the war (it has this in common with another incredibly talky work of art, Mann’s Magic Mountain), which Shaw plays for some great laughs along with the deadly seriousness. For sheer pleasure among Shaw’s works, I can read/watch again and again and again Arms and the Man – YouTube has two good productions (I really like this one)…
August 24th, 2019 at 7:18PM
I think the talky prize would have to go to Back to Methuselah which I’ve only read. Arms is often performed here but the best Shaw I’ve seen was a St. Joan performed by four actors for an audience of six in a San Fernando Valley industrial park. I am a few chapters into Magic Mountain but haven’t looked at it in months. Probably time to pick it up again.