Jezebel 
Enter your username and password.
New York, 6:24 AM
Thu Dec 10
65 posts in the last 24 hours
Tip your editors:
Editor-in-Chief:
Anna Holmes
| Twitter
Deputy Editor:
Dodai Stewart
| Twitter
Senior Contributing Editor:
Tracie Egan
| Twitter
Contributing Editors:
Anna North
| Twitter
Sadie Stein
| Twitter
Reporter:
Irin Carmon
| Twitter
Editorial Assistant:
Margaret Hartmann
| Twitter
Contributors:
Rich Juzwiak
Email | Twitter
Latoya Peterson
Email
Jenna Sauers
Lizzie Skurnick
Interns:
Katy Kelleher
Twitter
Weekends/Commenter Moderator:
Hortense
| Twitter
Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
12/08/09
NO. Guns are bad, regardless of who is holding them.
12/08/09
12/08/09
There are many other purposes for alcohol.
12/08/09
What that projectile does is determined by the person who initiated the movement of the trigger.
There are many purposes for a gun as well. However like with most things, people disagree on the value of those uses, and when it's convenient for them, people sometimes ignore some uses altogether.
12/08/09
Really, please tell me of these other purposes.
.... I should probably point out that I'm up to my neck in a paper on the impact of the global arms trade on child soldiers. So I may not be as receptive to other perspectives as I ought to be at the moment.
12/08/09
Food Hunting and recreational shooting are the primary legitimate uses that people frequently like to ignore.
Also, isn't the global arms trade mostly SKS's, ak variants/clones, FN FAL's, CTME, various bolt actions, browning hi-powers, various soviet and Chinese surplus, and god knows how many American service rifles we pumped into various coups and proxy wars?
12/09/09
The US is the biggest manufacturer and exporter of weaponry. Hands down. The pervasive gun culture we have in this country is exported worldwide, manifesting itself in the most horrific human rights abuses possible.
Hundreds of thousands of children have been abducted from their homes in Uganda, Mozambique, Sudan, Sierra Leone, Burma, and countless other places. In many cases, the deciding factor as to whether these children would be forcibly consripted into an armed group was whether they were big enough to pull the trigger on an AK and carry it.
The proliferation of small arms makes conflicts last longer and makes them more fatal. When the weaponry runs out, wars tend to stop.
If you think this is an acceptable price to pay so you can have a pretty gun hanging from your ceiling, or so you can shoot at targets for fun, then there's nothing I'm going to say that can convince you.
12/09/09
12/09/09
Additionally, the massive Soviet manufacture of AKs was largely due to Cold War arms stockpiling, for which the US is at least partly responsible.
12/09/09
It seems blind to ignore that the wielder bears the ultimate responsibility for how an object is used.
Look these atrocities are just going to happen regardless of whether guns exist. If it isn't guns it's going to be crossbows. Not crossbows? Then blowpipes and poison darts. Eventually, violence will regress to fists and feet and people will still kill each other.
On a side note, I grew up close to a natural Orchard. My big sister and I got attacked by a big alligator that got through the fencing and into the house grounds, if dad wasn't around with the shotgun I don't think things would have turned out very well.
12/09/09
I'm also well aware of where most if not all of the AK-series weapons are from.
If you have the time, I'm quite curious to see stats or a breakdown of the firearms used in these conflicts.
Also for the record, I've had a long standing belief that the United States shouldn't be pouring weapons into unstable regions as a form military aide.
The guns we have given Mexico for the "war on drugs" are already biting us and them in the ass.
12/09/09
A majority of my arms research came from Small Arms Survey, [www.smallarmssurvey.org] , which is what Human Rights Watch cites when it comes to weaponry. There's a ton of information on that site, including individual country surveys.
12/09/09
Some atrocities are going to happen no matter what, but most eight year olds are physically incapable of killing someone with their bare hands, or even with a stick or a knife or a crossbow. They just aren't strong enough. Give the kid a gun, and he's just as deadly as any other person. Yes, some people are going to kill each other regardless. I just have a problem with it being so easy for children to do so.
12/09/09
12/09/09
12/08/09
That being said, the culture in hockey even if it's a no-check league is to be more physical, if only because it's the nature of the game. Unlike soccer, you have protective gear (so hits and shoves don't really hurt), and are taught to use your body as much as you can (legally).
Because there is a lot of blocking, pushing (like when you are defending the net), lifting of sticks, etc, it can be easy sometimes to get riled up, especially if a team is particularly chippy. Even though it's not allowed, I've been antagonized to the point where I snap and retaliate. The worst I've done is take a swing (only once ever), and a couple of other times I've shoved, or even pulled someone down with me after they (illegally) hit or tripped me.
So what she's doing is a natural reaction, though the ref should have stepped in waaay before it got to that point.
12/08/09
that said, it's commendable that she held her own. in a contact sport like hockey, especially with male counterparts, she's gotta be able to hold her own.
12/08/09
I've had refs admonish me for cursing under my breath during a game because it's "not ladylike" (I am 30 years old, btw).
Oooh, made my blood boil-- penalize me for cursing because it's against the rules, if you want, but do NOT tell me what is and isn't ladylike. It's sexist, and none of your damn business to begin with.
12/08/09
It doesn't really look to me like 7 was "tag teamed" - she had put herself in front of the other team's net, which pretty much meant that there was going to be some shoving from everyone. She got taken down and it appears that she took the other no. 7 down when she fell on his stick... and then the fight began.
I'm mostly familiar with NHL rules, not high school, but I know the rules against fighting are stricter for the younger kids and it seems like the refs should have broken up this fight a lot earlier than they did, particularly by the time there was an apparently injured player lying on the ice... but I suppose that's not the point.
The thing that actually annoyed me about this video was that it was all about a "high school girl" beating up boys and how she was targeted and fought back. It makes it sound like some sort of demented Lifetime movie.
12/08/09
If you take two equally trained 5'10"/160 pound people, one male and one female, the overwhelming odds say the man is going to be stronger.
But outside of mixed gender semi-pro boxing, that situation is almost never going to come up. People vary in age, weight, height, fitness, and training.
I had to accept at age 14 than my little bro was 9 inches taller and 70 pounds heavier and that meant I would never win a fight, but that would be the case even if I was a guy.
I think a lot of women underestimate how strong they are.
12/08/09
Ref standing by when a player is on the ice beneath another and this is freaking HIGH SCHOOL not the NHL, is not okay with me. Stop watching and break it up.
12/08/09
My favorite part was when 14 (from her team) took down 68 (from the other) for putting his hands up in a triumphant cheer. I would have kicked that guy's ass too.
But seriously, what the hell were the referees doing? Isn't a large part of their job to prevent/stop these fights, not stand there watching?
Also, who were the voices we could hear? Her parents?
12/08/09
After they saw she wouldn't just take it, they left her alone and let her play.
12/08/09
12/08/09
12/08/09
Basically, no I don't think it's a good thing, if equality means stooping down a level, rather than pulling other people up to a higher one. This just condones and normalizes violence as an acceptable response to a stressful situation - how is that good, when we spend half our time on here talking about the devastation male violence wreaks in our society?
Just to add, I'm not saying No7 acted badly as, due to the circumstances, her actions are justifiable and the norm it seems. But praise-worthy? No.
12/08/09
12/08/09
There is even an unofficial position called The Enforcer on every hockey team. (Yay MacCarty!)
It is quite different than baseball, basketball or even football. Comparing apples to oranges in a way.
So, while there are penalties for fighting, they are part of this particular sport. High contact, big on mind-games et al
PS: Go Red Wings!
12/08/09
12/08/09
12/08/09
12/08/09
I went to a fight and a hockey game broke out, etc.
12/08/09
I am not one for wanton violence and would much prefer watching the players skate well and score awesome goals. But, fights happen and if they are very short-lived, they serve a purpose.
Again, it is a mind game issue, for the most part, with few exceptions.
Go England! ?
12/09/09
(I went to a game 2 wks ago and saw them get eviscerated by the Flames... Why does my one game a year have to be the bad one!)
12/09/09
he he I kid!
hearted back!
McCarty retired on Monday, eh?
12/09/09
12/08/09
Anyone who's ever taken a punch from someone (or been in a fight) knows that is not the time to stop and have an existentialist discussion.
You punch back, then school their ass later.
12/08/09
In all seriousness, if this is the case, then who cares? It shouldn't matter if she's a girl.
12/08/09
12/08/09
12/08/09
Illegal fights on the ice should be punished regardless of sex, if that's the rules at their level. Still, it seems from the video that she was just trying to hold her own, and keep from getting hurt. Hard to say in such a pile up. Why'd the refs take so long in pulling them out and apart?
12/08/09
12/08/09
12/08/09
12/08/09
I think that she did what any guy would do if they felt wronged on the ice - she fought back. I think its strange to say that 'violence is bad', when watching a game that is inherently violent. I don't think shes a feminist hero for standing her ground, it just means shes a hockey player that doesn't take shit - and that is something to be proud of as a team mate, a parent or a hockey fan. Good on her.
12/08/09
12/08/09
12/08/09
Only pro hockey has fights like this - in college you can get kicked out of the game for brawling, and these kids are only in high school. Both those refs should be fired for doing absolutely NOTHING to break it up. It's their responsibility to keep the game as clean as they can - no matter who's fighting.
That being said, I used to coach highschool girls' hockey. I would have LOVED it if my girls had shown even a quarter of the spark that this girl has.
12/08/09
They don't think she should be playing the game with boys.
Striped Shirt Misogyny
12/08/09
12/08/09
12/08/09
The fight should have been stopped, certainly. But let's not project onto the ref and linesmen motivations of which we can have no clear conception.
12/08/09
first, how does age play into this? A misogynist is a misogynist.
second, how is it that the refs in the attached video can break up a fight between grown ass men / pro hockey players and yet the ones on the video above pretty much just stand around doing nothing while a bunch of high schoolers beat eachother up?
12/08/09
Secondly, not only do high school students tend to line high school games, quite often high school girls with an interest in hockey refereeing will line/ref. In the first video, we know nothing about the refs, including their age or sex. How, from very little information, can you decide they must be misogynists?
I referred to their age because, as high school students, we don't know their physical capacity to break up fights. One of the things they teach at ref school is not to endanger yourself in trying to stop people determined to beat someone else up, particularly when those people are wearing blades on their feet and carrying sticks.
The fight should have been broken up. Period. But I'm not about to cast aspersions on the characters of referees whom we, at this point, know nothing about.
12/08/09
12/08/09