The Week In WTF: Target Practice

TRIGGER WARNING: This post references violence against women.

God, wouldn’t it be awesome if “target” in the title referred to the store and I was going to share a story about a surly employee doing something anti-social but hilarious? Sadly, that is not the case.

No, what I’m yammering on about is the NRA convention held last week. The speakers list was a veritable Who’s Who of big name Republicans without day jobs: Rick Santorum, Sarah Palin, Ted Nugent. I had a little fun with that on Twitter where I fantasized about Ted Nugent and Todd Palin being caught having an affair. I also speculated that Sarah Palin could rehabilitate her image by starting a line of cosmetics (Pitbull brand lipstick, perhaps?) and hosting a show on QVC. I joke about all of this to escape the cognitive dissonance of the idea of a convention center full of people who are drawn together to celebrate in owning deadly weapons. “We can shoot people! Yay!” Owning guns should be a more grave endeavor, if you ask me. There should be lectures on safety and responsibility, not pep rallies.

Nor should there be overt homages to rape and abuse. There’s a retail component to this convention, apparently, and there’s no Palin branded lipstick in sight. Instead, there are shooting accessories. Like targets for practicing your shooting. Realistic targets. Realistic, human shaped targets. Realistic, human shaped targets THAT LOOK LIKE HALF DRESSED, BLEEDING WOMEN AND ARE CALLED “THE EX”.

I’m not going to post a picture because the realism is a bit much and I don’t want to set off any triggers but here’s a link to the Zombie Industries monstrosity. I frankly want to storm their headquarters and beat the ever-living shit out of them for suborning domestic violence. You can’t tell me that people who think this is funny or clever shoot guns for sport or food or self-defense. They shoot guns to feel powerful and they are sick and disgusting. Yeah. I said it. Anyone who gets a chuckle out of this is sick and needs help and should probably not have guns. Because KILLING PEOPLE IS NOT FUNNY.

Targets like these is why domestic violence and sexual violence against women continues unabated in this country. We are expect to react to stuff like this with a mischevious grin and take it for the “joke” it’s meant to be. Wrong. It’s not funny. It’s not cute. Finding it funny or cute is a symptom of advanced moral decay and should require therapy.

This sort of thing is unacceptable. It promotes violence against women. I will be sending a link to this post to the company that makes these targets along with a letter explaining why glorifying violence against women is so fucking wrong. You can contact Zombie Industries to share your feelings here.

Also, watch this space today. Later, I’ll be posting something that is actually funny and also helps women.