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Thoughts on the Furry con Chem Attack (Content Warning)
11 years ago
Content Warning - Language, description of violence
While being around furries or hanging out in the fandom is the least of my worries, I am seriously worried about the state of prejudice and hate towards furries and fandoms en generale.
The furry fandom is not the first nor will be the last to be publicly ridiculed and attacked, but I'm worried that it's beginning to be socially acceptable to endorse violence against others. So certainly, a lot of us have seen the comments on the news stories, right? Yeah, cesspit of hate. I stopped looking after I had seen enough.
I know that whoever planted the chemical weapon was attempting to gas an entire building with a chlorine gas canister and device placed in the stairwell, so it would seep down to all floors through the emergency evacuation path note1. Whoever was doing it was attempting to harm, obviously.
I'm certain some of us have personally witnessed the violence. I can clearly recall being shown a warning which showed us "how to treat your furf*gs" which involved an image of sawing a fur's head off.
So yeah. People are pretty fricking terrible. That's nothing new.
And there's not much we can do. I know that if we're as reactive as other social movements have been, then things will only get worse.
What are your guys' thoughts?
While being around furries or hanging out in the fandom is the least of my worries, I am seriously worried about the state of prejudice and hate towards furries and fandoms en generale.
The furry fandom is not the first nor will be the last to be publicly ridiculed and attacked, but I'm worried that it's beginning to be socially acceptable to endorse violence against others. So certainly, a lot of us have seen the comments on the news stories, right? Yeah, cesspit of hate. I stopped looking after I had seen enough.
I know that whoever planted the chemical weapon was attempting to gas an entire building with a chlorine gas canister and device placed in the stairwell, so it would seep down to all floors through the emergency evacuation path note1. Whoever was doing it was attempting to harm, obviously.
I'm certain some of us have personally witnessed the violence. I can clearly recall being shown a warning which showed us "how to treat your furf*gs" which involved an image of sawing a fur's head off.
So yeah. People are pretty fricking terrible. That's nothing new.
And there's not much we can do. I know that if we're as reactive as other social movements have been, then things will only get worse.
What are your guys' thoughts?
My understanding is that it wasn't a cannister of Chlorine gas, it was powdered chlorine in a jar of some kind. Currently the authorities are investigating it as a criminal attack, but so far no one has claimed responsibility.
Currently I'm thinking that it wasn't a deliberate attack, but possibly some twit trying his hand at a shake and bake meth cook.
And also, with the Chlorine, it was on the 10th floor, definitely not the kind of volume that could take out the whole hotel, but it did make a few floors unlivable for some hours before things could be ventilated and such, it was something that burst in the stair well. Of course there's ALOT of conjecture going on and not alot of solid facts from any law enforcement parties. But I expect there to be more definitive statements made as to exactly what happened in the coming days.
Regarding the whole 'die furfags' stuff. I haven't really been exposed to alot of that kind of thing, at least outside of online tumblr stuff. Perhaps because I don't really advertise the fuzziness and keep a really low profile with that kind of thing.....also.....my perceptions might be a bit skewed as I live in the Northern Virginia area which is already rather cosmopolitan and not in the deep south. So that last paragraph to be taken with a grain of salt.
And the internet's a terrible place, at times.
And I don't know much about meth, so... yeah, no conjectures there from me.
But again, there's lots of thoughts and hypotheses that are looking at every possible scenario. But won't be able to say anything for sure until the police and the FBI start making definitive statements.
But we're lucky that no one was seriously hurt, and the FD/rescue squads/police did an amazing job with getting 4600 people out of a hotel and managing an evacuation, along with the Hyatt staff and the con staffers. There were something like 19 people that had to be hospitalized, but I understand that they were released rather quickly.
Needless to say it was a 3 alarm incident and the call to the police was not made by a person, but by chemical sensors that picked up a gas leak. So they had ambulances there from at least 5 or more counties all coming to the hotel and preparing to have a heavy triage incident.
But still. I don't understand. People were there to have fun and be sociable. An attack of that or any sort just makes no sense. It's this weird part of the human mind that I'll never be able to understand when they wish to inflict potentially deadly harm on someone just because they are different. I don't care if they don't like furs, but why would they try to hurt us?
Anyway - sorry my thoughts are a bit scattered. It's just sad to me to that as you said this is seemingly becoming the norm. I'm just glad that everyone was alright!