{"id":22942,"date":"2016-09-18T10:01:10","date_gmt":"2016-09-18T15:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/gregladen\/?p=22942"},"modified":"2016-09-18T10:01:10","modified_gmt":"2016-09-18T15:01:10","slug":"knife-attack-in-saint-cloud-terrorism-racism-guns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/2016\/09\/18\/knife-attack-in-saint-cloud-terrorism-racism-guns\/","title":{"rendered":"Knife Attack in Saint Cloud: Terrorism, Racism, Guns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Update:<\/strong><\/p>\n

From WCCO<\/a>:<\/p>\n

An Islamic State-run news agency claims the man who stabbed and wounded eight people at a mall in Minnesota before being shot dead by an off-duty police officer was a \u201csoldier of the Islamic State.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Original Post:<\/strong>
\nWe know nearly nothing about the Saint Cloud attack, but I’m going to offer some preliminary context-related thoughts anyway. Not conclusions or guesses, just context. (See below for some basic info on the attack.)<\/p>\n

One thing you need to know is that Minnesota is a state with the least racist and most socially and culturally enlightened people in it. And, some of the most racist and anti-civilization people in it. Saint Cloud is, essentially, the capital of the latter subculture, a very racist place<\/a>. This is Michele Bachmann territory.<\/p>\n

This is one reason to be really careful about drawing conclusions about what happened there. When I hear “Saint Cloud,” “Stabbing Attack,” “Asked if Muslim,” and “Said Allah” all in the same report, my best guess is that a local Islamophobe tried to kill or injure recently immigrated Somalis<\/a> (of which there are some) in Saint Cloud.<\/p>\n

Gun nuts will point out that this is a case of a “good guy with a gun” doing some good. It is. But, the “good guy with a gun” was a cop. So, really, this is a cop stopping an attack. Meanwhile, apparently, the attacker did not do a lot of damage to others, because, it seems, he wasn’t using a gun. He was using a knife. So, no, “you could do the same thing (as some guy with a gun) with a knife or a piece of string therefore GUN FREEDOM!!!1!!” is not an argument.<\/p>\n

If this does turn out to be an attack BY a Muslim on others in Saint Cloud, I suspect there will be white rage turned into violence soon in that community and nearby places such as Little Falls and Big Lake.<\/p>\n

Report from the New York Times<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\nST. CLOUD, Minn. \u2014 Eight people were injured during a stabbing attack at a Minnesota shopping mall that ended with the suspected attacker \u2014 who was dressed in a private security uniform and made references to Allah \u2014 shot dead by an off-duty police officer, authorities said.<\/p>\n

…eight people were taken to St. Cloud Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries following the attack first reported about 8:15 p.m. Saturday at the Crossroads Center. One person was admitted. …<\/p>\n

… an off-duty police officer… shot and killed the unidentified suspect, who was armed with a knife and wearing a private security firm uniform …<\/p>\n

Local police had three previous encounters with the suspect, most for minor traffic violations…<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Update: From WCCO: An Islamic State-run news agency claims the man who stabbed and wounded eight people at a mall in Minnesota before being shot dead by an off-duty police officer was a \u201csoldier of the Islamic State.\u201d Original Post: We know nearly nothing about the Saint Cloud attack, but I’m going to offer some … Continue reading Knife Attack in Saint Cloud: Terrorism, Racism, Guns<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22943,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[449,61,533,2145,1302],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5fhV1-5Y2","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22942"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22942"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22942\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}