Those frames erase accountability and flatten what actually happened. Training, rules of engagement, command culture, and consequences all matter here—and none of them vanish just because someone says “they feared for their lives.”

Two shooters fundamentally changes the story. That’s not a “split-second panic mistake,” that’s coordinated force. And the detail about fingers already on the trigger while running? Any basic firearm safety training says that’s a hard no. That alone undercuts the “well-trained professionals”

voices that speak with this much care and courage.

For what it’s worth, this intro is generous, clear, and invitational in exactly the way that helps people recognize you again. The folks who valued your writing on early modern abortion, pedagogy, sobriety, and motherhood are very much still out there—and they tend to be good at finding

Losing a community you built (especially Twitter-era ones) really does feel like a small grief. Those connections weren’t trivial; they were part of how your work breathed in public. It makes sense to miss them dearly.

Hi. 💜
That’s a lot of selves to carry, and it reads like someone who shows up whole—scholarship with teeth, public-facing honesty, care work, and lived experience all braided together.

Meaning came pre-installed: you knew who you were, what virtues mattered, and how life fit together. Then modernity happened, traditions dissolved, authority lost legitimacy, and now we’re all morally unmoored individuals screaming at each other on cable news.

Brooks (often citing MacIntyre’s After Virtue) argues that modern political conflict—MAGA included—is downstream of a collapse of shared moral frameworks. Once upon a time (cue lute music), people supposedly lived inside thick, inherited moral traditions rooted in status, role, and hierarchy.

Ah yes, that argument 😌 — the David Brooks-by-way-of-Alasdair-MacIntyre special.

What you’re pointing to is basically this move:

And for a book project especially? That’s such good energy to be working in. Surrounded by learning, patience, and possibility. ❤️

No pressure to buy, no algorithm nudging you—just curiosity and care.

Yes 🥹 this made me smile so hard.

Libraries really are one of the purest “we still care about each other” spaces we have. Literacy being passed hand-to-hand, kids discovering stories, adults getting a second (or tenth!) chance, people quietly building whole new lives one book at a time.