It Has to Stop
In the wake of another shooting at yet another school, I can't help but wonder when will this nation wake the hell up and get real?
When will our national conversation on such events stop being about whether we are conservative or liberal, gun-owners or non-gun-owners, Republicans or Democrats and start being about how to stop this insanity?
Now I don't use the word "insanity" to disrespect anyone with mental illness. As I was reading today in an article, of course we assume that anyone who would shoot up a school and kill children MUST be nuts. It's the only way we can console ourselves that these things are not who we are as a nation. Wake up people, it has become who we are.
Plenty of theories abound but one seems to ring true for me. Maybe it isn't the sole reason, or even the primary one but let's think about it for a moment... Desensitization.
If you were at all paying attention to the news WAY back in the 1980s groups of parents were all concerned about the effect of violent cartoons on children. Later there was concern about violent video games, movies and on and on. Point of fact, studies have shown time and time again that the more we are exposed to violence the more we are desensitized to it. To put it another way: we get used to it. People were concerned that such exposure would result in long term damage and I think it has. But at the same time parents (then and now) weren't willing to "parent" their children and limit such exposure - somehow this became the job of teachers, TV became an unmonitored babysitter with the responsibility of limiting programming and society was responsible for producing games, and movies that were violent. Never mind that most were rated R and were on TV after 9:00 p.m./10:00 Central.
We also know that children don't understand that death is actually final. Cartoon characters "die" and get right back up, actors in films die and pop up in another movie "all better". The concept of death and its finality don't make sense to a young mind. It's not a concept they can grasp. This is where parents are supposed to come in and explain things. The teenage mind isn't fully mature, it doesn't function on logic. Fast forward to later in life and same young person playing games where you get points and actually win by killing people. Okay maybe said "people" are bad guys, aliens, whatever... they are "other" and not "us" so it's okay to "kill" them. Fast forward again to the person being bullied, or otherwise feeling wronged and somehow they have access to a weapon, or several weapons. Legally obtained weapons.
Because this person has been over time desensitized to the horror of killing, it doesn't occur to them that what they are about to do is wrong, is awful even. They don't feel it. Maybe they can't any more. They have a reason that makes sense to them. They aren't necessarily "mentally ill" in any clinical sense although to the "normal" people they might seem to be.
As a nation we're kind of like that, desensitized. We may shed a tear or two, shake our heads and bemoan the actions that result in people, children, being killed. Killed while at school, at a concert, at the movies, otherwise having a normal life unaware of the death that stalks them. We offer our "thoughts and prayers" and relieved that no one we know was harmed, shrug our shoulders and go back to our lives after a day or two. This is beyond inadequate. Sandy Hook should have been the last straw, it wasn't. Why wouldn't the deaths of children aged 5 to 10 NOT be the last straw? What the hell is wrong with the United States of America?
I know this: Responsible gun-owners aren't the problem. People who respect the weapon aren't the problem. People who teach their children to respect the weapon aren't the problem.
I don't own any guns but I have fired them. I enjoy shooting trap with a shotgun. An AR-15 is a great gun to shoot at a target to test your long distance skills, so is a 9mm handgun, but not at a person. I don't need to own a gun. I can go to a gun club and rent one to use. My father has guns, beautiful rifles in a locked cabinet. The grand kids aren't allowed near them and wouldn't dream of breaking that rule.
So no, I don't think guns are necessarily the problem. Illegal access yes, I have a problem with that, I also understand that criminals will get their hands on guns by illegal means, they don't care about gun-control laws. Lack of background checks at gun shows and through private sales I have a problem with and I am not a fan of concealed carry. There is a reason after all why we no longer live in the "wild west". Think about this - if a law enforcement officer is called to a scene where shots have been fired and a lot of people have guns, how is that officer going to know who the "bad guys with guns" are versus who the "good guys with guns" are? He/she isn't going to know. Every person with a gun in that situation has to be assumed to be a threat. Every. Person.
Not every person with a concealed carry permit should have one, regardless of whether or not they have a clean background check and have or have not been clinically diagnosed. There are law enforcement officers who shouldn't have weapons either. People who think they are powerful because of a gun, who use their gun as some kind of extension of their "big, tough, powerful" personality. These people aren't mentally ill per se, they are bullies.
Some may want to be "famous" for a short time for their actions. To be notorious. To be remembered. To somehow matter after they are gone. To go out in a blaze of "glory". Whether the shooter is or is not motivated by hatred of people not like him - people of color in a church, "popular" kids at a school, the managers who passed them over for a promotion or fired them - is not relevant except insofar as there seems to be an emboldenment of some people to spout hatred lately and perhaps that is a factor for some - such as the white shooter who walked into a black church in Charleston and opened fire.
Granted, we all want to be remembered. We all want to matter. That is no excuse for picking up a gun and killing people. That isn't mental illness. That isn't a factor of gun control. That is certainly NOT the way to accomplish that "goal" of being remembered, not in the way these people might think.
Access to mental health care IS a problem but seriously, not every white male who perpetrates a mass shooting is clinically mentally ill, or has a documented history of mental illness. These shooters are not all immigrants or foreign terrorists so falling back on that excuse doesn't fly. Having a border wall would not have stopped Sandy Hook or Parkland or Columbine. Gun control laws would not have stopped them. Did you notice that they are all white males? Let's stop saying that the shooter is mentally ill.
I honestly think that as a society we have become desensitized to violence, to death and now to mass shootings of children.
Wake up America - It has to stop.
When will our national conversation on such events stop being about whether we are conservative or liberal, gun-owners or non-gun-owners, Republicans or Democrats and start being about how to stop this insanity?
Now I don't use the word "insanity" to disrespect anyone with mental illness. As I was reading today in an article, of course we assume that anyone who would shoot up a school and kill children MUST be nuts. It's the only way we can console ourselves that these things are not who we are as a nation. Wake up people, it has become who we are.
Plenty of theories abound but one seems to ring true for me. Maybe it isn't the sole reason, or even the primary one but let's think about it for a moment... Desensitization.
If you were at all paying attention to the news WAY back in the 1980s groups of parents were all concerned about the effect of violent cartoons on children. Later there was concern about violent video games, movies and on and on. Point of fact, studies have shown time and time again that the more we are exposed to violence the more we are desensitized to it. To put it another way: we get used to it. People were concerned that such exposure would result in long term damage and I think it has. But at the same time parents (then and now) weren't willing to "parent" their children and limit such exposure - somehow this became the job of teachers, TV became an unmonitored babysitter with the responsibility of limiting programming and society was responsible for producing games, and movies that were violent. Never mind that most were rated R and were on TV after 9:00 p.m./10:00 Central.
We also know that children don't understand that death is actually final. Cartoon characters "die" and get right back up, actors in films die and pop up in another movie "all better". The concept of death and its finality don't make sense to a young mind. It's not a concept they can grasp. This is where parents are supposed to come in and explain things. The teenage mind isn't fully mature, it doesn't function on logic. Fast forward to later in life and same young person playing games where you get points and actually win by killing people. Okay maybe said "people" are bad guys, aliens, whatever... they are "other" and not "us" so it's okay to "kill" them. Fast forward again to the person being bullied, or otherwise feeling wronged and somehow they have access to a weapon, or several weapons. Legally obtained weapons.
Because this person has been over time desensitized to the horror of killing, it doesn't occur to them that what they are about to do is wrong, is awful even. They don't feel it. Maybe they can't any more. They have a reason that makes sense to them. They aren't necessarily "mentally ill" in any clinical sense although to the "normal" people they might seem to be.
As a nation we're kind of like that, desensitized. We may shed a tear or two, shake our heads and bemoan the actions that result in people, children, being killed. Killed while at school, at a concert, at the movies, otherwise having a normal life unaware of the death that stalks them. We offer our "thoughts and prayers" and relieved that no one we know was harmed, shrug our shoulders and go back to our lives after a day or two. This is beyond inadequate. Sandy Hook should have been the last straw, it wasn't. Why wouldn't the deaths of children aged 5 to 10 NOT be the last straw? What the hell is wrong with the United States of America?
I know this: Responsible gun-owners aren't the problem. People who respect the weapon aren't the problem. People who teach their children to respect the weapon aren't the problem.
I don't own any guns but I have fired them. I enjoy shooting trap with a shotgun. An AR-15 is a great gun to shoot at a target to test your long distance skills, so is a 9mm handgun, but not at a person. I don't need to own a gun. I can go to a gun club and rent one to use. My father has guns, beautiful rifles in a locked cabinet. The grand kids aren't allowed near them and wouldn't dream of breaking that rule.
So no, I don't think guns are necessarily the problem. Illegal access yes, I have a problem with that, I also understand that criminals will get their hands on guns by illegal means, they don't care about gun-control laws. Lack of background checks at gun shows and through private sales I have a problem with and I am not a fan of concealed carry. There is a reason after all why we no longer live in the "wild west". Think about this - if a law enforcement officer is called to a scene where shots have been fired and a lot of people have guns, how is that officer going to know who the "bad guys with guns" are versus who the "good guys with guns" are? He/she isn't going to know. Every person with a gun in that situation has to be assumed to be a threat. Every. Person.
Not every person with a concealed carry permit should have one, regardless of whether or not they have a clean background check and have or have not been clinically diagnosed. There are law enforcement officers who shouldn't have weapons either. People who think they are powerful because of a gun, who use their gun as some kind of extension of their "big, tough, powerful" personality. These people aren't mentally ill per se, they are bullies.
Some may want to be "famous" for a short time for their actions. To be notorious. To be remembered. To somehow matter after they are gone. To go out in a blaze of "glory". Whether the shooter is or is not motivated by hatred of people not like him - people of color in a church, "popular" kids at a school, the managers who passed them over for a promotion or fired them - is not relevant except insofar as there seems to be an emboldenment of some people to spout hatred lately and perhaps that is a factor for some - such as the white shooter who walked into a black church in Charleston and opened fire.
Granted, we all want to be remembered. We all want to matter. That is no excuse for picking up a gun and killing people. That isn't mental illness. That isn't a factor of gun control. That is certainly NOT the way to accomplish that "goal" of being remembered, not in the way these people might think.
Access to mental health care IS a problem but seriously, not every white male who perpetrates a mass shooting is clinically mentally ill, or has a documented history of mental illness. These shooters are not all immigrants or foreign terrorists so falling back on that excuse doesn't fly. Having a border wall would not have stopped Sandy Hook or Parkland or Columbine. Gun control laws would not have stopped them. Did you notice that they are all white males? Let's stop saying that the shooter is mentally ill.
I honestly think that as a society we have become desensitized to violence, to death and now to mass shootings of children.
Wake up America - It has to stop.
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