My first reaction was not shock. My first reaction was, “not again”. I sighed and turned up the volume as I spent the morning cooking, listening to the reports.
Isn’t that something? I was not shocked.
How can we be shocked? This is now something that happens with regularity in this country. It’s nothing new. Another news cycle of interviews with all the usuals–the families, the almost victims, the psychologists, the police, the politicians. The awful intrusions into the private horror and despair of grieving families, the endless speculations about the “shooter.” It’s all too predictable, all to common for us now.
And the usual things are said by the usual people. “It’s time to talk about gun control.” “They are using this tragedy to push their agenda of taking our guns away from us.” “Now’s not the time to talk gun control, it’s a time to grieve.” “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” “A man in china cut 22 people with a knife. Shall we ban knives too?” This dialogue is the same, just the location changes.
And what am I to say? More of the same?
The Right is already at it. “Obama will just use this as an excuse to take away our guns. We knew he would. There will never be another election.” We are reminded that if we mention it, we are “using the tragedy.” Did we use the tragedy of Katrina when we talked about new levees for New Orleans? Did we use the tragedy when we talked about how to improve our national security after 9/11? How are we using this tragedy by discussing the insidious love affair we have in this country for violence and weaponry? How are we using this tragedy to figure out ways to stop this slaughter of the innocents?
But guns don’t kill people they tell me.
You know what? YES THEY DO. They kill people more efficiently than any other means short of bombs. Just because they need a human operator takes nothing away from their lethal potentiality.
Knives kill people. You want to ban knives?
No I don’t want to ban knives. Knives can be lethal but are a step down from guns. More people survive knife attacks than they do gun attacks. Knives take longer, you can’t mow people down with a knife.
The NRA remains steadfast that ANY legislation will take us down that “slippery slope” which ends in the total banning of guns.
WHO SAYS?
Is it the same fool that tells me that allowing gay marriage will inevitably lead down the slippery slope to animal-human marriage?
Or the one who tells me that use of marijuana will lead me down the slope to a full-blown shooting-up heroin addiction?
Or the one that tells me that masturbation will cause me to go blind?
You know what?
I’m sick of the NRA. Who are these crazy people? Why they are in the business of selling guns. They don’t want to sell less. They don’t have hearts and souls like yours and mine. They don’t care that what they produce kills. When President Obama was re-elected, gun sales went up 45%. Forty-five PERCENT. Because the NRA fools told the jackasses that love them, that Obama is gonna take away their right to buy and possess guns, and of course he’s a commie/pinko/socialist/NEW WORLD ORDER guy who is gonna destroy America so you better be prepared for the REVOLUTION.
And guess what? Gun ownership is actually down in the US. You can’t believe that can you? Neither could I at first. There are over 300 MILLION guns in America. But ownership is down. The percentage of people who own guns is DOWN. So that means that more guns are being concentrated in fewer hands. Mr. Patriot out there is building an arsenal. How’s that make you feel? Nervous? I sure am.
Explain to me why on God’s green earth or any other planet for that matter, why anyone other than the military NEEDS assault rifles, high-powered handguns, any handgun, multi-clip ammo, or any of probably a hundred other things I don’t even know about but whose only point is to kill something from as far away as possible, as surely as possible, and frankly as explosively as possible?
Tell me why such things are necessarily required in your closet, in my neighborhood?
You like to shoot them?
Fine. Let’s have licensed ranges all over the freakin’ country and you can go out there, pick the weapon of your choice and shoot at plastic deer until the cows come home. But you go home without your little friend. Get that?
You want to hunt? Fine. You can have a shotgun or a regular rifle.
Do you know it’s illegal in some states to hunt ducks with a gun that can hold more than THREE cartridges? Otherwise it’s not sporting. It’s just blasting away at a space and figuring you’ll probably hit some. Yet you can own an assault rifle with a 100 ammo clip.
This is not the wild west. No matter how romantic you think it was, it wasn’t. It was ugly and mean and people died horribly. There is nothing noble about Rambo. All your “let’s pretend we are Navy Seals and kill bad guys” video games are designed to make you comfortable with guns and the culture of violence. I promise you, the reality is nothing so fun or clean. It’s dirty, it smells bad, it looks worse, and rational people do not find such things either “fun” or exciting.
We need to stop blaming the shooters in these tragedies, for they are simply sick souls. Can you figure out why someone who feels that the world has screwed him thinks the way to go out is to kill innocents who had nothing to do with his “wrong”? No? Neither can I, which leaves the only answer–people do this because they aren’t right in the head. We need to identify them early and help them before they are so deranged that killing people in a blaze of suicidal glory sounds appropriate to them.
We need to end this.
I’ve had enough.
I’m don’t want to spend the remainder of my life wondering what’s in the mall besides the stores and the merchandise.
I don’t want to live that way or think that way.
It’s time to demand rational gun laws from our ELECTED officials, and damn them if they don’t pass it.
Enough is enough.
Related articles
- Why the NRA Is Still Winning the War on Guns (theatlanticwire.com)
- NRA Should Have Noses Rubbed In Mess On Floor Of Newtown Elementary School (dekerivers.wordpress.com)
- What Better Place Than Here? What Better Time Than Now? (spiffysean.com)
- Enough Unnecessary Tragedy, Time to Disarm America and the NRA (planetpov.com)
- Gun Control – When will America come to Its Senses? (afnclarke.wordpress.com)
- Is the Newtown Massacre the Mass Shooting That Starts Us Talking About Gun Control Again? (blogs.villagevoice.com)
- Of Course Today Is the Day to Talk About Gun Control (gizmodo.com)
Existential Ennui 