THAT’S
the headline that should be on the news. Instead we hear about a lone gunman,
thoughts and prayers, and a vast array of people saying the following two things:
1. “There’s not much we can do.” Followed by Chicago
statistics of how strict gun laws do nothing to deter or reduce gun crime.
2. He was mentally unstable.
In
regards to #1:
This
has been the attitude for years and once for a change, I’d like to see someone
at least try to do something. I hear people defending the second amendment while chanting mantra-like "you won’t
take our guns", but what I don’t see is someone (ANYONE) implementing things to try and
deter these horrendous events from happening. That this happened is a tragedy, that we’ve
lost count of how many people have been lost because of terrorist events like
this is heartbreaking and infuriating. Because we let the dust settle and do
nothing. I'm not saying what I or anyone else suggests is the way to go... but let's just try something. Anything.
I
have gun owning friends. I have gun loving friends. I have friends who hunt. I’m
not for any of these things but they have the right to do so responsibly and I
don’t think less of them for their decisions. I know men and women who want to
carry firearms and hell I have a friend who knows how to handle a crossbow
pretty damn well. But
they all have gun permits and do their best to be responsible gun owners
because they know this is a serious matter.
Throughout
the years I’ve seen a LOT of pushback in regards to new gun laws and as recent
as this year, new legislation has passed to make purchasing a firearm even
easier… which obviously makes me twitchy. Imagine you want to put new and better drug testing
procedures in your company and a ton of people fight it tooth and nail. What
would your reaction be? That’s my stance in terms of firearms.
I
don’t understand how the resistance can be so solid and insistent and I can only
see two things in this equation: gun lovers that don’t want people to know what
they own or to be questioned why they own it and gun manufacturers who don’t
want to lose business. Different people have been targeted and on this occasion
it was a white terrorist opening fire on mostly white Americans. There was a white
terrorist who opened fire on children in a school in Connecticut and killed 28
people, including defenseless children. There was an American terrorist who
opened fire in a gun club in Orlando killing 48 people. A white American
terrorist opened fire in a theater in Colorado during the screening of the Dark
Knight Rises killing several people in the process. My question is what is the line that needs to be crossed for there to be action taken.
Now
after the above paragraph, some people might be shocked that I used the terms
American terrorist and white terrorist. For me, I’m shocked at the amount of
people who have died because of firearms in the hands of people with bad
intentions. Which brings me to my second point.
#2
Dialogue of mental conditions and terrorists/murderers
Calling
the terrorist from Las Vegas mentally unstable, a lone wolf, or crazy is a knee
jerk reaction. I’m not saying it’s OK, I’m saying it’s a natural reaction… but
I do have something to say about this. I know people who are bi-polar, have
massive anxiety, chronic depression, have had suicidal thoughts, have attempted
suicide, and some who have unfortunately succeeded. I know people in the autism
spectrum, that are gender fluid, bisexual, asexual, agender, that have severe eating
disorders, and suffer from severe insomnia. I know people who have post-traumatic
stress disorder, who have been abused by relatives or family friends, who have
survived sexual assault, who have been shot, who have had a stroke, who have Parkinson’s
Disease, who have lupus and lime disease, who are fighting cancer, are
undergoing chemotherapy, have been left for dead, are recovering addicts, are
currently fighting addiction, and countless other things… and many of them are
some of the kindest, most selfless, most genuine, hard-working, pay it forward
humans I know and because our language is limited, we put them under the same
box than a white terrorist.
This
is not only wrong, it is bullshit.
We
need to take of the veil off in regards to yet another “isolated” case which
isn’t isolated. There’s plenty of precedent of people who have done things like
this and we keep hearing “well what can you do?” or "this is not the time to talk about policy, we must respect the victims in this." And to me, any answer is better
than what is being considered, which feels like a big pile of nothing. In addition, I'm wondering when the right time to discuss gun policy is because there never seems to be a right time for people who don't want to do anything about this situation.
I’m
not saying my ideas or what people whom I support say is what has to be done…
but something. Anything. Is better than thoughts, prayers, and turning the page
yet again with no action.
