Gun control. Two words certain to strike an immediate and extreme emotional response in any American hearing them. We’ve become numb to them in a way, so desensitized to the reality of mass murder in our own country that the rhetoric surrounding events like those recently in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio reads the same as every mass shooting before it. Political pundits on all sides strive to twist the narrative so much that we don’t know what to think or feel anymore. It shouldn’t be this way. I’m certain the victims of the El Paso shooting weren’t thinking about bullet-proof vests while walking around Walmart. Being gunned down in the street wasn’t even a fleeting thought in the minds of the Dayton victims. Nor should they be. In a country that has long considered itself the trendsetter for the world, its citizens should not have to don body armor for a trip to the movies, wear bullet-proof vests at the bar, or send our kids to school with bullet-proof backpacks for their own protection. Yet here we are again: cleaning up the bodies.
Gun control is in the public consciousness again following not one but two mass shootings in less than thirteen hours. Democrats are screaming for background checks and gun control laws while Republicans scream right back that this isn’t the time to talk about gun control, and that laws like that won’t change anything. Meanwhile we’re stuck trying to figure out how to express our grief at the loss and how to finally, finally ensure this doesn’t happen again. Then again, we’ve been through all this before. Politicians argue ‘round and ‘round until we dizzy and give up.
Until it happens again.
You see, I was once one who believed guns weren’t the problem. I grew up in a rural part of California, on a vineyard ranch. My dad, uncles, and cousins all enjoyed hunting season, and my great-uncle even had a makeshift slaughterhouse set up in a barn so that they could skin and dress their kills. My dad kept a loaded rifle on the wall in the hallway of our house, just in case a rabid animal or coyote showed up. My siblings and I were taught from an early age not to mess with it. That a gun was a weapon with one purpose: to kill; and because its purpose was to kill, we should never aim it at a person, even if we were sure it wasn’t loaded. There was never any ambiguity about it. They weren’t collectibles or toys; they were there to be used. As such, we were all taught to respect what they could do and to take care in how we used them. As a result, I had never really thought much about guns. They were what they were, and that’s just the way it was.
Then came Columbine.
I was a college student when the Columbine massacre occurred. I didn’t even know what had happened until later that evening and I remember being confused. It didn’t make sense based off how I’d been raised to think about guns. Media outlets and politicians both took to the news to pass off blame. First it was violent video games, then bullying, and finally mental illness to blame for the shootings. Yet even then nothing truly changed. We believed it was a one-off; that something as tragic could never happen again.
We were wrong.
Over and over mass shootings are happening and every time the conversation is the same. First, they blame video games. Video games are all released with ratings from the ESRB in an attempt to keep the truly more mature and violent games out of the hands of children. Then they blame bullying. Schools across the country have increased counseling staff, invested in watchdog programs, and adopted zero-tolerance policies regarding bullying in school. I am not arguing that these methods work perfectly, every time. Indeed, there are flaws with all of them. However, in the twenty years since Columbine, the only area that seems not to have changed at all would be gun control.
Gun control alone is not the answer. On that, both sides can agree. We need more than just to restrict access to high capacity assault weaponry. We need easier access to mental health care for everyone. We need more school programs to give our kids a focus in the real world. We need to fund programs designed to help those most at risk of committing these violent crimes. Finally, we need to take our heads out of the sand and put a stop to the hate, prejudice, racism and bigotry that feed the mechanisms of violence. We need to change. The price of failure here is never going to be acceptable, and our politicians have proven they’re unwilling or unable to listen. Because the payment for our folly is due, and it isn’t paid in cash.
It’s paid in our children’s blood.
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