Mad World

It's been a week since the tragic shootings at Newtown, Connecticut's Sandy Hook Elementary School but it has gotten any easier to reconcile in my brain what happened. It's amazing how desensitized we all are these days to rampage shootings. At the time of Columbine we all sat riveted to our television screens because we couldn't believe what was unfolding before our very eyes. Now, we sit riveted because we can't believe "it" happened yet again. "It" being another shooting by a troubled young man in a public location, resulting in the loss of several innocent lives. I think it is because of this desensitization that I only half paid attention on Friday morning when a news headline spoke of a school shooting. I glanced at the headline but didn't have time to click the story because I had to take a phone call. In the middle of that call I turned on the TV and realized it was a shooting at an elementary school, not a college or a high school as I'd assumed, and it took a minute for that to sink in. Actually it took...well, it still hasn't really sunk in. How could anyone target 6 and 7-year-olds with that kind of rage and violence? They were just babies with no sense of what was going on, and they should never have had to experience something so heinous. There should be no such thing as a 7-year-old survivor of a rampage shooting, nor a 6-year-old murder victim. And it really makes you wonder about this world we're living on and whether we are indeed in the end times. Children being brutally gunned down for (as far as we know right now) no reason has to be some kind of sign.
It seems like only a few months ago that I was writing my post about the Aurora theater shootings, which took place not far from where I grew up. That's probably because it WAS a handful of months ago. And that right there is the brightest, redest flag that should serve as a wake-up call for this country. The NRA, usually the first ones to release a statement defending the right to bear arms after these incidents, went has gone silent in the wake of the Sandy Hook shooting. The reason being that there is no defense this time. Children were killed. Children were hunted by this psycho with a semi-automatic weapon. All of these shootings are tragic but you have to be a different kind of evil to shoot kids. And the NRA would have to be a special kind of stupid to defend that. True to form, they showed us just how special they are by demanding an armed cop be in every school in America, after blaming everything but guns for the shooting. According to the head idiot of the NRA, of these shooters knew there were armed officers at schools, they wouldn't even consider going in there with a gun of their own. Right. I'm sure that would solve everything. This guy had a semi-automatic weapon and attacked a school that has some of the best security in the country. Even if a cop had been posted there, he would have only needed to case the school for a week or so to determine where the officer was and what weapon he was carrying. Then he could've proceeded the exact same way, shooting the cop on his way in and continuing on his rampage. Someone who decides to commit this kind of crime is already so twisted in the head that they're not going to care if a cop is there or not. And it is completely ridiculous to even consider giving teachers guns. Even if they are trained to use them properly, the chances are still higher that they'll shoot a student or co-worker accidentally, or that a student will get a hold of a gun and injure themselves or others. Not to mention, I would not send my child to a school where anyone had access to a weapon of any kind.
We always say the latest incidence of mass murder will change things, laws will be written and guns will be more difficult to obtain. But then the news moves on to another story and we all forget about it until the next shooting happens. The same is true this time around, but it will likely go the way of all the other calls for change and we'll all be trying to make sense of another tragedy in three months or six months or a year. Lawmakers will claim that the reason nothing changes is because they meet resistance over tightening gun laws, primarily from Republicans and rednecks who whine about their right to bear arms. But this country was in a very different place when that right was given to us. It was a time when there was no police force and people kept guns to protect themselves from others. We no longer need that. We need to ban automatic weapons across the country and put those who wish to purchase guns under the microscope before they are allowed one. Currently, every state has different guidelines and waiting periods when it comes to buying firearms. New York has a ninety day waiting period, while California has banned automatic weapons altogether. Gun shows are popular places to get weapons because most do not have any kind of waiting period (guns purchased from a show were used in the Columbine killings). It really puts things in perspective when you realize that 21 U.S. states require waiting periods of 24 to 72 hours before you can marry (after obtaining a marriage license), yet in most U.S. states you can apply for a gun, purchase it and potentially shoot someone all in less than a day. You have to wait to commit your life to someone you love but not to take the life of someone you hate. There needs to be a complete overhaul of gun laws in this country. You should have to pass a mental health check that not only looks at your medical records but also delves into whether you've ever been involuntarily committed or come close to it. That should be a standard part of a background check when someone wants to purchase a weapon, and it should apply to gun shops, pawn shops AND gun shows. To make sure they comply, you impose stiff penalties for failure to adhere to the law. For example, if you illegally sell a gun that is used in the commission of one of these mass killings, you should be held just as responsible as the person who committed the crime. Of course, all of this has to actually happen and not just remain a topic of discussion until Sandy Hook falls out of the media spotlight. And that's the challenge.
We'll never know if different gun laws would have changed or prevented the loss of life at Sandy Hook, but some of the details that have come out so far are disturbing. Apparently the mother of the shooter was aware he had mental issues and did not like to leave him alone. If that's the case, one has to wonder why she didn't have some sort of security measures in place for his own safety and for hers? Why was she keeping weapons in a house that was already not quite safe? Why did she teach her mentally ill son to shoot guns when she likely knew it is illegal for those with mental issues to own them? Clearly he didn't just snap and decide to do this, it required planning. You don't destroy the hard drive of your computer just for kicks or in a fit of rage, it takes time to remove that and quite a bit of effort to smash it to pieces. Worst of all is that it seems like there may be no clear cut motive for his actions. Early on, the media said his mother worked at the school or that he had attended the school and that may have been part of the motive, but both of those have since been recanted. It seems as though the same profile always emerges of these people who commit mass murder; in their 20's, usually white, described as nerds or outcasts or "weird", book smart but socially awkward and most all of them are from quaint suburban towns - Littleton, Aurora, Newtown. You always hear the same thing about how people never thought it could happen where they live. But if I lived in a suburb, I wouldn't find it difficult at all to believe because those ares seem to be more susceptible to this kind of violence. I grew up in the inner-city and never worried this kind of thing, even after Columbine. Maybe a part of it happening in the suburbs is people having nothing better to do in such a quiet town than hang out with friends and get drunk and play Call of Duty or other first-person shooter games. But that's not the deciding factor because there are obviously thousands of kids who grow up in these towns and deal with the same boredom and never commit a crime. That's where mental illness and bad parenting come in. The Columbine gunmen built pipe bombs right under their parents' noses in their bedrooms and, although their parents had no advanced knowledge of the crime, they suspected it may be their children who were involved when they heard about it. They knew something was off but did nothing about it. Hell, even going into their rooms and poking around may have saved countless lives and averted disaster. I couldn't bring a paper clip into my room as a teenager without marking it down in our household inventory, forget about weapons or alcohol or anything else I wasn't supposed to have. The Sandy Hook gunman was an adult but it seems as though he was still living at home and, if his mother was as concerned as others have said, maybe she should've kept a more watchful eye on what he was up to in her house.
At the end of the day it's about the victims, who happen to be children in this case. I can't imagine how terrible it is to lose a child, especially after having dropped them off at what should be one of the safest places. It's terrible for this kind of thing to happen at anytime of the year but a week before Christmas has got to make it even worse. If you had gifts under the tree for that child, what do you do with them now? Remove them and keep them wrapped in a closet? If you lost your only child or your only child of that age, it's going to be awful to remove the car seat they used to occupy everyday. That's something that should be a proud moment when you're celebrating your little one being not so little anymore. But it won't be in this case. I understand one of the boys who died left behind a twin sister who didn't quite understand what had happened to her brother. I get worried if I don't hear from my sister for hours, I couldn't function or survive if she was suddenly just gone forever. I wouldn't understand that now and I'm 31, nevermind trying to comprehend it at age 7. Having experience with trauma and the sudden loss of someone I loved, I've always felt like it was worse for those left behind. Yes, the person is gone but the rest of us have to deal with so many emotions, the shock of what just happened and the realization that you will never see that person's face or hear that person's voice again. I saw an interview with the boyfriend of one of the teachers who was killed and it was like looking in a mirror a decade ago. The poor guy was understandably devastated and couldn't stop crying. They had only been together a year but he said he was jealous of those who had her much longer than he did. It was an odd feeling to be able to know the exact swirl of emotions that were inside him. And to know what lies ahead as he deals with all of those emotions. It won't be easy for anyone to move on. But hopefully those 20 children and 6 adults deaths will not be in vain and change actually will come.