Since a bunch of you are asking in the wake of the latest outbreak of gun violence, here are the essays:
The Seven Stages of Gun Violence
The Bang Bang Crazy Series:
Part 1, What we need, see, are more guns, big fucking guns
Part 2, Gun violence isn't the exception in America, it's who we are
Part 3, Sandy Hook, the NRA, and a gun in every school
Part 4, More dead kids and why we have laws
Part 5, Gun control and a polite society
Part 6, The Christopher Donner rampage, they needed killin'
Part 7, Still more dead kids and let's print our own guns!
Part 8, Let's try blaming the victim, shall we?
Part 9, Armed soldiers on post, sure, nothing to go wrong there.
Part 10. Big Damned Heroes!
Part 11. Two in the Bush
Part 12, Excuses
Part 13, Arm the Teachers
Part 14, The cowardice of Responsibility.
What do we do about it? How do we change our culture of gun violence? Bang Bang Sanity
I don't have the will anymore to write anything new about this madness.
Nothing will change until we as a nation find the goddamn strength to stand up to this murderous insanity and actually do something about it.
As a 75 year mother of two, grandmother of 1, teacher with over fifty years in some form of public education, resident of Connecticut, I will never understand this nation’s obsession with weapons! I thought Sandy Hook would wake up this country but no it goes on and on and on! Why should those of us with real compassion and concern for our country have to put up with all of the 2nd Amendment bull———! Get over yourselves! We do not want your guns! We would like universal background checks and maybe a ban on those assault weapons that you all need for leisure activities! Even that may not satisfy many of you , but I deserve the right to feel safe in this country as much as the next guy!
ReplyDeleteagree
DeleteAgree
DeleteI agree 100%. I'm so tired of hearing our politicians b.s. about thoughts and prayers
ReplyDeleteThoughts and prayers to Cthulhu.
DeleteWe need to start holding our elected officials 100% responsible for school shootings! They have had plenty of time and reason to enact tougher gun laws and they choose NRA funding over our children's lives! Every! Single! Time! It's time to hold them responsible!
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately it cannot change until the citizenry who vote to elect the politicians who perpetuate the degradation of our society for their own personal gain, and against the interest of the electorate, are educated to where they can recognize the folly and stop putting these politicians into office.
ReplyDeleteUntil then, nothing will change.
I'm done with this. So done. The gun debate stopped dead when we decided we were okay with dead children.
ReplyDeleteTHIS! When I was a young person we joked about drunk driving, it was comedy fodder. We laughed at the party goer who drove over his neighbor's mailbox, we laughed at late night comedy skits mimicking a drunk struggling to get a car key into the door lock. Now I don't know a single person who would hesitate to take car keys from a drunk. Why? Harsher penalties and increased awareness of the harm changed cultural attitudes. When drunk driving became a big deal we began behaving like it's a big deal. We can, and we must, do the same about firearms.
ReplyDeleteAgree
DeleteThe thing that will work better than anything else (probably not in my lifetime) is voting out of office every politician who puts his NRA money ahead of his constituents' lives..... When support for "gun rights" over the rest of us is a ticket to Congressional retirement, then things will change.....
DeleteThe essays are good and remain pertinent. Gun control, bundled with the many other high impact issues, should be sufficient for a huge call to action.
ReplyDeleteEnough! We can have a better nation if we are better citizens (as a very wise man regular reminds us).
Thank you Jim, for reposting, for writing these in the first place, and for the comment about not wanting to write anything more about this until something changes.
ReplyDeleteI totally understand and support this. What you have already written about this and your solution are complete, as they are and should be read by everyone. There isn't much, if anything, more to be said if folks haven't understood it yet. 😔
Thank you again for these.
At this point, I can only see conservative politicians who resist any change to guns as enablers of child murder.
ReplyDeleteThe answer always seems to be if you want fewer people shot with guns, you need to put even more guns on the streets.
ReplyDeleteConsider this: Switchblades--without exception-- are illegal to own and/or carry in Hawaii, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Washington, State. Nunchucks are illegal in 7 countries and 2 U.S. States. But we have "a Constitution Right" to own/or carry guns. Go figure.
ReplyDeleteFor most of this country's existence, the Second Amendment was seen as a collective right, written to enable the nation to call up a militia when needed. In the 1945 case of United States v. Miller, the gist of the decision was that Miller had failed to show that the sawed-off shotgun he'd been arrested for possessing had any relationship to the weapons used by a militia. There was no discussion about "individual rights" to possess and use weapons.
ReplyDeleteOne of the ironies of all this is that the places filled with people who are extensively trained and experienced in the use of firearms -- our miltary bases -- have far more restrictive regulations on the possession and carrying of guns than any civilian cities. It makes little sense that the less training people have in the use of guns, the fewer restrictions there are on them.
Before we can expect any sensible regulation of guns, we need to regain control of Congress from lobbyists and corporations. That means, we need a complete ban on paid lobbying and on corporate "donations" so the people in Congress will be more responsive to the people who elected them and not to the wealthy corporations that bought them.
I upvote your comment.
DeleteUnfortunately, this won't stop until the politicians that block legislation regulating firearms are held accountable by their constituents. The massive amount of money being thrown around by the NRA and gun manufacturers provides all the incentive these pols need to look the other way while mouthing their lame "thoughts and prayers" for the victims.
ReplyDeleteI saw a sign yesterday.
ReplyDelete"Let us honor our school children for valiantly laying down their lives to support our right to have guns."
I was meant as a protest, but it sums up the situation in the United States. This is what I gave 4 years of my life for?
Paul E. Cooper - Former QM3 (SS)
The unbelievable irony of it all. Force women to have children - often as a result of violence, and then some person with 'a right to bear arms' kills them with a gun. Sickening quasi religious logic.
ReplyDeleteSo much for the "save the fetus" crowd and regulated health care but, as George Carlin said, once they're born F them and their mama's. They want to take away the 14th Amendment with Roe V Wade but Lordy don't take away the 2nd and guns for all. In their minds "It's not the same, guns are our God given rights," but apparently personal bodily autonomy only applies to men and dead people for organ donations.
ReplyDeleteBack when I was a kid, growing up on a ranch in an open carry state, we all had guns--they were essential tools. But my dad's sometimes-hired hand, Two-Gun, considered his guns--2 Colt 45s, carried low and tied down for a quick draw--weapons. Two Gun worked cheap. He was also an idiotic lunatic with a rich fantasy life. Today, whenever I see men parading around with their holstered handguns, looking like ol' Two Gun, I just think they're Republicans.
ReplyDeleteThis morning on Morning Edition on NPR they interviewed the author of the book "Trigger Points: Inside the Mission to Stop Mass Shootings in America" who had some very good things to say. One point worth mentioning from the interview:
ReplyDelete" But it's a range of problems that are behavioral, that are circumstantial. There are things going on in their lives. There's lack of connection. You know, these are at-risk people, people in crisis. And there is opportunity to intervene before they get down this - what's called the pathway to violence."
The whole interview is worth a listen there are some good ideas presented.
https://www.npr.org/2022/05/26/1101423572/author-examines-the-behavioral-patterns-of-people-who-carried-out-mass-shootings
Read every single one of these years back. Changed my thinking, and my life a bit.
ReplyDeleteThese are good work, for all it may matter. Thank you for them.
Not to sound like a jerk, but its clear from the past couple of decades that what's required is:
ReplyDeleteVoting the GOP out of power;
Purging the Democrats of DINOs, blue dogs and corporate Dems, none of whom actually want to be part of an opposition party, that is, they support the GOP; and
Expand SCOTUS.
Then meaningful gun control has a chance.
Of course, the odds of those first three things happening...
We live in a nation where a significant percentage of the population not only puts gun rights above virtually everything else, but would literally fight to the death -- their own, and anyone else who stands in their way -- to resist any action to eliminate them.
ReplyDeleteHow do you combat that? In my view, you don't.
We're well past any point of reasonable compromise. The propagandists on both sides (but primarily on the right these days) have effectively pushed us over the line, to viewing the opposition not as a fellow contryman who wants the same things but differ on how to achieve the, TO ACTUAL ENEMIES.
Just listen to AM Hate Radio for 20 minutes. No, 10 minutes would probably be enough.
We are now enemies in our own country, and there is but one outcome. And it's coming. Probably sooner than many people would ever think possible.