A long time ago, children died from diseases, starvation in famines, birth defects, even in wars. In more recent times, many died in automobiles when they crashed. Even seat belt laws didn't stop those deaths, though they helped when used. We have a new primary cause of children's deaths now: mental illness. The Governor of Tennessee was on TV insisting that the cause of the recent school shooting was mental illness. He didn't say that the true highest cause of children's deaths is now guns. He didn't mention guns. It was all mental illness.
People can and do get mental illnesses. It happens all over the globe. We are no sicker than any people anywhere else. Other countrys' children are not dying in such numbers with bullets ravaging their small bodies, despite mental illness in their populations. But ours are. Toddlers find adults' guns, think they are safe, or toys, and suddenly a bullet goes where it shouldn't. Or several bullets do, because it is so easy to shoot off multiple rounds. That was curiosity, or playing what they see on TV. Not mental illness. Not unlesss you count the parent's inability and/or unwillingness to keep their guns out of the reach of children.
Older children, even adults, get angry just like the rest of us, get mentally ill, learn to hate. They "act out", grab a gun from the home, or a friend, or wherever guns can be found these days which is practically everywhere. They go hunt their targets, whether teachers, classmates, or whoever needs to pay in their minds, and find their fame. We can blame mental illness, bullying, thrill seeking, or whatever. Those things used to be "solved" by a schoolyard fight, where bruises, bloody noses, possibly even a stabbing or a broken bone might have been the result, followed by suspension of those involved. These days there is too often no one left to suspend, with the final victim often being the shooter.
We lump it all under "mental illness". Who else would go around shooting bunches of people if they were mentally healthy? Calling it by that name means we are not at fault for what is happening almost daily in this country in schools, churches, anywhere people gather. We as a nation fall back on the reasoning that our constitution gives us the unimpeded right to bear arms. It's just a few bad apples who misuse them.
Those bad apples are finding close at hand the tools that have only one purpose: kill. Kill as many and as fast as possible, without stopping to reload, to think, to let any inconvenience slow them down. We call that misuse to pretend we don't know that is exactly why they were made, call them hunting rifles as if we were going to feed ourselves on a deer with 30 bullets in it. We blame the shooter for picking up the weapon so easily at hand, call them mentally ill. We stockpile guns, play soldier on the shooting range with them, pat each other on the back for our prowess at pretend killing, hitting targets with human shapes instead of circles on them, and find ourselves innocent of any wrong. We are so "innocent" that we defend rabidly our right to do that, without restrictions of any kind, just because of a piece of paper back when muskets were necessary for safety and defense when our white invader ancestors were claiming territory in this country. We hadn't killed off wolves and bears which might have found our presence an invitation to attack for a ready meal or to fend off a danger to their young. We hadn't yet destroyed all the peoples already there who were willing to fight for their lives because they were here first, or others from overseas who also wanted to claim this land for themselves and a different king.
But muskets had to be reloaded for every shot. Better have good aim and kill immediately what you aimed at rather than risk vulnerability while reloading. After some years one could shoot six bullets without pause, then 30 or more. You didn't need to aim anymore as the spray would find its victims. Any victims.
We kept interfering in attempts to regulate the possession of firearms, arguing "rights". We stopped the bans on instruments of war for home use and entertainment, because "rights," and because the aftermath of a tragedy of a mass shooting just "wasn't the time" to do it. Now they come so frequently that there never is a right time by those standards. We refused to stop violent people from owning them, or home grown militias from stockpiling them. We defined "rights" as absolute, inviolate. No other rights were given limits, after all. Right?
We have the right to freedom of speech. This freedom can come with penalties, however. You can't tell lies about another and defame them without expecting consequences. You can't incite violence, start a riot, or cause panic in a crowded theater by falsely yelling "Fire!" Too many don't understand that being free to speak one's opinions is not also the guarantee of an audience. Having nothing worth listening to is not to be equated with somebody shutting down your rights.
We as citizens have the right to vote, but persons of color are less able to use that right. The poor are less able to travel to where they can vote, after first having to travel to procure the "proper" ID and getting time away from work to do all of that. Felons can't vote under many different circumstances in individual states. We impose age restrictions and all sorts of requirements before that right is actually allowed.
Pick a right, and you'll find laws about how and where and when. But laws to control the use of guns, or even who should be able to own which kind of them, are fought against tooth and nail. People gotta make money, doncha know.
So maybe it really is all about mental illness after all: the mental illness of American society that can support the blanket defense of the tools of violence while decrying their use in the way they were designed. Pretty sure that's not how the Governor meant it, though.
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