“Being a reporter in America is being a war correspondent.” — Logan
More people got shot today. People get shot every day. This is America, the land of getting shot. This week it was two television employees in Virginia, one reporter and one photographer, murdered on live TV.
Here is the grim reality, which has been said before but bears repeating: nothing is going to change in this country when it comes to violence, gun violence in particular. Nothing substantive, anyway. If a classroom of six-year-olds dying won’t do it, nothing will. I suppose the only defense we have left is to keep talking about it when it happens. That’ll be the last thing to go. Talking about it, I mean. Eventually we won’t even do that anymore, because why talk about something you can see inside, outside, on your screen, in front of your face?
The gun debate is as tired as the shootings themselves. I’m tired of having it. I don’t think anyone should have a gun that isn’t specifically made to hunt an animal that you then intend to eat. Everything else should go. Don’t quote the 2nd Amendment to me, because unless you understand the part about “well-regulated militias,” we won’t agree. I don’t think you should get to have a handgun or an assault rife. You can think whatever you want. It doesn’t matter if we disagree anyway.
Some might argue that this level of cynicism borders on nihilism, and that nihilism won’t solve anything. Maybe it won’t. But there’s only so much death and gun violence you can see before you realize that your voice is lost among the haze of raining bullets and the clacks of firing mechanisms.
I suppose we could take a common-sense approach for starters, but that’s not very American. We could have universal background checks. We could outlaw military-grade weapons for civilian ownership. We could push for stricter legislation on any number of gun issues. But we won’t, because of that damnable amendment and the heinous misinterpretations of it. So we’ll watch people die in droves instead. It’s just another Wednesday in America, after all.