Merry Christmas everybody.
And look at the great presents we got!
Political drama and finger pointing!
Yeah!
Let’s start at the top of this dungheap and descend shall
we? A short while ago, there was a
terrible shooting
in Newtown Connecticut, that now everyone is talking about. The perpetrator is Adam Lanza, and his
victims are, for the most part, children.
Nobody knows why he did what he did. I don’t support any of his actions and I
imagine those I shall speak against today don’t either. Are we all clear on these facts? Great!
From here, we descend.
The shooting has started tongues wagging about gun
control, and this is now being discussed by Obama administration at the
highest levels. Politically, the first instinct
is to address the ease of access to weapons.
There’s a bunch of studies
about how America trails the world in gun control and leads in gun violence. And this has provoke defensive, even shameful
responses.
Senator
Jay Rockefeller has used this time to prepare a motion to study the effects
of violence in media, with a particular emphasis on video games, specifically
to “…examine whether violent video games/programming causing kids to act
aggressively or otherwise hurt their wellbeing…” The timing is tactless, if nothing else, and
smacks of a connected Senator trying to change the dialog away from gun
ownership and proliferation to the media’s often disproved ability to program
children to violence. I repeat that while
Adam Lanza is known to have been active in a technology club, motive,
especially motive rooted in media images, cannot be known at this time.
The NRA, equally
tactless, has at least found something palpable, shall we say the elephant in
the room, about video games to latch on to as their scapegoat – the fantasies
of violence and modern weapons. NRA
executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre has now made history in trying to pin
the shooting on video games, choosing perennial whipping boys Bulletstorm, Grand
Theft Auto, Splatterhouse and, remember these guys, Mortal Kombat, as the cause
of all of this suffering. He at least
goes full tilt into this dillusion – the solution, according to the NRA, is not
fewer, better regulated guns, but more guns and more people to shoot them. Mr. LaPierre suggests round the clock armed
guards at every school in America. That
will really help with the dozens of problems schools have with being seen as
prisons by their students, being overbudget, and otherwise not being safe
places to learn and grow. I’m sorry Mrs.
Smith, Timmy had to hospitalized; he went to the store and got one of those
cheap pop cap explosive darts boys play with and the guard on duty had a new
hair trigger.
Every part of this discussion seems tactless and self
serving here. I actually feel dirty
living only 500 miles away from this. In
this instance, considering what has happened and moral decency, here is the
example that I wish we would all follow.
1) All
sympathies must be directed to the victims and to the other residents of
Newtown. This is not fair, but so few
things in this life are. No one may
cheapen these lives or this tragedy. This
has happened, and we pray to God for deliverance or at least guidance.
2) Allow
Senator Rockefeller his inquiry. The
implications of his inquiry, the shame of being singled out for witchhunts and
the like, is not fair, but few things in life are, and I really don’t think he
can do much with this podium. His
actions are cheap and petty, but he lives in a free country and can take his
office to be so cheap if he so chooses. Voters
can object, but they have to vote against him to do so.
3) To
the NRA, you guys are terrible. If the
human mind can’t take responsibility for its exposure to gun violence in
iconographic form, why is more real guns … how could that … what part of the
human mind could … no forget it. Don’t argue
with fools. I hope the NRA gets a good
sized slice of humble pie, and I hope that it comes not from government, not
even from the victims, but from what I would bet is the large segment of NRA
members who are also gamers, and who like the Modern Warfare, gun fetishy types
of games that Mr. LaPierre demonizes.
4) For
America, and the world, I hope we can finally do something here. Guns are not just tools for killing, they are
tools for automated killing, they make these sorts of murder sprees more than
the results of a deranged mind, they propel those deranged minds to great achievements. Achievements that we do not support. Maybe we will never ban the gun, maybe that
is not what we ever needed, but I hope we can take gun use away from the
province of fully automated, idiot proofed killing efficiency.
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