Well, here we are again. I wish I could react the same way everybody else seems to and say I am in shock over what transpired at an LGBTQ+ nightclub in Orlando in the early morning of June 12, 2016.
I wish I was surprised.
You never want to be in a situation where you have grown accustomed to events like mass shootings. But as citizens of a nation that is grossly negligent and remains obtuse to the need for increased gun regulation, we have become disgustingly desensitized to tragedy.
"A masked gunman opened fire into a crowd this morning," "Ballistics reports show that X gun was used in the shooting," "4 lives were lost today," "20 lives were lost today," "At least 50 lives were lost today, making this the largest mass shooting in the history of our country."
These words are commonplace. These are words that we hear too often.
Does our lack of surprise make the events less tragic? Of course not. Does it mean that we are officially at a point where we are asking ourselves "If over 50 lives lost and over 50 injured doesn't spark a change in the heads of Americans, what will?" Of course it does. This is a terrifying thought. If the deaths of over a dozen children didn't make a difference, what will? And, truth be told, I am so exhausted over the same f**king conversation every time something like this happens. We hear, "something must be done," returned with "increased gun control will make no difference." Are you kidding me, America? Get over yourselves.
And that's the saddest part of any moral debate that goes on in this country. It is becoming hauntingly true that we have grown so divided into our own stupid political parties, so focused on what we're supposed to believe, that the only way in which we can understand the argument somebody else is making is by actually experiencing what they have undergone. What happened to viewing something from somebody else's perspective?
So let me ask the NRA, those who believe in more lenient gun control, this: will it take a member of your family, your child, dying in a mass shooting for you to understand that the heart has died out in America? That the hate outweighs the love? For you to understand that because of advancements in gun technology and our knowledge (that is sadly based on too much experience) of the sheer damage guns can do, there should be more limits to who can actually get their hands on one? Isn't that just common sense?
In response to the use of the second amendment argument, do you really think that our forefathers had this level of tragedy in mind when they decided we have the right to bear arms? You think they, keeping in mind the actual caliber of weapons of the age, had anything in mind but the protection of our nation from oppressive forces? They believed in arming 20-year-olds who were preparing for or already fighting in a war, certainly not imagining a world in which 20-year-olds are using stolen firearms to murder 20 elementary schoolers in cold blood.
Certainly they weren't imagining the level of hate, the level of evil, the level of damage that humans would be capable of inflicting on their fellow man in this day and age. Certainly they weren't imagining the level of screwed up problems existing in our nation that people with the means and motive will kill for. America has changed. America has devolved. Why is it that seemingly only on the issue of protecting Americans from the greatest threat today—other Americans—are we still stuck in the 1700s?
I am not surprised by this tragedy. But I am more confused than I was yesterday.
Wake up.
