Two things have been on my mind lately.
I keep thinking about that gorilla, Harambe, the 17-year-old silverback who was shot and killed after a young boy fell into his enclosure at the Cincinnati Zoo this past Memorial Day weekend.
This tragedy comes less than two weeks after the gun that killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in 2012 was sold at auction by owner/human hemorrhoid George Zimmerman for upwards of $100,000.
I wanted to say something biting and clever about these two events, like how even animals of African descent aren't safe in America, but that's too easy and borderline offensive. Besides, we know that already. What I really want to talk about is guns.
If the American flag were to be redesigned based on cultural iconography, it would likely be a bald eagle nesting in an apple pie with a Colt .45 in each claw. Guns hold a sacred status in America. They have more rights than most women and minorities. You see them at every ball game, bus station and shopping mall. Most hang on the hips and shoulders of licensed authorities, trained professionals who are taught only to draw and fire as a last result. (That is, unless, a minority is involved.)
For all my parenthetical snark, I might be one of the last twenty-something liberals to believe that there are still good cops. It's easy to be cynical (and with each new report of an unarmed black person shot dead in the street it gets even easier) but I'm not here to further indict the police. I'm here to indict the public for a change.
Growing up, I've watched our country slowly devolve into a 3,000-mile shooting range. I was too young to remember Columbine in 1999, but I remember Virginia Tech in 2007, Fort Hood in 2009, Tucson in 2011, Aurora and Newtown in 2012, Fort Hood (again) and Isla Vista in 2014, and Charleston and San Bernardino in 2015.
We're facing an epidemic. Even now, as I'm write this, two people have been shot dead on the UCLA campus. Gun deaths have become so ingrained in our national psyche that killers like George Zimmerman and Darren Wilson are making six-figure profits under the guise of heroism. The intense public interest in the sale of the former's weapon suggests a kind of morbid sensationalism to the likes of which we haven't seen since the Old West. Before long, we'll be lining up to take pictures with the corpses.
Gun control is a rabbit hole. Each new travesty confirms another place where we aren't safe: schools, churches, movie theaters, our homes. The shooting range gets bigger but we'd sooner lose our lives than our precious Second Amendment rights. Where does it end, then?
According to some, it doesn't.
It's true that we will never eradicate guns from our society. The fact is, we need them. Why? To stop others from using them. Like a paintbrush or salted anchovies, guns can do wonders in the right hands. They can be tools for good. But as the world continues to grow darker and madder, the right hands become a lot harder to find.
