When will it end?
October 1st, 2015. At least ten people were killed and seven injured as a gunman opened fire at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon.
This was one of over forty school shootings to happen this year.
Just this year.
According to the New York Times, it was the first "major mass casualty incident at a school this year." And yet again, the media has gone into a chaotic spiral of stories on the shooter, his intentions, identifying the dead, and being the first to have the scoop.
Yet again, politicians tweet their condolences and condemnation of the shooting. But is any legislative action even occurring? No. At least not any successful legislative actions.
According to the LA Times, there have been 142 school shootings since the horrifying shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT that killed twenty children and six adults. This school shooting is a benchmark because it is when the focus on gun control became a much more enormous issue than previous years, despite similar events preceding Newtown at schools like Virginia Tech.
The statistic of 142 school shootings makes the going rate of school shootings at almost once a week since the Newtown shooting.
Courtesy of UNODC | Graphic: Hagit Bachrach
The National Rifle Association has fiercely protested against any form of gun control legislation. What the NRA does not seem to understand is that the legislation is not aimed at taking their away their right to bear arms (which by the way, was intended in the 2nd Amendment in the Bill of Rights for citizen militia guidelines, not for every day ownership-so take up that fight with the Founding Fathers).
Tightening gun control regulations seems to equate with them as taking away rights to bear arms. Those who hunt, those who feel the need to have a weapon for any self-defense purpose, those who collect, those who simply admire them-none of that is what is being "attacked". The abuse of guns is what is being addressed due to events such as Sandy Hook, Virginia Tech, Marysville-Pilchuk, University of South Carolina, Charleston, Sunnyside-I could go on.
One has a right to bear arms and to own a weapon. Measures are needed to make sure a weapon does not get into the wrong hands. That is the reason for the background check measures, for the data collection, for the monitoring of gun ownership. They are not an attack on gun ownership, they are measures trying to be taken in order to keep people safe with guns.
After Newtown, almost nothing happened to address it besides impassioned pleas and limited discussion. Since every single shooting since then, almost nothing if anything at all has happened at all in relation to gun control. Citizens can make statements every day, but those who have the power to make change-legislators-have a real chance to address it in a lasting manner. If this were anything else that was killing people in the way that gun abuse has, drastic measures would be taken. Prayers and pleas can only do so much.
Courtesy of Pew Research Center
We cannot become numb to these events, we cannot pass them by in our glances at the news and think "another shooting". Mass shootings should not become a routine.
To quote President Barack Obama's statement on the shooting at Umpqua:
"Somehow this has become routine. The reporting has become routine. My response here, from this podium, has become routine....Our thoughts and prayers are not enough".
Contact your Congressional representative, your state legislators. Discuss it with your peers.
Ignoring it passively and hoping for a better tomorrow-that time has come and past a long time ago. The time to act was a long time ago, but we can still act and the time to act is now.
People do kill people, but in these instances, people killed people by abusing a gun.
