I am afraid to turn on the TV. I am afraid to listen to the radio. I am afraid to pick up a newspaper. I am afraid that I do not understand. I don’t understand how someone could go out and knowingly kill so many innocent people. I don’t understand how someone could pick up a gun and shoot down others as a form of “getting even.” I don’t understand the hatred in some citizens' hearts and for that, I am afraid.
We live in a world where people are cautious to go to the movies or fly on an airplane. A world where you look twice at the person of another religion or you feel the need to keep a weapon in your home. We live in a world where so many of our military of every race, color and creed are working together to protect our country and yet we still have people at home trying to divide it.
It is impossible to know another person’s thought process or what occurred in a situation unless you were there yourself. You cannot control something that has already happened by starting protests or riots. You cannot bring back someone’s life by taking another. The only thing you have the power to control are your own actions, so why not do something positive?
We are capable of so many great things. We have put a man on the moon, we created the first airplane and watched it defy the laws of gravity, we have even built the first modern submarine. All of those feats and accomplishments came together because people came together. According to the Pledge of Allegiance, we are “One Nation, Under God,” so why don’t we act like it? Ask yourself if we would have done those things with a divided home. If everyone became blind to the color of someone’s skin or deaf to the practices of different religions, would our country be greater? Would I still be afraid?