Unimaginable pain… unimaginable horror: Reporters and commentators have struggled for words to describe last week’s tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut. And yet if it’s unimaginable, it’s only because we still won’t face gun violence head on.
These killings are not rare, not in this country. A blog on The Nation’s website notes 16 multiple shootings in the US this year alone. Sixteen. In a temple, in a shopping mall, at a soccer tournament, in a coffee shop, a hospital, a nightclub, a spa, a movie theater, a funeral home, several schools….
This is what guns do.
On Monday, a New York Times photo showed a cluster of mourners at the burial service for Jack Pinto. He was only 6. And after the service, his grieving parents would leave him behind, in the Newtown Village Cemetery.
This is what guns do.
Some want to focus on mental illness, which has been involved in some of this country’s mass killings. And certainly we must do much more in the area of mental health, funding research and treatment. But only a small percentage of people with mental illness become violent. And many killers are not mentally ill. To talk about mental illness in this context does great harm to those who are struggling with that difficult illness. And it diverts our attention from the real cause of the carnage.
Mental illness did not kill the 20 little children and six adults in Sandy Hook school. A gun did.
And let us not forget: While the national focus right now is on the Newtown tragedy, single murders are even more common. Rochester media carry reports of shootings almost daily. If we focus only on the mass carnage, we say that these other victims matter less. They do not. These victims, too, are important. These families, too, grieve.
There are calls for “meaningful action,” for stronger controls. But pushing for background checks, gun registration, purchase limits: that’s nibbling around the edges. Because people are human beings.
We cannot protect people from a mother who lets a disturbed son learn how to shoot. We cannot protect people from an angry husband who has too much to drink, or a neighbor who mistakes a well-meaning friend for an intruder, or a former employee who snaps, temporarily, under emotional stress. Or teenagers who decide to rob a convenience store.
We can try to ensure that they don’t have access to guns.
Watching these tragedies unfold, I admit: I cannot wrap my mind around the attraction so many Americans have for guns. In his post-Newtown massacre column urging gun control, the Times’ Nicholas Kristof wrote about growing up learning to shoot. “Shooting,” he said, “is fun.”
My mind lurches, from descriptions of a gunman mowing down terrified 6-year-olds – a parent’s soul screams at the thought of those children’s last moments – to Kristof’s words: Shooting is fun.
The people of this nation must find another way to have fun. And we must use rational measures to protect ourselves, relying on police officers rather than vigilante justice.
Guns are made for one purpose and one purpose only: to kill. We do not need controls. We need guns banned from civilian use. All guns.
Now.
Karen Grella
Rochester lost an important community leader this past weekend with the death of Karen Grella.
Karen was a member of the Rochester school board from 1980 to 1996, serving part of that time as president. She was a bright, tireless, creative public servant, as intensely dedicated to the children of Rochester as anyone I’ve known. And she was more knowledgeable about education and this district’s challenges than most people I know.
She pushed hard for high standards in city schools, and her legacy includes the creation of both the School of the Arts and the International Baccalaureate program at Wilson.
Our thoughts are with Karen’s husband George (who, as our longtime film critic, is an important part of the City family) and her sons, daughters, and grandchildren.
This article appears in Dec 19-25, 2012.
This article just bleeds uneducated ifgnorant filth. “Mental illness did not kill the 20 little children and six adults in Sandy Hook school. A gun did.” Guns are incapable of anything unless handled by a human who is willing to inflict harm on whatever that gun is pointed at. Ridiculous.
“But only a small percentage of people with mental illness become violent. ” True, but only a (very) small percentage of gun owners become violent also.
As far as your goal of banning all guns from civilian use — good luck with that. There’s the pesky 2nd amendment to contend with.
You gotta be kidding me!!!Did I just read That filth?!Terrorists didn’t kill anyone on 9/11,Planes did.
So we are to give up the ONLY thing keeping the federal government from total tyranny ? …. With the Patriot act and NDAA along with the Political Protest bill just passed, we already live in a pseudo fascist state. The only thing keeping the corporate fascist state run government from putting us into camps is our right to bear arms. Mary Anna Towler your statements are the most ignorant ones I have come across in a very long time. With a;; this legislation passed in the last 10 years, we are near the same point Germany was right before the Nazi”s took power. The last right to go was the citizen”s right to bear arms. A mentally sick person was armed and probably fulfilled some promise he made in anger to his parents. We need REAL MENTAL HEALTH CARE, not a gun ban. WE NEED TO MANDATE INSURANCE COMPANIES TO PROVIDE COVERAGE FOR MEDICINE, MENTAL HEALTH CARE, AND THERAPY>>> NOW !
“The abortion industry has one purpose and one purpose only: to kill. We do not need controls. We need abortions banned. All abortions. Now.”
Yes, it’s a bad analogy. For one thing, the annual gun toll is what the abortion industry would call a couple of real slow days.
And of course, it’s a bad analogy because the authoress doesn’t want to ban the lethal behavior itself — that would be redundant. No, she insists on banning the non-violent, constitutionally protected actions of law-abiding citizens. So the analog would not be a ban on abortions, but a ban on copulation. The authoress disapproves, so the rest of us “must find another way to have fun”.
“So we are to give up the ONLY thing keeping the federal government from total tyranny ?”
I’m not anti guns, but I have never understood this argument. A bunch of relatively untrained citizens with a mish mash of firearms is supposed to be a threat to the most powerful military in the world? This *might* have been feasible in the 1800s, but come on. We live in a time where a drone can take you out while you’re doing your weekly shopping. Your gun collection isn’t protecting you from the government at all.
The point is that there are many mentally ill people out there with possible dreams of horrific acts, and the gun gives them a VERY easy way to carry out this fantasy. Guns make killing someone an instant, emotional response to a bad situation. To people who say “he could have done this with a knife”, show me the knife that can be thrown around a room and hit 10 people in 10 seconds. Killing someone with a knife is a close-up personal act that requires thought, a gun allows the person to just shoot everything in sight.
Check this out below:
“This is one of the most powerful statements you will read about the lack of national, particularly presidential, outcry and pain when the children butchered are non-white Americans. Read and weep for the Black and Brown children who are slaughtered daily all over the world.”
DHS
Dohugh@aol.com
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“There will never be an appropriate time to say that this nation only stands at attention when the majority of victims are white Americans, as was the case at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown Connecticut, so I might as well say it today.” — December 17, 2012 , Kirsten West Savali.
Race and Violence In America: We Are All Newtown.
December 17, 2012 by Kirsten West Savali.
http://www.clutchmagonline.com/2012/12/rac…
This was very disappointing as I usually enjoy City’s editorials. It sucks but you cannot prevent every tragic event like this just through legislation. You really need to have a way to defend yourself and guns are a citizen’s best hope to do that.
Thank you City Newspaper for telling it like it is or at least how it should be. We do need to ban guns because there is enough evidence that people cannot control themselves.
It is the gun, stupid.
The gun is the issue. These killers are inept cowards. Without a gun, they are nothing. With a gun, they are very effective and successful killers. Without the gun, how many people could have been killed?
And the issue is NOT mental illness. Unless of course the mother of the Sandy Hook killer was also mentally ill. Here you have an educator with a son who is mentally ill. Don’t you think her guns were foremost in her mind and that they need to be kept from her mentally ill son? In this case, it’s the mother’s fault.
But this is really all about the gun.
“people cannot control themselves”
Perhaps not, but in a free society you don’t get to control others just because you don’t like them, don’t understand them and disapprove of them.
It’s chilling to see the stupidity and hypocrisy of so many so-called liberals who are champing at the bit to do it. Shame!
I’M WORRIED ABOUT THE SAFETY OF THE OBAMA CHILDREN. They have to live in a home surrounded day and night by guards and Secret Service people who are armed to the teeth with semi automatic and assault weapons with huge capacity magazines. They are a family just like any American family. GUNS DO NOT BELONG IN THEIR HOME. For the safety of these precious children, the White House should be made a gun free zone. We’ll all rest easier knowing that something is finally being done to make these children safe.
“just because you don’t like them, don’t understand them and disapprove of them.” Kit…are you saying you do like these killers and that you do approve of what they are doing?
I never said I didn’t like them. I don’t know them, so I cannot form an opinion one way or the other. I’m talking about controlling guns, not people.
Everyday there is a new and more horrific example of why we need to take guns out of the hands of civilians. Two firemen die in Webster on Christmas Eve…what wonderful world of gun violence we live in.
The Webster tragedy would not have been possible without guns, though I suppose the front yard could have been rigged with land mines or other explosive devices. But again, this is an act of a coward made possible by a gun.
For some reason, so many can’t see this simple fact or just don’t want to admit it.
And so many seem to say guns are more important than children and firemen.
The nutjob in Webster bludgeoned his grandma to death with a hammer.
By liberal “logic”, only outlaws will have hammers.
Tom Janowski says, “I’m talking about controlling guns, not people.”
Sure. And if the government shuts down your printing press or your place of worship, it’s perfectly constitutional — after all, they’re just controlling machinery or real estate, not people.