White-hot rage. That’s me. And I’m done walking on eggshells around this country’s mouth-frothing, offer-no-solutions, rhetoric-drenched, knuckle-dragging gun culture. It makes me want to scream that the massacre of 20 first graders wasn’t enough to shock and shame and disgust and change this despicable attitude. That GUNS trump public safety. That GUNS trump the mass death of babies! That GUNS are a source of some twisted, perverted pride.
Yesterday, Seattle Pacific University—mere blocks from where I work—was terrorized by yet another mentally ill 20-something male with an easily accessible gun. He’d been hospitalized twice in the past couple of years with mental issues. AND HE WAS ABLE TO GET HIS FUCKING HANDS ON A GUN. I am so done with this broken record.
For hours upon hours upon hours yesterday, sirens shrieked past our building non-stop. A constant cacophony of police, fire trucks, medics, ambulances, FBI, ATF, SWAT.
One dead. One in critical condition. One in satisfactory condition. Another hospitalized with emotional trauma (and minor injuries) after heroically pepper spraying the shooter and subduing the asshat (while other students piled on top of him and held him down until the police arrived). This hero is pretty much a baby, too. Early 20s. Turns out he’s getting married in a couple of weeks and their wedding registry was discovered and people in the community bought everything on it for them! Then a local sports radio personality set up a “GoFundMe” account to raise some money toward their honeymoon and/or to give them a nice start in married life. It’s uplifting that there are good people out there. (And a “Good Guy With Pepper Spray.”) Update: The goal was $5000. Tonight it’s at $6800!
But my rage knows no bounds (aside from taking it upon myself to shooting up people). I have thought these thoughts, and while they aren’t kind, I mean them.
Deny the need for gun control? Think today’s NRA is the end-all? Believe that the 2nd amendment is God’s Right to Trump Public Safety? Don’t believe background checks are a good thing? Refuse to fund mental health?Against gun safety training? Think ‘open carry’ is totally fine in Target or coffee shops? Against the production of “safe” guns? Don’t agree with closing the gun show loopholes?
Then, I hope you or a loved one gets shot by a gun. No, I do not wish for you or a loved one to die or to be seriously injured. But I hope you feel the most staggering terror, that you sink to your knees upon hearing the news that your child has been shot, that you fear the end of your life before your eyes, that you shit your pants, that you cry more tears than you ever thought possible, that you feel the most gut-wrenching despair like you have never felt before in your entire life. I hope you feel ruined. I hope you feel for that time that you’ll never be able to face another day without that person you love more than life itself. And I hope you say to yourself, “Oh jeeze, was I wrong.”
Because the problem with people who glorify guns beyond all common sense is that they have no capacity for empathy.
