An Unrelated Strongly-Worded Diatribe

So guys, I had most of a post written last week in preparation for today. And today we learned that last night, another asshole in an endless parade of sick, sad, horrible, broken people once again very easily got his hands on several weapons capable of killing lots of people very quickly, and then used them to do just that.

And my problems with legal research just don't feel relevant today. Maybe next week.

Today I want to just vent a little, because if I don't let out some of the pressure, I feel like I'll maybe explode.

There is nothing surprising about the events in Las Vegas last night. As a country, you and I made sure that this would happen, and we keep making sure that it will continue to happen. 

Newtown was really the last stand for our American humanity. It was the last test, and we failed it miserably. When we decided that those little kids' deaths wouldn't change anything at all about the way we deal with guns and gun violence in this country, we relinquished our moral authority, we surrendered our judgment, and we lost the war.

We did this.  

We did it by voting for people whose only interest in the question of gun violence is in how much money they can hustle off the pecuniary largesse of the corporate sponsor of American mass shootings, the NRA.

We did it by not demanding that the feckless cowards in our Congress do the work we elected them to do (and if you elected them to do this, well, you know how much to blame you are).

We did it by not voting.

We did it by apathy.

We did it by posting memes to Facebook instead of calling our representatives.

We did it by allowing the NRA—the soulless, amoral lobbying arm of the gun manufacturing industry—to get away with substituting an argument about an "individual right" that they have manufactured from wholecloth over the last 20 years for the correct argument about how we can realistically stop people dying in mass shootings.

We did it by allowing them to say, over and over and over—without laughing them out of the goddamned room—that the only thing that can stop a gun is another gun (Laws. Jesus, it's not that difficult. Laws can stop people owning and using guns. You do not have to take my word for it; there is literally an entire world of evidence right outside our nation's borders showing that it works). And not for nothing, but you can see the corporate strategy at work here, right? Guns are the problem, and the solution is to buy more guns. It's the perfect collision of American consumerism and the prevailing national disdain for earnestness and empathy.

We did it.

We created—or allowed to be created—every condition that makes this stupid shitty cycle repeat. We have allowed the sociopathically unfeeling NRA to fabricate an individual American "right" to own a gun, while denying that there is an American right to healthcare (including the mental care that might stop some of these people from wanting to use a gun on a bunch of people they've never even met).

We have allowed the hectoring, bullying, shouting NRA to assert this invented "individual right" as an absolute, not subject to any restriction. We've allowed them to get away with the fallacious straw man argument that decries every conceivable measure aimed at even the most incremental restriction as an abrogation of this manufactured "individual right".

We've allowed the creation of a society that makes it more difficult to drive a car, apply for a loan, or correctly do our taxes than it is to buy a legal gun.

May I suggest that we stop?

We can still vote, and voting is almost the only thing we can do that's worth doing. It's certainly the most effective. Find out whether your Senator or Representative took money from the NRA here. And if you want to stop this, vote against that Senator or Representative at the next chance you get (and every single chance after, if one's not enough).

If you have money to give (or just want more information about local efforts to stop gun violence), I suggest States United Against Gun Violence.

And if you are having thoughts of harming yourself or others, click here or call this number: 1-800-273-8255

If you want to argue with me about this, I'll engage. If you think I'm wrong, well, maybe I am; I've been wrong before. But you have to be focused on ending gun violence. If that doesn't matter to you, talking to you isn't worth my time.

And please, please be good to one another. We definitely need it more now than ever.

Godspeed,

d