My heart aches for the children and families suffering on this memorable Monday due to the shooting at Sparks Middle School in Nevada this morning. I cannot imagine the horror felt by students, parents, teachers and friends today as they experienced this news I heard about hours later.
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During my semester abroad this year, more than once I was asked by British colleagues or friends what it was like to live in a place where I was never really safe. They asked if I felt scared going to movie theatres, malls or even my own school and I couldn't really think of the right words to say. I think I was a little angry and embarrassed that the society I lived in made me feel differently than what these people did.
One night, I had the most horribly vivid nightmare of my life- about three friends and I going to a grocery store for some snacks when a guy came in and gunned everyone in the store down. It was so realistic that I had to make a long distance call to my poor mother at 4am her time!
I rethought the questions I had been asked about being in public places... and I realized I really was scared.
It was disheartening today to find bitter tweets about the Nevada school shooting, on an outlet that has typically been used to show an outpouring of neighborly love in hard times. Instead, I was witnessing in live time, a chunk of American youth say that they weren't going to pay attention to mass shootings anymore.
It's pretty sad to think teens and young adults are already becoming desensitized to violence in public places, especially those that end in deaths. I even saw a comment today that appeared totally logical, until the person said, "If we only just armed the teachers and trained anyone working with hundreds of people to defend themselves, we would be much better off."
Can you imagine a 13-year-old kid with a gun walking into a classroom full of students and a teacher pulling out another gun and shooting the child? Not that they wouldn't (because who knows) but because I don't ever, EVER, see that as working out for anybody.
This problem we're having in this country has to go back to its roots- in the US legislature and in modern society. Let's even take it baby steps! Maybe create a psych analysis to sort of screen people before letting them purchase guns. Maybe make a limit on one gun per household... maybe take gun advertisements out of the media in the same way cigarettes were! There are a billion ways to start to change the outcomes of guns getting into the wrong hands, and it seems our legislators are taking their sweet time in the grey area surrounding it all.
I suppose it'll take more than that to make people feel safe again, but something's gotta give here.
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