Often when tragic events occur, people are told to give it time before talking about it...this would be an appropriate time to talk about the school shooting in Parkland, now that it has been almost a year since the shooting.
So, I'll dive right into what had been discussed on the subject:
Porn gets blamed for school shootings and it is believed by many that taking out school prayer and pledge of allegiance is also the cause of the shootings. This is all while the demographic of the school shooters would consider themselves the most patriotic, and they identify as christian. So why y'all blaming islamic extremism for terrorism in this country when I could just as easily blame christian extremism?
Have you once considered it is our culture that fantasizes violence and guns under the guise of white supremacist capitalist patriarchy? Republicans, sponsored by the NRA, fits that description.
Republicans think that getting NRA funds isn't unethical and doesn't affect their politics, while the NRA thinks that guns are necessary for everyone to own in case of a tyrannical government seige. How are these two groups of people connected then if one group despises the other?
Both these groups don't want big government, so which is it, really? Because, Republicans do in fact want government impeding on my bodily rights and the NRA uses government entities to create the propaganda for the sale of firearms. Both these groups want police and the military to be more weaponized and funded, but that's the exact big government they should be resisting; instead it is the kind of tyrannical government they hope to secure.
This is where the argument starts to slant towards racism. Racism and misogyny once again plays into this context. The US has the biggest military, police, more weapons than any other country, and the most incarcerated. The relationship in these travesties is that the US has a relationship to protecting violent white groups while killing peaceful groups of color like protesters, civil rights leaders and the like.
Look at any rebel flag totin', second amendment lovin' person's facebook profile: Guns are safe in the hands of whites because that's patriotic (not just in the context of police and military.) Because they also frame white gun owners as having land to hunt animals. The nature of laws has framed white gun owners as normal while Black American or Mexican/indigenous gun owners are labeled as thugs by society.
But the NRA spokesperson, a white "attractive" female, is co-opting Black struggle to not deal with mass shootings by white males. Really what she is suggesting was that guns don't kill people, Black people kill Black people. Statistically, that is true that crime is intraracial rather than interracial. Still, Black people have been talking about gun violence for decades among youth, but the NRA didnt talk about those issues until now in this oppurtune time to divert the subject. Once again, this argument is disguised as racism. Black people-- not just youth--are killed by white police with guns. Of course the NRA is silent.
These NRA-backed Republicans are actually the most violent people. Go to a protest, rally, vigil, or community event sometime and notice the kinds of people that want to throw punches, scream, rip down signs, key our cars, run people over in their cars, and massacre people. Since Trump was elected, there is a rise in violence committed by pro-Trump racist white wingers (or what they often get called the "alt right" or "right wingers".) There are over 50 incidents of psychos reported where they were violent towards LGBTQ people, people of Muslim faith, Mexicans, and protesters. This does not include the incidents that are not reported as many leftists are constantly getting death threats.
The NRA and white Republicans don't actually fear big government because this government works for them as it always has: This government was written by white men for the benefit and protection of violent white men. The lives of violent white men will only take their own lives, and in the press, their lives are given a sweet backstory. People of Color are killed playing in the streets, killed for not giving a turn signal, and their stories are mutilated.
There are no solutions to this reoccuring tragedy if we do not change our culture. There are warning signs from the many perpetrators and murders: they leave evidence abound, but their circle of family, friends, peers, coworkers, etc do not always find the perpetrator's actions/behaviors as sinister when they feel the same way!
It's not easy enough to say the government will start to run background checks because that's supposed to already be in place. But also, these kids are taking stock of guns around them that they didn't have to buy. It's not easy enough to say the government will start refusing the mentally ill from obtaining weapons because frankly, who gets to decide what that is? Mentally ill persons are more likely to use a weapon on themselves than others; and even still, we cannot discredit the fact that those who kill are mentally ill.
We have to better as a society at recognizing the patterns; and start conversations to help others.
It is up to healthcare professionals, social workers, parents, friends/family, and others to report and recognize when something doesn't seem normal.
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