Only in America

Trey Smith

As the Sandy Hook shootings unfolded, I watched many of the journalists I follow on Twitter post links to the articles about gun violence that they had written after the previous mass shooting, or the one before that. I watched friends on Facebook like and link to the inevitable memorial pages, this time around noting the too-short lives of 20 smiling kids who were practically infants, ensuring readers and supporters that these little angels are now safely in Heaven.

That's an impulse I understand, but it's not a solution.

Only in America do political writers all seem to have a stable of articles about mass shootings that they can bring out and repost or revise when the next one occurs.

Only in America do we collectively shrug our shoulders when yet another young white man goes on a shooting spree.

Only in America do we remain convinced that people will kill no matter what, so we may as well give people virtually unlimited access to some of the deadliest hand-held weapons ever invented.

Only here, in America, do we think that the best we can do is a Facebook page and a plea to God.
~ from The Conservative Philosophy of Tragedy: Guns Don't Kill People, People Kill People by Jill Filipovic ~

One lesson that parents teach their children is to learn from mistakes. When things go awry, you should try to figure out why and then work not to replicate the error again.

In the US, we are prone to make the same mistakes over and over and over and over again. Other nations have figured out that an easy access to guns leads to more violence and death. So, they have learned from this mistake and have made it so that guns are not so accessible. To no sane person's surprise, these moves have led to a sharp decrease in gun violence.

Only in America do we try to fix mistakes by doubling down ON them. Gun violence a problem? Well, we can fix that by flooding the market with even more guns!

As we fiddle away as Rome burns, the body count keeps growing higher.