I'll never understand

Oklahoma City. Gabby Giffords. Norway. Columbine. Virginia Tech. Tuscaloosa just last week. Aurora, Colorado.

I feel so discouraged. I spend every day of my life trying to make lives better, trying to help people see the possibilities of a better life. I try--I really try--to help people who have seen the worst that the world has to offer to reframe and focus on light and love and kindness.

Maybe I am just naive in thinking that love and kindness matter at all.

And don't get me started on the warped interpretations of the Second Amendment that make these events not only possible, but ubiquitous. More than 300,000 people have been killed in the U.S. as the result of gun violence since the terrorist attacks of 9/11, but nobody cares. There is no call to action, and just mentioning anything negative about guns will get the bible-thumping NRA zealots calling you un-American and ready to well, shoot you down. And they win. They always win. I'll bet most of them have never actually read the Second Amendment, and of those who have, they've chosen to be blind to the part about access to guns for the purpose of a well-prepared militia. I don't think the Founding Fathers meant every man and woman should be his and her own personal militia.

Not that we can undo the ubiquitous presence of guns in the U.S. There is no putting that genie back in the bottle.

Instead, those who are angry, impatient, ill, obsessed, insecure, or violent will always have access to that thing they worship. Guns have only one purpose, and that is to perpetuate violence, be it in war, in law enforcement, on the streets, or against nature's animals.

We can't undo the flow of guns, but among the information included in the reports of Thursday's violence was the bit about how the shooter had purchased about 6,000 rounds of ammunition in the last few months. And that was perfectly OK.

This reminded me of something Chris Rock said in his act several years ago. His modest proposal wasn't to eliminate guns, but rather to make them impossibly expensive to use. If you haven't seen this before, take two minutes. It's funny and smart. Even if you have seen it, watch it again.


Personally, I think he's onto something. Not that it matters. The crybabies in the NRA will always find a way to bully and shout down any voice of reason. It's what they do. I wonder if they get a collective hard on every time a mass murderer lets loose with an automatic assault weapon. I'll bet they do. They probably come all over themselves when they think about how it could have been them dominating and eliminating innocent people who weren't angry and insecure enough to be similarly armed. And they revel in knowing it's perfectly legal but, as they see it, maybe still a bit too regulated.

They win. They continue to win, and people like me, who advocate peace, kindness, and a more highly developed sense of human compassion, well, I'm not sure there's a practical place in the world for us anymore.