Gun violence has become a gruesome theme in the past two days. First, a talented, beautiful, and young artist, Christina Grimmie, followed by a mass shooting at an Orlando nightclub (a notably gay nightclub during the month of Pride). These tragic events have launched a heated discussion on gun control throughout the U.S. while the rest of the world rightfully criticizes us.
It is honestly pitiful how it takes a tragedy for these topics to be put into light.
The fact is, people are dead. The rest of us respond with a hashtag and words of condolences or maybe you’ll just feel crummy for the rest of the day or maybe you’ll write an article like this, wishing things were different. But you can’t go back in time. One of my favorite writers, Khaled Hosseini wrote in his novel The Kite Runner, “There is only one sin, only one. And that is theft. Every other sin is a variation of theft. When you kill a man, you steal a life… you steal his wife’s right to a husband, rob his children of a father…” For the friends and families of the Orlando mass shooting victims, someone was stolen from them and life will never be the same.
History repeats itself, following every mass shooting in U.S. history, the media and public fall into a frenzy. We’ve seen it after Sandy Hook or Virginia Tech. We’ll demand change, better gun control, better security. But it is easy to fall out of this discussion after the heat dies down, when the news has faded and tragedy bears less impact under the cruelty of time.
An estimation of 50 deaths have resulted from the Orlando shooting. For each person, we’ll assume that at least four people really love them. Parents, friends, or lovers. That’s 200 people whose lives are crumbling down around them in this moment. 200 people who were stolen from.
We can reduce this conversation to “there are crazy people in this world, that’s just how it is” but that doesn’t change the statistics. Compared to Australia, where gun laws and national gun buybacks are strictly intact, the U.S. has become a residence to blood and gore. There has not been a mass shooting in Australia for over a decade while the numbers of mass shootings in the U.S. continue to climb.
Additionally, these mass shootings don’t just reflect the U.S. and their loose gun laws—it also highlights the stigma behind mental illness in America. Whenever a mass shooting happens, we can excuse it by saying things like “the shooter wasn’t in his right mind.” This brings up several problems. First of all, it reinforces this harmful idea that all mentally ill people are all violent and unpredictable and uncontrollable. It excuses neurotypical people from the responsibility of their own violence or blood lust, because underneath all the social courtesy and norms we are also animals well and we are capable of such barbarity, even in our “right minds.” And secondly, it poses the question that if these people did happen to be mentally ill, as they sometimes are, how did they get their hands on a gun?
Gun violence is becoming a part of American culture. This isn’t a discussion anymore, it is time for the U.S. government to take action. The equation has been straightforward thus far: more guns equals more crime. How is everyone supposed to be and feel safe in the United States when guns can be snuck into almost any place?
In Christina Grimmie’s case, if security had found the gun when the shooter was entering the concert, or if the shooter was prohibited from buying a gun in the first place, a beautiful life would have been spared.
Change has to be demanded or else waking up to “RIP” hashtags will become a standard aspect of our lives. We’ve grown too numb to the savagery.
