Don't Tell Me You're Shocked

2 more mass shootings. And of course, in a pre-Presidential election year, we're hearing the regular bullshit: It's ______ fault. Fill in the blank with gun nuts, Trump, Congress, the NRA, lax gun laws, or whatever/whomever you feel like blaming if it makes you feel good.

You're so wrong. The perpetrators already got what they wanted: Your anger and shock.

Ah, but ...

Don't tell me you're shocked. This country is deeply diseased as well as deeply divided, and there is a correlation. In a country of programmed violence found EVERYWHERE, don't tell me you're shocked. Don't ignore it. It's on TV. It's on social media. It's in the game arcade at your mall. It's in the bullying at your high school. It's in video games you bought your kids such as Grand Theft Auto, Doom, Wolfenstein, etc, etc. It's prevalent. And it has desensitized a whole generation to the real effects of killing.

Don't tell me you're shocked. Don't tell me you haven't been paying attention to the violence in the streets. Don't tell me you haven't been paying attention to ANTIFA violence, college campus violence, Ferguson violence, shooting Congressmen playing baseball violence, the burning and looting in DC during the Inauguration violence, and so on. Unless you're deaf and blind, I'm not buying it. You stood by and saw it happen.

Don't tell me you're shocked. The degradation of morals and values in this country started quite a while ago. The breakdown of family units has been going on for decades now. You let some liberal organizations take God and religion out of your life. Unsurprisingly, the number of single-parent families has been on the rise for a long time, and in one culture, almost 3 out of 4 babies born are to single mothers. This is a recipe for disaster, as we have witnessed.

Don't tell me you're shocked. The emptying of mental wards and casting sick people out into society because it was a cheaper alternative is now paying dividends. Was the price worth it?

Don't tell me you're shocked. Watching tents spring up in large cities and walking around piles of shit on the sidewalks should have shocked you long ago. But it didn't, and when these cities announced they were sanctuaries, you should have been shocked even worse. But you weren't.

Don't tell me you're shocked. Don't tell me a whole slew of new guns laws is going to stop this. It isn't. When a society has degraded into this level of sickness, it's not the tool used to commit these crimes that is at fault. It's the sick people that are responsible, and until we bring back sentences equal to the crime committed in an expedient manner, justice in this country is never going to deter these nutcases from killing as many people as possible just for the notoriety.

And finally, don't tell me you're going to take away my right to defend myself against these maniacs. Gun-free zones are prime territory for these whack-jobs and that's often where they strike. Disarming the people is specifically barred in our Constitution, and for good reason. Only a good guy with a gun can stop a bad guy with a gun. When the chips are down, a defensive gun in the hand is worth the entire police department 5 minutes away.

Until our culture recognizes it is sick and works to turn that around by addressing mental health problems, turning the general population into sheep is not the answer. Attacking politicians is not the answer. New guns laws stacked on top of a gazillion old gun laws is not the answer. Telling us that the second amendment should be repealed is not the answer.

Looking in the mirror and deciding to repair basic societal values is the answer. I'm not sure what the answer is to how, but I do know removing guns from the general population won't accomplish that. The only thing that can come of that is the creation of a whole new class of victims, and that simply isn't a solution. In the meanwhile, may I suggest taking a firearms course if you are not familiar with them and then filing paperwork to carry. You may not like that, you may not want to do that, and if so, that's fine too.

But don't tell me you're shocked. Sorry, I'm just not buying it.