Guns and Guns and Guns

And guns and guns and guns

Is the idea that we will eventually give up? Is the idea that every mass shooting, every domestic murder/suicide, every accidental discharge, every self-inflicted gunshot wound, every bar fight that turns into a gunfight, every Super Bowl bloodbath will eventually numb us to the point of desensitization? Is the idea that we’re supposed to fall into a learned helplessness, too despondent to put up a fight?

If so, I have good news for the gun lovers: it’s working.

A couple dozen people got shot yesterday in Kansas City. We all heard about that. But three people were also shot in DC; 2 in Carrollton, Missouri; 4 in Atlanta, GA; 2 in LA. People were shot in Newark and Pompano Beach and Baton Rouge. I’m just listing a few. We won’t hear about any of the “lesser shootings,” of course, because a few people shot here or there doesn’t garner much attention. Not because the stories aren’t tragic, but because they’re too common. Gunshots are the soundtrack to modern American life.

NLX450 Bushmaster “Zeus” Rifle. For when you want to play God.

But no politician of any party is standing up and stating the simple truth of what needs to be done to ease the problem: we need to get rid of the fucking guns.

I don’t care about the “sanctity” of the United States Constitution. That document is meant to serve the People, not the other way around. Too many Americans worship a piece of paper instead of the ideals it was meant to enshrine. When did we turn a document designed to be amended into a golden calf?

Whose life? Whose liberty? Whose pursuit of happiness are we meant to privilege?

We can debate what the Founders wanted, but I don’t give a shit anymore. People are massacring each other. We lose over 40,000 people a year due to gun violence (and yes, over half of those are suicide and yes, there is a direct correlation between ready access to guns and successful suicide attempts). Guns injure tens of thousands more. People’s lives are upended, often permanently. They incur enormous medical bills. They face long-term psychological trauma. The gun control group Everytown estimates that “federal, state, and local governments are spending a combined average of $35 million each day to deal with the aftermath of gun violence across the country.” No matter how you measure it, the American gun kink has become unaffordable.

Why is it your freedom to carry a metal dick in your waistband more cherished than my children’s freedom to live their lives without fear of being shot in school? Why is your right to own as many weapons of war as you want (plus all the attendant ammunition and bump stocks and laser scopes and whatever else) more important than my neighbor’s freedom to go to a movie without doing a spot check of the emergency exits in case a shooter decides to show up? Why are all of us forced to live with the low-grade fever of fear every time we venture into a crowd? Because a badly worded amendment badly interpreted by a conservative split Supreme Court says so?

Fuck you, no.

The guns have got to go. It’s no longer theoretical or philosophical or abstract. It hasn’t been for decades. My favorite solution is repealing the Second Amendment and replacing it with something that removes the absurd idea that our loving Creator has bestowed upon his favored Americans the right to own personal arsenals But I’m not picky. I’ll take any and all solutions that break our enchantment with death.

So, yes, it’s the guns. And the guns lead to more guns. Which leads to more blood spilled. Which leads to more guns and guns and guns. And so on, until there will not be a person left in this country who has not been or does not know somebody directly impacted by gun violence. Most of us already do. I know several.

I understand that there are legitimate reasons to possess a weapon. With the proper training, registration, insurance, etc. I have no problem with people needing one having one. But that’s not most of us.

They can tell themselves whatever they want but most gun owners just like guns. They like guns and they overestimate their own intelligence. The mother who leaves her loaded .22 in her purse for her toddler to find isn’t a bad person. The guy with the Bushmaster AR-15 is a law-abiding citizen right up until the moment he unloads it into his wife and children. The idiot kids running around the streets strapped with cheap handguns to make themselves feel like men. The paranoid home owner who shoots the stranded motorist who comes to their door.

They know the majority of Americans are sick to death of this shit. They don’t care. Because the money is too good. And that’s what all this comes down to in the end, a small group of very wealthy people exploiting paranoia and fear to market their product. They want people to die in mass shootings because mass shootings drive gun sales. They like that the nation has become a death cult. They’re counting on you giving up. But I’m not giving up. And I hope you don’t either. It’s the guns.