Too Close

Waking up last Monday to news about the Las Vegas shooting angered me. So much that I was too mad to write about it. I tried to compose a blog post last Wednesday but I was still too pissed to get it right. As it is now, that draft is still on my laptop, 800 flustered words looking at me with hostile glances of abandonment and unrequited rage.

Now we're a week and a half post-tragedy. Frankly, I'm still furious. I am sick and tired of talking about guns and violence with my kids and having to explain the horrific news to them - headlines now becoming so routine to almost seem meaningless.

I'm creased because of the same predictable arguments presented after each mass shooting. Everyone has their own opinion on gun control and their favorite indisputable set of statistics to trot out and shout at anyone who disagrees. I'm livid that we're the only industrialized nation where this kind of crime happens on a regular basis. I'm apoplectic that we have the power to prevent these killings and choose not to do it because of the special interests of a wealthy and powerful lobbyist group. I am outraged by those who value their gun ownership more than they do human life. I am flustered how terrorism is always the scapegoat for minority shooters, but white shooters are always described as lone wolves.

I am seething at politicians who continually defund mental health care, then say mass shootings happen because of a mental health crisis in America. I am irritated by every tweet and PR statement from politicians who say they're offering thoughts and prayers for the victims, especially from those who refuse to discuss any legislation could help us avoid more senseless violence. They remind me of the apostle Paul's letter to James, explaining how faith unaccompanied by action is dead.

I'm indignant. But I am also scared. Because these shootings are far too frequent. More than that, they're shooting close to home. Too close.

To begin, last Monday's shooting happened at the tail end of a music festival, mirroring the attack at an Ariana Grande concert in London last spring and the massacre in Paris nearly two years ago at a club where Eagles of Death metal were performing. My brother works as a concert promoter. He and I both have friends in the music business: performers and producers and promoters and technicians whose lives revolve around the stage and the road. All of them are hyper sensitive to the reality we live in, their world is now a target for those who wish to cause unbelievable harm to a large number of people. Music is not the only way to earn a living on a stage. I also have friends who are actors and public speakers. Our world needs these people and I do not want to see one of their events in a deadly headline.

Outside of the entertainment industry, I have several friends who are pastors, ministers, church volunteers, and laypeople who spend much of their time in houses of worship. Churches, temples, synagogues, and mosques are not immune to this kind of violence. Historically, African American churches were terrorized by white supremacists across the south. Bombing, arson, gunfire. Even into the late 80s, the Aryan Nations attempted to murder a catholic priest and human rights activist in Coeur d'Alene. More recently, religious facilities have been the sites of shootings. A few weeks ago in Nashville. The EAME church in Charleston two years ago. A Sikh temple in 2012. And ten years ago, a shooter ended his rampage at a church in Moscow Idaho, a city about an hour and a half south of me. It is a sad state of life where I know terror can affect many of those I love the most in a place that should be a refuge.

Then there are schools, the most common location for mass shootings in America. I'm a dad. It should be more than obvious I am concerned for the safety and welfare of my kids. Earlier this week, a student at the high school my son will probably attend received threats she would be shot. A month ago, there was a shooting at Freeman HS in a small town about 15 minutes south of my girlfriend's house. And three years ago, a gunman killed four students at MPHS, my school, where I graduated in 1997. I grieve these shootings as they have hit so close to home and I often feel helpless to protect my own children.

This is not just a suburban issue. Or a teenage issue. School shootings have struck every level of education from elementary schools to universities; public and private schools; in urban districts, the suburbs, and rural communities. There have been nearly 200 school shootings since Columbine. Twice as many have been killed or injured in these attacks. This is a risk facing every family in America.

And we're not going to do anything about it. Why? Because we love our guns too much. This national fetish will continue to infect every corner of society and the body count will grow to staggering levels. As long as the best we can do in response is to offer thoughts and prayers, I'm going to stay angry. I have a feeling I might be waiting a while.

(me in 30 years, still waiting)