MODERN SOCIETY—THE PERFECT STORM OF GUN VIOLENCE

The “blame game” has started.  Cringeworthy politicians seeking only to raise their low-popularity numbers have begun an ill conceived campaign to blame the President for the mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton.  But these tragedies  have been with us for many decades and (unfortunately)  have become as American as apple pie.  The nation that put a man on the moon, can’t seem to solve the problem of keeping its citizenry safe from the constant stream of mad-men wielding lethal battlefield weapons to kill in places where innocent civilians congregate.

As well as having the biggest  most powerful military, the most vibrant economy, the highest GDP and more...America is also (sad to report) the gun violence capital of the world.  Over the last several decades we have experienced what one might be called the perfect storm of gun violence. This cyclone of death is NOT  the result of actions of one person—in the Oval Office—but the result of the confluence of  multiple factors: social, technical as well as political ones. All of these factors played out in an environment of easy access to lethal firearms—designed for  battlefield use.

The recent mass shootings in El Paso, Texas  and Dayton, Ohio occurring within a span of less than 24 hours has shocked and saddened us all.  But these tragedies  are not  isolated or unprecedented events. Far from it.  Mother Jones (August 5, 2019) provides a list.  Here are a few I picked out: 1982 (Welding shop Shooting) 1984 (San Yisdro), 1991 (Killeen Texas), 1993 (Garden City NY) 1994 (Columbine HS, Littleton, Colorado), 2007 (Virginia Tech Massacre), 2009, (Fort Hood Texas) 2012 (Aurora, Colorado) 2013 (Wash DC, Navy Yard) 2015 (San Bernardino) 2016 (Orlando Fl nightclub) and more.  Thus this is not a novel or recent phenomena.  No it is not related to global warming or to President Donald Trump’s call for a sensible solution on the southern border.   That border crisis is one that the Democrats for two years decried as “fake” and allowed to fester, so as to use it as a political bludgeon against the GOP and President Trump.  If any one is responsible for inflaming the nation’s sensibilities regarding that issue we can lay it at the feet of the Democrat Party.  But that issue is a red herring with no relationship to either Dayton or El Paso.  The circumstance that ententes the tragic events in those two cities were were generated decades ago, in the halls of Congress rather  than our southern border.

There are several factors which have come together in the USA to create the perfect storm for gun violence.  They include a society which prides itself on “rugged individualism”,  one in which there has been a  precipitous decline in the traditional family unit, (and the humanizing social values of that societal element).  Other factors are the rise of digital technology which in its various  forms  such as violent video games,  sexist rap music,  pornography which degrades objectifies and dehumanizes women, and an “entertainment” industry which glorifies violence and sexual perversion, war, and mass murder.  Not to be ignored is the nation’s political and economic system which in its dependence of big business donors has hollowed out the middle class, shipped well paying jobs off-shore and abandoned large segments of the heartland and its working class population.  And finally, but most importantly, we are a nation flooded with battlefield style weapons of war, that anyone with the cash to purchase one —can do so weather they are insane deranged, disturbed or exhibit apparent and immediate criminal intent. 

But it is not access to weapons alone that has caused our problem.  Today our society focuses on “self fulfillment” and ignores its responsibility to the next generation. . Today there are more and more children who grow to maturity outside of a stable, secure and loving family.  They face the difficult prospect of development into adults without the guidance and love of both a mother and father in their lives. (In 1960  73% of children lived in a traditional family, today less than half —46%—do.  See: Pew Social Trends 2012 pewsocialtrends,org). In our times , the majority (54%) of our children  are raised in less stable and secure circumstances and as a consequence are more prone to poverty, ill health, lower self-esteem, psycho-social  dysfunctions, decreased educational and vocational success as well as greater likelihood for criminality and psychological illness. . As a society, rather than encouraging circumstances that lead to stability and well-being for our children—, ours accepts social instability.  The consequences of this are that more and more  individuals fall into destructive habits and circumstances, making them more likely to evolve into hardened adults who have little empathy for others.

Like the Dayton, Ohio shooter (no name should be attributed to him) some of these individuals  are drawn to partake in dehumanizing and debased behaviors which exacerbate the circumstances of unstable and insecure upbringing.  This person—the Dayton shooter— played in a pornoband, generating so-called porno “music”.   Participants of this genre of “music” freely admit that it “functions to purposely degrade and debase human behavior”.   Those that observe and take part in these acts of dehumanization are clearly desensitized by their actions  to the point that in time they are likely to play out in real life their degraded fantasies.  Some like the 2017 Las Vegas mass murderer (and it seems the Dayton event) were also clinically depressed by their life styles,  but did not have the courage to do the act. To end their lives  they orchestrated a mass death—-and suicide.

Hollywood, the mass media and the video game industry all are complicit in creating sounds and imagery and stories that function to desensitize and dehumanize and to shock and to objectify and degrade women and the sex act.  These so called industries claim that such destructive images and ideas are “art” and have the protection of our laws—and have no effect on violent human behavior which mirrors the very acts portrayed.  Numerous studies make these claims.  But common sense and tells us otherwise.  We are a nation swaammped by films, sounds, “music’ images and electoinc games and images which are popular with children and which inure viewers  to violence and death dealing instruments as they encourage violence.

A political and historic fact is that we have a Constitution which guarantees our  citizens the “right to bear arms”.  I must add this aside The arms that our founders were familiar with when that Amendment (Second)  was written were single shot muzzle loading black powder weapons with a rate of fire of three rounds per minute. But that rate was possible only after long training.  Others, new recruits, might get off only one round per minute.  Today’s battle field style weapons (like the AK 47) could be fired at a rate of 600 rounds per minute (for a short time) even by a novice who had just minutes before purchased the weapon.  These instruments were designed for battlefield use—with minimally trained soldiers. They were meant to be lethal even in the hands of a novice. Obviously our Founders Did not have these weapons or the density of our population in mind when they formulated and wrote the Second Amendment.

So all that was needed for the volatile mix was easy access to lethal weapons of mass destruction the sad fact that our nation is flooded with an arsenal of rapid fire military style weapons. In the USA there are 1.2 guns for every man woman and child in the USA.  The above factors set the stage for violence and the access to guns completes the arc to mass shootings.

What can be done?  How about a moratorium on violence on TV, on film and the horribly violent video game industry?    Make more efforts to support family life.  Children must grow up in secure, stable and loving families.  We must confiscate and ban all battlefield style weapons.

Finally there are those among us who simply are too unstable to own or use a weapon of any type.  These should be excluded from buying, owning or using a weapon.

This is hot reocket science..  It can be accomplished. If we are all afrad to go into a Walmart store, we are at the stage where something has to be done.