Why we need gun control – an alternative spiritual view

Introduction

The demonstrations in which hundreds of thousands of people have participated — many of them students — demanding sensible gun laws, is a very positive development. It represents a countervailing force against the sheer money power and bullying power of the gun lobby. It remains to be seen whether these demonstrations will have a lasting political impact, and will ultimately achieve the goal of meaningful reform.

Many of the reasons why we need sensible gun laws are painfully obvious — both to Americans, and to friends of America like Great Britain. The latter is one of several Western nations which have enacted strict gun laws, and as a result have seen gun violence plummet dramatically. No thinking person can question the basic connection between the mass proliferation of firearms and a spiraling murder rate.

It is especially fitting then, that our young people are rising up to question the political and moral corruption which keeps both gun sales and gun murders at astronomical levels — fitting not just because young people are often innocent victims of gun violence, but also because young people bring a fresh perspective unstained and unsullied by the base motives which have led us to the present morass.

Young people are shepherded through active shooter drills at school, and in neighborhoods like South L.A. (as demonstrator Edna Chavez points out) they learn to duck bullets before they learn to read. So they’re angry about this wholesale, bump-stocked destruction of their innocence. They rightly observe that in an atmosphere of fear, even those not directly impacted by gun violence in the form of losing a friend or loved one nevertheless feel the intense psychological pressure. If they are angry, and are speaking up with anger, this is understandable. But is there anything beyond the anger?

Trump’s America: Teachers With Guns

Teachers don’t want to become policemen or engage in shootouts with psychos carrying AR-15s. Most teachers want fewer guns, not more. But the arm-our-teachers “solution” is cynically designed to boost gun sales.

The emotions of the moment are overpowering, and I feel them. But we should continue to look at the underlying structural issues: There are AR-15s in our schools because there’s too much money in politics. To get the guns out of our schools, we need to get the money out of politics. Otherwise, on key issues where the American people are largely united — like sensible gun laws — the politicians will vote against the people and side with the gun manufacturers, who contribute millions of dollars to their campaign coffers.

Parkland School Shooting: NRA’s Wayne LaPierre Sings

Breaking news and broader discussion of issues

Everyone expected that due to mounting pressure, Wayne LaPierre would have to issue some kind of statement in response to the latest school shooting in Parkland, Florida, which left at least 17 people dead — most of them children. But no one expected that he would break into sunny song: