Gun control.....

Lately, I've been hearing a lot of talk about gun control. I can't say I have a strong position on the subject. In fact, to a degree I am indifferent. I own one for protection but have never had the "pry it out of my cold-dead fingers" attitude. It's just a tool.

My ex-husband taught me how to use one and insisted that I take the NRA class to make sure I knew how to clean one, the proper etiquette and operation. He insisted that we go to the range regularly and practice. If nothing else, he insisted on responsible gun ownership. It's a good thing really. He was far more involved with the political movements that believe taking guns away from citizens in this country would subject them to tyranny by the government.

I never bought that argument. If the government ever decides to take the velvet glove off the iron fist, they have far more effective means at their disposal that they will not be threatened by a few .22 caliber handguns. The government is the bear in the livingroom.

Gun control will not stop crime. Removing the tool will not stop people from committing crimes. They will use another instrument of intimidation.

I've been hearing arguments that events such as the Virginia Tech shootings and Columbine would never have occurred if guns had been unavailable.

Baloney! Both Columbine and Virginia Tech were not random acts of violence. They were plotted and planned. And all of the perpetrators had enough control over themselves to come up with a plan and implement it.

Perhaps they would have built a bomb instead. The instructions on how to build an IED is available on the Internet.

Perhaps they would have chosen a chemical attack. Chemicals are also available on the Internet.

Gun control will not stop suicides. Even though the recent suicide in my family was committed with a gun, I know he would have done it another way if he was determined to do it.

I simply don't believe gun control will work. Here's why:

This is one of the most violent cultures in the industrialized world. I doubt anyone would argue with me about that which is why I am not bothering to get statistics.

Violence, power and might are staples of the culture. Violence is glorified in all media. The tools used to exercise it will never be as important as the mindset that creates it.

If someone has a dark enough heart, he or she will find a way to commit an act of violence. Whether it is a knife, an improvised explosive device or some other lethal means. The ones coming to mind are ones I would prefer to not even mention.

So maybe we need to figure out what causes and why there are so many dark hearts.

The problem will never be solved until it is addressed as the systemic problem it is. Those who drive culture need to change hearts and change minds. It needs to focus on more positive things than power and might. It needs to emphasize higher social values. Social engineering? Yes. It happens all the time.

Stop all the movies and TV shows that emphasize so much violence ~ or that violence is a solution to problems.

Stop glorifying military action. Show it as being only a last resort action. War is a horrible thing ~ and glorifying it makes absolutely no sense and offers no redeeming social value.

Teach children the value of honor, respect, kindness, social responsibility and compassion.

Authoritarian solutions rarely work. They only scratch the surface of a much larger problem.


Peace,


~Chani

Feel it...

Yesterday while I was in surgery, the event at Virginia Tech took place. It was the first item I saw on the news after coming home.

Plenty of others have already written posts on this that are far more eloquent and heartfelt than mine can be at this point.

Still, the one thing in common all of them express is a wondering what to do with this information, how to process it, how to somehow make it understandable. How to move forward....

Move forward, they say. We must move forward!

The truth is that it will never be understandable. The shooting at the Amish school was incomprehensible. The shootings at Columbine, while horrible, had a central reason. It may have been a crazy reason, but those two kids who did it had a reason. 9/11 had a central reason. There is something we could point to and say, "this is why it happened." We don't have that yet in this case. We don't even know who did it. And some things just defy reason.

We are still stuck with the feelings surrounding it ~ and the lesson we may be able to derive from it. The only way we will learn from it is to feel it.

Yesterday after surgery, I noticed that the nurses and the surgeon were both very concerned that I might have pain. They wanted me to qualify it. One to ten. They advised me to take Tylenol or offered me something stronger if the pain qualified higher than one or two.

God forbid I should experience any pain!

I didn't bother to explain that I expect to feel pain when some guy has been poking instruments into the middle of my eyeball and scraping the lens. I expect to feel pain when my eyeball is splayed open like a grape!

I expect to feel pain when I find out my father shot himself in the head.

I expect to feel pain when 32 of my fellow planet-dwellers are shot down in a lecture hall like soi dogs.

This culture hates pain. Any pain. At all costs. Drugs, booze, denial, suppression. More sex. More "stuff". More shopping. More food. But No Pain!

Come on, folks!

Self-soothing can be a good thing, of course. None of us could cope with the world's pain on a constant basis without relief. I'm not suggesting that by any means. I am suggesting though that we collectively sit still and feel the pain.

My concern is that we try to find relief too quickly. There is a need to move forward too quickly.

Sweep it under the rug. Hide from it. Run from it. That is the worse thing we can do because then there is no lesson in it, no change of heart, no growth, no learning. There will only be more of the same.

There will be a few days of sentimental newscasts, memorials and promises to come up with a strategic plan to make sure it never happens again. And then everyone will move on. Life as usual.

There is no way to guarantee it won't happen again unless everyone in this country and all the other countries of the world are police states. There is no way to guarantee we'll always be safe from the triumph of random chance, from chaos. It won't happen.

What we can do though is honor those who died by allowing ourselves to feel the pain, to sit with it, to allow it to change our hearts. We can allow ourselves to learn from this.

We may not be able to change the world or tame chaos but we can change ourselves.


Peace,


~Chani