The rush to "do something"

By Alexandra Romanov
With the horrible tragedy of Sandy Hook Elementary comes another push for one group of citizens to hurry up and “do something”. It’s easy to get caught up in all of the emotional pleas, unproven claims, and outright falsehoods being screamed at lightning speed over the Internet but shouldn’t we really take a moment to reflect on the truth of the tragedies and the myriad of gun laws currently on the books before we rush to fix the wrong problem?

I appreciate that virtually no one wants to ever see a repeat of Sandy Hook, Columbine, or Virginia Tech. I think most of us can agree that the death of innocents is never a good thing. Now I ask those of you demanding that the law abiding be disarmed, or registered, or further inventoried the following questions:  did you demand the same of law enforcement after Kent State or did you excuse that as an exceptionally bad choice made by an individual who happened to be a member of a heavily armed group? If you choose to see one law enforcement officer as an individual and refuse to hold the group of mostly law abiding law enforcement officers accountable, why do you treat civilians differently? Are you equally upset and torn up over the death of over 500 this year in Chicago alone? What exactly are you demanding be done about that? Are you aware that your government admits to having killed 775 Pakistani civilians, including 168 children, in drone attacks? Are you equally torn up over the deaths of those children even though you were not treated to a media play by play of each and every tiny casket? Are you also demanding that your government immediately disarm itself, or limit its weapon choice? If not, ask yourself why you only care about one group of dead innocents.

I ask these questions because if you aren’t equally appalled by all of these events, then it is not the death of innocents that bothers you and you need to be very honest about that. Are you looking for a law that takes away all of your worries that bad things might happen to you and yours? There is no such law. Bad things happen to good people every day.  Every day somebody’s child dies in a way that in hindsight appears absolutely avoidable. That doesn’t make those deaths ok, but “doing something” if it is the wrong something, doesn’t stop them either.

Now, if you are equally appalled by each and every unnecessary death and you wish to ban all guns, some more guns, or some different people from having guns as your solution to some, most, or all of these deaths I ask you this: Are you well versed in the current laws in your town? Are you well versed in the gun laws on the books at the time and location of each of the above mentioned tragedies? If so, then you are clearly well aware that each of those killers broke multiple laws: gun laws, homicide laws, federal laws, local laws. What “one more law” do you think is suddenly going to stop a criminal who does not care about the current laws? Do you think there is actually any law that can eliminate the technology of gunpowder? How exactly is this path of “solution” actually going to stop the death of innocents?

It’s been proven, repeatedly, in cities like Chicago, Detroit, New York, and DC that strict gun laws do not create crime free zones. Gun control is clearly not the answer to preventing these types of tragedies. If we want to stop the killings, then we need to be honest with ourselves about our real goals and then spend the time to look harder and more thoroughly at those who choose to kill instead of their weapons.

Live Free or Die Alliance

www.livefreeordiealliance.org