A Call for What Purpose?

I just saw this video on television tonight. Watch and reflect upon what you see.

This video is meant as a call to stand up against the stand your ground laws prevalent in 26 states. This PSA was developed around the George Zimmerman shooting of Trayvon Martin, but as we discussed on this blog this instance is much greater than just these two individuals and Florida laws. How do you think Stand Your Ground Law incidents have racial profiling characteristics? How do such laws impact on justice system?

--Krystal

A Nation in Mourning

My heart is broken by the recent tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut. The loss of human life incurred and the number of families affected is too much to fully imagine. This tragedy has captured the attention of everyone nationwide as we all mourn the many loved ones lost and the heroes of the day who did what they could to keep others safe. 

Americans are crying out for help and change. These tragedies cannot keep happening at the rate they are. There is so much that is preventable in these killings and brutalities. People argue that wanting change and starting the conversation about gun control around these tragedies is "politicizing" these events. On the contrary, it is people desperate for change. It is people who don't want to live in fear anymore, who don't want to see America turn into a place of fear, anarchy, and death. It has become a risk we assume, by going out in public, that there is an opportunity for violence. This is something unique to America--and it goes back to our value system. America's system values individual freedoms over community freedoms, ie, the right for an individual to buy weapons, but not the right for communities to feel safe in public spaces. It is unfathomable in other countries that we do not take action, and it is, though devastating, just something that happens here. OUR LAWS ALLOW INDIVIDUALS TO BUY DEADLY WEAPONS IN REGULAR STORES. For many of us who have grown up here, maybe we've grown up thinking that is normal. I challenge you to really think about it. WHY ON EARTH SHOULD A CIVILIAN INDIVIDUAL BE ALLOWED ACCESS TO WEAPONRY SIMILAR TO WHAT IS USED BY THE MILITARY? Without guns, yes violence would still happen, but mass murders in school would be largely stopped. Mass murders of any kind--stopped. If there were no guns, legally or not, we would see a dramatic decline in murder. There is a larger conversation that needs to happen, around media and violence in our entertainment, the way human life is discounted in video games, movies, and tv shows, things our youth grow up watching, people without memorable names and faces being killed with little emotion. To shift our perception of human life to something of higher value is needed, as well, but the very simple fact of it all is that eliminating guns from stores would prevent the actual deaths we are currently seeing. This does not happen in other places. 

As you might notice, I am desperate. I am crying out for change. I beg everyone to consider what freedom means to them and take action. Freedom is the right to live without fear, it is the right to enjoy entertainment in public, to go out in crowds, to send your children to school. Freedom is the right to health and happiness for ALL. Freedom is not having to go through metal detectors and be searched upon entering airports, government buildings, and now schools. That is the direction our country is going. 

"If roads were collapsing all across the United States, killing dozens of drivers, we would surely see that as a moment to talk about what we could do to keep roads from collapsing. If terrorists were detonating bombs in port after port, you can be sure Congress would be working to upgrade the nation’s security measures. If a plague was ripping through communities, public-health officials would be

 working feverishly to contain it.

Only with gun violence do we respond to repeated tragedies by saying that mourning is acceptable but discussing how to prevent more tragedies is not. “Too soon,” howl supporters of loose gun laws. But as others have observed, talking about how to stop mass shootings in the aftermath of a string of mass shootings isn’t “too soon.” It’s much too late."
- Ezra Klein 

Take action in your own life: make a conscious decision to not say hurtful or negative things to others. Build others up, love with all your power. This is what will change the world and affect peace. 

 Support the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence to start getting involved in the conversation.  We must save America. It is that serious...this country is at stake. Life as we know it, the American dream, all of it, at stake. 

Pray for those affected by this horrible event, and take action in remembrance of them. It's not political, it's about prevention and honoring lives lost, may they not be lost in vain. 

--megan 

Dealing with the aftermath

The past two weeks have been especially traumatic for two teams in the National Football League, the Kansas City Chiefs and the Dallas Cowboys. Last week was particularly traumatic when Jovan Belcher, Chiefs player, shot and killed his girlfriend and mother of his 2 month old child and then went to speak & apologize to his coaches and shot himself infront of them.

NBC elected to make some feelings known when during last week's edition of Sunday Night Football, one of the highest watched television programs on a weekly basis, Bob Costas spoke out in favor of stricter gun laws. Costas later apologized for his statements made after many complained about the manner in which his platform was used politically.
What do you think? Did the NFL handle this situation appropriately? Should the players have kept Belcher's jersey up in the locker room as a jester of remembrance? How do you feel about Bob Costas' statements on Monday Night Football?

These are devastating tragedies for all involved. The National Football league has been pressed with how two deal with both of these tragedies. In most cases when a fried has passed a solder has fallen they are honored and their lives are celebrated by friends, families and associates. When that person has committed a vicious crime especially one that leaves a now orphaned 2month old child the situation is handled in a different manner. The NFL did not choose to honor Belcher, instead a moment of silence for victims of domestic violence was initiated. There were member of the chiefs organization who chose to handle the situation differently. Belcher's jersey was left up in the locker room as remembrance and some players chose to honor their friend. Others were too confused and shocked to really know how to react and put the pieces together. 


--Krystal

Stop the Senseless Loss

The "freedom" to own guns in this country ought to be a point of shame. Our lax gun laws and availability of firearms to the general public is something that other nations find amusing, if not alarming.

And despite numerous armed murders, assaults, and robberies, the laws have not changed. People argue, "Guns don't kill people. People kill people." We glorify violence and weaponry in our media and entertainment. We allow people to entertain ideas of owning guns for purposes of hunting, protection, or simple novel interest. And because of these "freedoms," we allow the senseless loss of life on our streets and in our schools and public spaces. We all have blood on our hands. 

The New Yorker posted a piece on Saturday, "One More Massacre," by Adam Gopnik, that says it far better than I can, so I will keep this post brief. 

Essentially, these massacres will keep happening in our public spaces should we not do something. The second amendment protects people's rights to own guns; it also takes away people's rights to live in safety and free from fear. The sad thing we all know is that this is not new. This has happened, and it will happen again. People die by gunfire near nightly on the DC streets I walk by day. 

"How does one argue with someone convinced that the routine massacre of our children is the price we must pay for our freedom to have guns, or rather to have guns that make us feel free?" Gopnik asks. (Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2012/07/aurora-movie-shooting-one-more-massacre.html#ixzz21q5i6Ay1)

Guns were created with the purpose of killing. Why is it so surprising when they do just that? What good would it have done if someone in the crowd at the movie theater had a gun with them? As Krystal said to me, we can't just go back to the days of the Wild, Wild, West, and just shoot who shoots us. Being vengeful and letting every man serve justice is not the answer to this dilemma--this would lead to anarchy and demise. 

Let's celebrate freedom with clean and safe streets and long and prosperous lives for all. Let's celebrate the freedom to go to a movie "just for fun." Let's find freedom in knowing that schools and work places are safe. We must act now, we cannot sit back and watch this senseless injustice continue. When we fight for the rights to own guns, we are fighting for the rights of the crazy, deranged, and blood-thirsty. We are giving a God-like power to men who cannot be trusted to use it well. When we create movies and TV shows where it looks cool and exciting to use weapons and when violence is approved for general audiences, it becomes ingrained in our culture. When we show mass killings in our entertainment, we devalue human life. Even in The Dark Knight Rises, many, many people were killed throughout the movie. And yet the movie went on, and justice was served, the lost lives just part of it. We have devalued our neighbors life and put ourselves at the center (but that's another post).
When we fight for bans on weaponry and fire arms, we are giving power to the people to live in the very definition of freedom. Imagine this country if there were no guns: less bag searches and privacy violations, less fear after dark, less random and calculated violence and tragedy. When we restrict access to guns, we open access to a rich and satisfying life for all. 

--Megan