After San Bernadino, Take a Look in the Mirror

What do the following incidents have in common?

Dec 14, 2012 – Sandy Hook Elementary School, Newtown, CT, lone shooter, 20 year white male kills 26 people (20 children & six adults) with a gun purchased legally by the shooter’s mother

June 17, 2015 – Emmanuel AME Church, Charleston, SC, lone shooter, 21 year old white male kills 9 people (6 men, three women) with a legally purchased gun

October 2, 2015 – Umpqua Community College, Roseburg, OR, lone shooter, 26 year old white male kills 10 people and injured 7 more with a legally purchased gun

November 27, 2015 – Planned Parenthood Clinic, Denver, CO, lone shooter, white male, 59 year old white male, kills 3 people, injures 11 others with a legally purchased gun

December 2, 2015 – Inland Regional Center, San Bernadino, CA, two shooters, husband, age 28 and wife, age 27 of Pakistani descent, killed 14 people and wounded 17 with legally purchased guns

All of these tragic incidents involved 1 or 2 individuals, all but one under the age of 30, shooting into a crowd of innocent people with a legally purchased gun. Yet only one is called an “act of terror.” The other four are referred to “active shooter incidents.” 

In 2013 the FBI published a study of “active shooter incidents” between 2000-2013. During that time there 160 incidents involving “an individual actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a confined and populated area” where 3 or more people were killed. In those 160 "active shooter incidents" 486 people were killed and 557 people were wounded. The number of these incidents have accelerated since this study, and all of them had characteristics just like ones listed above.

Over the past several days I have been trying to wrap my head around the insanity not only of these mass shootings, but the way we talk about them. All of them are tragically sad. All of them involve innocent people dying needlessly violent deaths. Two things stand out to me.

First of all, by calling San Bernadino and not the other shootings an “act of terror” we encourage demagogues like Donald Trump to get air time saying travel restrictions on Muslims coming into the country. Statistically we would do better to detain white males already citizens of this country under 30 if we want to save lives.

Second, President Obama in his speech last Sunday night is right when he says we need to make it difficult for people to legally purchase assault style rifles. It only makes sense. All the people injured or killed would be alive were it not for legally purchased guns.  Republican presidential hopeful Ted Cruz called Pres. Obama’s statement “political” but a day after the San Bernadino shooting Cruz held a rally at an Iowa gun range saying we stop ‘bad guys” by using our own guns; so who is using the shooting for political gain? At least President Obama was proposing action by Congress to restrict access to the kind of guns used in these mass shootings.Ted Cruz seems to be proposing a mass shootout.

Then of course, we have Jerry Fallwell, Jr, president of Liberty University, a conservative Christian school, propose to his students they start bringing guns to school [Note to self: Steer clear of the unlikely event of being invited to speak or visit large university in Lynchburg, VA]. We have Wayne La Pierre, executive vice president of the NRA who proposed following the Sandy Hook killings that armed police be present in every school and teachers be trained to use guns. We have many states like Florida and Texas that pass laws allowing individuals to “conceal and carry” their guns in public places. Yes that makes sense, let’s just make it easier than it already is to bring guns into public places with lots of innocent people to shoot at.

Because so many of these mass shootings have occurred in educational settings, I have been forced to think about how I would handle a shooting incident in my school or classroom. My first thought would be to get people to safety as quickly as possible, and then the second thing would be to get the gun out of the hands of the shooter. So I find myself wondering, why do we make it so easy for the gun to get into the hand of the shooter in the first place?

Are we so blind as a nation that we cannot see that WE are our greatest security threat, not ISIS. Recently the New York Times published a report, detailing how all of the shooters in these mass shootings secured their guns through legal means.  Interestingly in the FBI study mentioned above the fact that guns were obtained legally is not even mentioned, it is assumed. 

If we are so concerned about terrorism, first of all let’s not use a euphemism like “active shooter incident” when white people commit the crime but terror when it happens to be someone who practices the Islamic faith. A few weeks I visited the memorial to the Oklahoma City Bombings in 1995. At that time our "sworn enemy" was Libya, so it was assumed the bombing was done by a Libyan "terrorist." Turned out it was Timothy McVeigh and a bunch of other white guys who pulled it off. Islam isn't our enemy, self-styled killers are, regardless of ideology, religion or ethnicity.

Secondly, then let’s make it more difficult for people to legally obtain weapons. If you want to stop a killing and you know a clear consistent fact, it only makes sense to work to prevent the easy access to guns. This just  makes sense - why is that so hard to grasp?

Third, let us take a look at ourselves and the cowboy, shoot-em-up culture we have created that is so out of step with the rest of the civilized world. There are more killings in any metropolitan area in the U.S. than occur in  any other country in the world. The Second Amendment may give people a right to bear arms, but it is not a right without restrictions. Moreover, our movies, our gaming industry, our militarism, our way of viewing what strength and machismo look like all support this violent culture of ours. We have reaped the seeds of our own inner turmoil and external violence. The madness starts at home. It starts by looking in the mirror.

I haven’t got a lot of answers to my questions, but these things seem clear.

The Commonwealth of NRA (or Marcellus, Comcast, etc.)

This past week Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett signed into law House Bill #80 (The Firearms Preemption Legislation bill) which was back by the National Rifle Association (NRA), who called it the “strongest firearms preemption statute in the country.” Essentially the law allows pro-gun organizations like the NRA to sue local municipalities that pass laws which the NRA deems obstructing the gun ownership and use rights of local citizens. In reality the law was more symbol than substance, as local municipalities like Philadelphia, which have passed laws limiting the number of handguns and individual could purchase at any one time, have been blocked by the State government from enacting those laws, since the state maintains jurisdiction over all firearms legislation in the Commonwealth. However, the symbolism of this law should not be overlooked, for in signing this bill, the State Legislature and Governor Corbett have given the pro-gun lobby the right to punish and harass whoever they want with the state’s blessing. As one of the most powerful and wealthy lobbying groups in the country, it essentially communicates that these lobby groups run the state, not the citizens who live there and vote.

In this blog I have long and often bemoaned the undue influence corporate and special interest lobbying groups hold over the democratic process in this country, be it guns, insurance companies, weapons manufacturers, or just wealthy donors. However, HB 80 takes this practice to a new level in that it puts it out there publicly, essentially saying no matter what citizens want in their local community or their state in regards to gun legislation, the NRA gets its way. This week the NRA is the culprit, next week it might be the gas companies who get huge tax breaks mining the Marcellus Shale region or Comcast that wants to control the airwaves and the Internet, or some other special interest group with undue influence. With regard to HB 80 what is sad is that while polls consistently show overwhelming support for tighter restrictions on the purchase and use of firearms, the House members voted over 2-1 in favor of the bill. So one can legitimately wonder who is being represented. Parenthetically, I want to commend my own representative, Rep. William Adolph, a Republican leader in the House, for voting “Nay”; there are some people with courage, but not enough.

As this bill was working its way through the Pennsylvania legislature, I was also taking note of the huge protests taking place on the other side of the world in Hong Kong. Thousands of young people in the city have taken to the streets to protest the process by which candidates for elective office are chosen in that supposedly democratic protectorate. A local election commission receives petitions for those wanting to run, and then decides on the candidates who will be put on the ballot; but here’s the catch: because of Hong Kong’s inclusion in China, those candidates must be approved by the national government in Beijing (which by the way is very non-democratic). That is why the students have taken to the streets; they want a real vote, not a slate of candidates predetermined and vetted by the powers that be. When pressed as to why he objected to the protestors’ demand, the mayor of Hong Kong said that open democracy would mean that people “who earn less the $1800/month” (about 50% of the population) might vote for candidates and policies that would cut into the power and influence of the wealthiest and powerful people in Hong Kong. (Hmmm – sound familiar?)

While our political leaders tout the values of democracy, even to the point of wanting to export that system to developing countries, they cave in or even worse, actively promote a system where the vast majority of people are ignored in favor of those with deep pockets. On Tuesday, I will go to the polls and vote, but I must say as time goes on I feel my vote matters less and less, unless and until we elect representatives who have the courage and conviction to actually believe in democracy, and listen to the people they are supposed to represent.

It Starts With the Guns, Stupid!

Today we learned of another mass shooting, this time on the campus of Seattle Pacific University, a small private Christian university outside Seattle. Two weeks ago the same sort of event happened at University of California Santa Barbara. Last night and every night in cities across the nation, the same thing happened, as young people, mostly young men, were gunned down. Meaningless deaths of mostly young people due to another young person wielding a gun.

In a recent "Daily Show with John Stewart", Stewart turned his satirical wit on the news media which has now begun to portray such meaningless slaughter of our young as “inevitable.”(The segment on guns starts at about the 3:15 point; its powerful and worth a look). Things have gotten so absurd that even the NRA is not sure how far its gun-slinging, gun-toting enthusiasts should be encouraged to go. (See this link to the article.)

The truth is only a fraction of the gun-related violence in our country ever makes the news, and usually only when such incidents involve white folks in places like elementary schools and college campuses. As horrific as the SPU and UC-Santa Barbara shootings are (a death is a death no matter where it occurs), the media generally ignores the carnage occurring in poor and urban communities all the time. Yet as Stewart points out, even white kids shooting white kids now has become "old news."

When the media pundits try to get to the causes they point to mental illness, family stress, depression, low self esteem and the like – all of which are contributing factors – but rarely do the mention the one common factor:  the ready availability of guns in this country whether thru legal or illegal means. Take the guns away and there will still be troubled youth and a certain level of violence will exist, but the dead body count will go way down.

Let me share a personal illustration. When I was 22 years old living in Boston, I was mugged by an assailant who demanded I give him my watch. When I resisted, he hit me several times with a baseball bat. I had to go to the emergency room but I survived the ordeal. Had that same event occurred today, most likely I would have been shot, the difference being in the late 1970’s guns were very rare in even seemingly “dangerous” neighborhoods such as where I lived. Don’t get me wrong, there were certain places one did not go to maintain safety, but in six years of working with street kids I never saw a gun and only hear one a few times. There was violence to be sure, but few firearms.

Anyone who reads this blog knows that I am passionate about addressing issues of inequity and injustice in many areas, and violence of any kind is something that needs to be addressed. However, let’s not be stupid or blind or in absolute denial. If we want to reduce the carnage of our young people which has become all too common, we need to start with reducing the availability of guns. We need to pass laws strengthening and expanding background checks, limit sales to one handgun a month, require fingerprint identification and licensing, hold gun dealers responsible for prohibiting straw purchases and require all guns lost or stolen to be reported the police. Hunters can still hunt. Target shooters can still shoot. People who feel they must have a gun due to some distorted view of the Second Amendment can still get their gun. All I am suggesting is that we don’t make it as easy to get a gun.

If we want to reduce the carnage, the solution is not difficult – its starts with the guns. And to those who say that gun violence is inevitable, let’s call such logic what it is: BULLS**T!

Eating Ourselves Alive

When I was about 7 or 8 years old I went to visit my cousins who lived in the Chicago area. They had some guinea pigs who had just had babies. After the babies were born they took the adult guinea pigs out of the cage because as my aunt explained if the adult guinea pigs were not removed, they might eat their newborn babies. That memory came back to me the other day when I read about Dick Metcalf, a long time columnist with Guns & Ammo magazine who was fired for writing a column entitled “Let’s Talk Limits” in which he challenged the idea that the there ought not be any government regulation on gun use or ownership. He wrote: “…. way too many gun owners still seem to believe that any regulation of the right to keep and bear arms is an infringement. The fact is all constitutional rights are regulated, always have been, and need to be.” In the past Metcalf has advocated regulation of concealed weapons and called for carriers of concealed weapons undergo training and preparation for responsibly bearing arms.

According to the editors of Guns and Ammo Metcalf went too far this time. Two days after the column appeared in late October, Metcalf was told that two major gun manufacturers, Ruger and Remington, threatened to pull their ads from the magazine unless Metcalf was fired.  So you know what happened. Metcalf is only the most recent of respected journalists and leaders in the pro-gun community who have been vanquished for questioning the “all or nothing” mentality of the NRA zealots and gun manufacturers.  Note that people like Metcalf are hardly what one would consider “moderate” on the issue of gun rights, so the fact that he would be ostracized shows just how narrow and rigid the “pro-gun” advocates are. The Second Amendment has become the holy grail in the minds of its worshippers, granting them absolute freedom to do whatever they want in the area of gun use and ownership. Newtown, Aurora, Virginia Tech, Columbine, Tucson – nothing must dampen their worship of the almighty right to bear arms.

This most recent issue is illustrative of what is happening in the conservative political community in general. The Tea Party advocates like Ted Cruz and Rand Paul are creating havoc within the Republican party, so much so that even House Speaker John Boehner, who is about as conservative as they come, has called them out for being too rigid and unyielding. Even Boehner knows that most of the gridlock in the House last year came about because Tea Party hardliners are trying to foist their rigid views on the rest of the Republican Party.  Like my cousins’ guinea pigs, they appear to be devouring one another.

Those of us who stand outside that intra-conservative debate should take note. Seeking to dialogue or reason with the ardent, hardline Tea Party, pro-gun types is not a logical strategy. However, joining forces with some who have been ostracized by their own people might make sense. On the other hand, we need to realize that as intractable and annoying as the John Boehners of the world may seem, they are only part of the problem. At issue is a deeper sickness in our culture.

While I get an admittedly sick joy in seeing conservatives beating up on one another, at the same time I am troubled by the uncompromising mean-spiritedness and narrow-mindedness that seems to be endemic in our culture. Last month I attended a rally commemorating the one year anniversary of the Newtown, CT shootings. The main speaker was former Democratic governor of Pennsylvania, Ed Rendell, who during his term had attempted unsuccessfully to pass legislation restricting the sale of handguns through a predominantly Republican legislature. At the rally last month Rendell’s solution and charge to those gathered was that we become “one-issue voters” like the pro-gun folks. In other words, he was asking us to become as rigid, narrow-minded, and unyielding as our adversaries.  While I have yet to think of an appropriate alternative I found Gov. Rendell’s solution to be a less than satisfying.

Developmental psychologists tell us that one of the marks of maturity is the ability to live and work with ambiguity. By that standard our culture (as illustrated by the pro-gun rigidity and Gov. Rendell’s response) has regressed to a pre-teen level. Such a culture has no more room for a thinking person on the left as it does for a thinking person like Dick Metcalf on the right.  Perhaps those of us who are a bit more grown-up (i.e. those who realize that ambiguity and compromise are not bad things) need to let the purists devour themselves, while we try to figure out a way to live and work together productively. Holding strong opinions and views on issues is not the problem, nor is holding to one’s position on some issues. However, when rigidity and narrow-mindedness become the only response, then like those guinea pigs all we are doing is eating each other alive.

* pictures from Google Images

Pulling the Gun Lobby Out of the Shadows

On Tuesday Pres. Barack Obama concluded his State of the Union speech with a powerful call for Congress to act on proposed gun violence prevention legislation such as strengthening the background check system and banning high powered military assault type weapons and ammunition. He did so by naming recent victims and their families in Newton, CT, Chicago and Oak Creek, Wisconsin and repeating the litany “They deserve a vote!” Rarely do presidential speeches bring tears to my eyes, but that refrain did.

The significance of Obama’s statement is both substantive and symbolic. Calling upon states to supply names of known offenders and those with mental health issues, and requiring all gun sales, including those at gun shows to go through a background check will not only prevent offenders from purchasing guns, but it will send a message to unscrupulous dealers that looking the other way as straw purchases go down is no longer acceptable. Some of those gun dealers will see a significant cut in their profits if that legislation is enforced. Likewise, banning assault weapons will get some of the most deadly weapons, weapons whose purpose is to kill at any costs, out of general circulation will reduce the likelihood of the mass killings we have repeatedly seen. While critics will say about only 1% of gun-related deaths come from such guns, ask the survivors in Newtown or Aurora how much they care about that 1%.

However, the symbolism of Obama’s statement is even more significant in my view, because for over two decades the gun lobby, including the NRA, the Gunowners of America (GOA) and the gun manufacturers have been operating in a shadow world by paying politicians to just be quiet on guns. They don’t have to be pro-gun, they just are not supposed to talk about it because the arguments for nonrestrictive gun laws are emotionally based and largely built on anecdote and myth. Two examples come to mind.

First, several years ago Congress quietly began to cut funding for the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) research on the impact of guns and gun violence on public health. Their research decisively showed that the presence of a gun in a home increases the likelihood that someone in the immediate circle of that home (family, relatives, close friends) will be victim of a gun-related incident. This runs directly counter to the myth that people need guns in their homes to protect from intruders. The intruders are not the ones in danger, the people in the home are. By presidential order the president has begun to restore some of the gun-related research, but Congress can do more to allow us to use science rather than myth to determine or national policies on guns.

A second example is a little known bill called the Tiahrt Amendment  that was an amendment to a 2003 federal spending bill that restricts the ability of law enforcement officers to identify the buyers of guns or require gun dealers to do inventories to see if their guns have been lost or stolen or used in a crime. It also restricts citizens from obtaining information on the source and buyers of guns used in crimes in their communities. This bill provides a “cover” for straw purchasers and the unscrupulous dealers who sell to them.

It is these shadow efforts of limiting research and weakening the powers of law enforcement that make NRA rhetoric such as “we don’t need more laws, we just need to enforce the laws we have” so hypocritical. Even as NRA leaders say such things (and they are still saying them), they are working in the shadows to keep law enforcement from being able to do their jobs.

President Obama’s refrain “They deserve the vote” challenged the gun lobby to come out of the shadows and called on Congress to stop hiding behind their silence. More than his Republican colleagues, the president was calling out his fellow Democrats who since Al Gore’s loss to George W. Bush in the 2000 presidential election have decided that support for gun prevention legislation was politically unfavorable. So instead of speaking out one way or the other, Democrats, including the President, have remained remarkably silent in the face of recurring incidents of violence in both urban and suburban communities. The president’s message was that Congress can no longer be silent.

The President’s message, though long overdue, was a welcome change. Let us keep the pressure on to make sure that his words will not in themselves merely be symbol, but will move Congress to act clearly and decisively on these issues, and that the members of Congress themselves will have to declare themselves one way or the other on these vital issues

Where will the Pro-Gun Folks Draw the Line?

Like many folks, I am watching closely as President Obama begins his campaign to reform the gun laws in this country. Because most laws regulating the sale and use of guns are legislated at the state level, there are only a limited number of things he can do; nonetheless, those few things are important. In his White House briefing he outlined four major proposals

- Require that everyone who wants to purchase a gun go through background checks (i.e. closing the gun show loophole);
- Ban military-style assault weapons and high-capacity magazines;
- Better train teachers and officials on how to respond to shootings at schools;
- Increase access to mental health services

Also through executive order the president called for increased research on gun related issues and mental health.

Even before his proposals had been made public the NRA and its spokespersons in Congress were criticizing them. When Obama indicated in an interview said that he enjoyed skeet shooting, they scoffed, even after he produced a picture of doing just that. I wondered why the president felt a need to even respond to such criticisms, until I realized he wasn’t trying to answer his critics, but rather discredit them in the eyes of the millions of American who feel confused and ambivalent on the gun issue.

However, I recently got a sense of where the battle lines on this issue will be drawn (I apologize for using such a militaristic metaphor, but that is what this feels like) when I received a letter from my Congressman in response to a letter I had sent him calling for an assault weapons ban. Rep. Pat Meehan represents the 7th District of Pennsylvania, which basically constitutes the western suburbs in the Philadelphia metro area. Rep Meehan is a dyed-in-the-wool conservative, a darling of many of the Conservative PACS. In response to my letter Re. Meehan wrote the following:

 “… we need to put an emphasis on what works to keep guns out of the hands of criminals while protecting the rights of law-abiding citizens. As I’ve previously said, I agree with the President that we can and should strengthen the nation’s background check system, filling the current holes and also requiring background checks at gun shows, regardless of whether the seller is licensed or not. Also it is correct o put a focus on mental health, improving care for troubled young people and the prevalence of violent movies and video games in our culture.”

Compared to previous responses I have received from the Congressman, there are some hopeful signs – Rep Meehan is now on record in support of a robust background check system, even at gun shows, a major source of gun sales. However, what is also noteworthy is what is absent from the Congressman’s proposals; he does not speak on the assault weapons ban, nor does he support the president’s call for more research funding or a strengthening of the ATF, which is has been vastly underfunded for years.

Rep. Meehan is a good litmus test for what political conservatives will or will not support. I think we who want to see more robust gun legislation need to see these are where the lines are being drawn. For some bizarre reason, otherwise intelligent men like Pat Meehan will not support the ban on armor piercing bullets or high powered rifles to the general public. He will speak about “enforcing already existing laws” without voting to provide to make that enforcement possible. And despite numerous incidents like Newtown, Aurora and Tucson he will continue to see this gun problem as a “criminal” issue, rather than an issue affecting everyday citizens caught up in our gun-worshipping culture.

In the political world of compromise and give and take, my sense is that conservatives will give a little on the background check issue, and dig in their heels on everything else, especially reinstating the assault weapons ban. They will use the language of “what works” to reduce crime, somehow having this huge blind spot when it comes to high powered weapons in spite several high profile events using those weapons. They will equate someone’s right to own a gun with the right to use a gun whose purpose is only to kill other human beings in a combat situation.

Because of my long involvement with this issue, people have been asking if I think significant changes will come. I don’t think significant changes will come without a real fight and continued pressure on Congresspeople and a continual discrediting of the lies and deception being promulgated by the NRA and other gun-rights groups. In Philadelphia and elsewhere sales at gun shows and gun shops have sky rocketed because of people’s frenzy and fear that someone all rights to own and use gun will be taken away. I don’t see that happening, nor do I worry about it. What concerns me is that those of us who see a major source of the problem as the fascination with violence at the heart of our culture must be committed to a long, arduous process of transformation that will require dedicated efforts to keep the truth and reality of guns’ destruction before the public and more importantly, our representatives in Congress and the White House.

So I took the letter that Rep Meehan sent me turned it over and wrote my response to his response asking why he has not come out in support of the assault weapons ban. The campaign for commonsense gun legislation continues.

Making Sense of the Senseless

Today in Newtown, CT 28 people are dead, 20 of them children who attended the Sandy Hook Elementary School. If the murder rate in Philadelphia stays on pace, there will 3-4 more young people in Philadelphia dead before the end of the weekend due to gun violence. The same will be true for communities all over the country. As the newscasters were reporting the Connecticut tragedy, one reporter asked rhetorically: how do we make sense of the senseless?

Whenever I hear of another gun-related killing, and especially when there is a high profile shooting like we have had recently in Oregon and now in Connecticut, I think of the line from Bob Dylan’s classic, “Blowin’ in the Wind” – how many deaths will it take ‘til he knows that too many people have died? The pattern is the same: a horrible shooting occurs, the reporters swarm on the scene, tears are shed, incredulity is expressed, and yet nothing is said about the all-too-ready–availability of guns. President Obama sheds a tear and hugs his beautiful daughters, but will he and the Congress take up the issue of America’s fanatical addiction to guns. Whether it’s Trayvon Martin or holiday shoppers in Oregon or twenty elementary children, there is one thing that could have prevented all the senseless deaths: gun laws that make it difficult for the average person to buy guns and then carry them in public. It is not that complicated to figure out, but extremely complicated to get that simple idea into the political discussion.

No doubt there will be those in the NRA, Gun Owners of America, and other pro-gun groups who will make the argument that this incident shows that we need more guns, that if there had been teachers in that school with guns, maybe Adam Lanza would not have killed the children. They will make that argument even though it does not stand up to the evidence. Gabby Giffords had trained guards around her and there were armed guards in the Portland shopping mall. They did not stop the killers in those situations. This is the false and dangerous logic that the gun lobby continues to sell to the public and our leaders, and IT IS A LIE.

James Atwood, author of American and its Guns, says that we as a nation worship the idol of the gun. He says:

“… America’s idolatry with guns [is] a confrontational belief system based on acquiring power over others. The system is buttressed by a fascination for and devotion to the violence guns provide. Those who believe need guns to prove themselves and others they are in control, to protect them from harm, and to give them a sense of security.”(emphasis original, p. 22)

Former NRA executive Warren Cassidy said that the best way to understand the NRA is “approaching [members of the NRA] as if they were a religion.” His words not mine. To suggest that guns themselves might be part of the problem is heresy in the holy temple of the gun. However, if we want to make sense of the senseless, this is where we must start.

I ask that you join me in contacting legislators at local, state and federal levels and demanding that the issue of gun ownership and the carrying of guns be put up for serious discussion.  I did just that after the Aurora, CO shooting and got NRA sponsored clichés from both Democrats and Republicans  except for my Republican state representative who agreed with the need to pass more restrictive legislation. We dare not give up. We are approaching the “tipping point”; change will begin to come when enough of us raise our voices enough times to finally drown out the senseless voices that continue to protect the “right to bear arms” at any cost, even the cost of innocent children.

Moses Walker Jr. and the Fallacy of Self-Defense

The recent shooting of off-duty Philadelphia Police officer Moses Walker, Jr.  proves the point that possessing a gun and knowing how to use it does not prepare one to defend oneself when you are surprised at gun point. On the early morning of August 18 Officer Walker was heading  home from his precinct when he was robbed at gun point by two men. While the details of what happened next are still being sorted out, Walker, who was armed, apparently tried to draw his gun but was shot and killed before he could get a shot off. Later his two assailants were caught and are currently being processed through the courts systems. Moses Walker Jr. was one of over 230 gun violence victims in Philadelphia this year, and one of over 32,000 nationwide.

Gun rights defenders – those who claim that having a gun protects you from would be offenders – should take pause. Moses Walker was a trained police officer, who as protocol requires, regularly practiced with his gun. Yet, even he was not able to defend himself.

Now some might say that such an incident means we have to have more guns in the hands of citizens and train people to defend themselves, but logic and the data suggests otherwise. While the National Rifle Association likes to regularly tell stories of gun owners defending themselves, the reality is that more often than not the opposite occurs. Insight into why this is so was made clear to me through a study done a few years ago with Muhlenberg College students who were put through the Pennsylvania State Police Firearms training. Some of the students were experienced gun users, others had no previous training or experience, but all passed the course. Then they were put in a situation where it appeared a gunman entered a classroom where they were in class; each of the students had their guns on them but none of them were able to get off a shot before they were “gunned down” with a paint ball. In analyzing the reasons for their ineffectiveness, the trainers pointed out that when accosted unexpectedly, our bodies go into a “fight or flight” mode, adrenaline kicks up and our heart pumps blood like mad to the extremities. The excess rush of blood hampered the trainees’ dexterity, and they were in some cases not even able to get the gun out of their holster. The trainers explained that it is only through regular sustained practice that trained officers are able to control their reaction enough to be effective in a high stakes situation.

The other reality is that pulling a gun on someone who pulls a gun on you, raises the stakes and creates a condition where injury is more likely to occur. Had Officer Walker not drawn his gun, he might have lived – minus his wallet. As a storeowner quoted by James Atwood (American and its Guns) said – "I don’t have a gun behind the counter so that I can live to the next robbery." Unfortunately, our “wild west” mentality is do deeply engrained and re-enforced by the media, it’s hard for us to see the simple logic of lowering the threshold to prevent unnecessary death

While there are not simple answers to the factors contributing to gun violence, reducing the flow of illegal guns to the street would be a major step. The city of Philadelphia and other PA communities have been blocked by the state legislature from enacting laws such as limiting the sale of handguns to one per month; requiring guns lost or stolen to reported to police; and putting a ban on assault style weapons. As a recent Philadelphia Inquirer editorial (August 23, 2012) pointed out “lawmakers in Harrisburg ….have steadfastly refused to pass legislation making it tougher to buy guns”, “have refused to clamp down on straw purchasers”, "have failed to close the 'Florida loophole’ which allows a person to carry a concealed gun in Pennsylvania even if his only permit is from another state.” Then it reports that Pennsylvania is in direct violation of the law when it says: “And despite a 2007 federal requirement, Pennsylvania has yet to give the National Instant Criminal Background Check System the records of 5000,000 people with mental illnesses who are barred from buying a handgun.”

The recent high profile shootings in Colorado, Wisconsin, and New York City coupled with the daily less-publicized violence that occurs in local communities must compel us to pressure our leaders and raise our voices against this madness. Polls show that most Americans agree with the sentiments expressed in this blog, but the concern has not risen to the level of acting and voting on those convictions. Until that happens and we get moving, the madness will continue.

(While this incident is several weeks old, I did not post this blog until now out of respect for Officer Walker's memory. By all accounts he was deeply loved and caring man, with a strong Christian faith. His "homegoing service" was a tribute to the character of a man who loved his community and lived his values every day.)

Blowin in the Wind

Many people who came of age in the 1960’s remember the Bob Dylan song, “Blowin in the Wind,” which asked a series of questions that probed the ethos of that age. Today as I read of the shooting deaths of nine people in Tucson, AZ and the serious injury to Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, the words of the third verse of that song seemed particularly pertinent:

                How many times must a man look up, before he can see the sky?

                How many ears must one man have,

                                                      before he can hear people cry?

                How many deaths will it take till he knows

                                                     that too many people have died?

                The answer my friend is blowin in the wind; 

                                                     the answer is blowin in the wind.

Not a day goes when we don’t hear of another senseless death due to proliferation of guns. Tragically and ironically, one of the people killed in the Tucson murders was U.S. District Judge John Roll, who had recently ruled against more stringent background checks on gun purchasers. The man who committed these latest murders had put up YouTube videos indicating his mental and emotional imbalance, and his disgust for politicians. Rep Giffords herself had boasted during last fall’s campaign that she packed a gun and knew how to use it. Ironically, the same model gun was used to shoot her in the head. While our government spends billions of dollars to protect us from outside terrorists, and more billions to keep out immigrants, it is the people who we pass on the street or the mall everyday who represent the greatest threat to our safety.

Not long ago, a friend of mine had a gun pulled on her at a gas station because a woman thought she my friend had cut her off. Fortunately, no one was hurt, but it was yet another example of the danger we face from total strangers, or in some case neighbors, and even loved ones wielding guns in a moment of rage or at the end of their emotional rope.

Now I am sure the pro-gun lobby and the NRA are spinning their tired response that it is not guns that kill people but people who kill people. However, as this and every other senseless killing indicates, it is people with guns that kill people. Therefore we must have laws and policies that carefully and regularly monitors those have been granted the right carry a gun.  The U.S. is the only developed country in the world that allows such lax laws when it comes to the management and control of firearms. As Bob Dylan asks: How many deaths will it take till we know that too many people have died, and that one way to address that question is to put common sense controls and background checks on those people who desire to own and use guns, especially guns designed solely for killing people.

The answer my friends is blowin in the wind, but it need not. The answer is right there is front of us, if we pressure our legislators to require stronger background checks on all gun purchases, and that we regularly monitor those who have been granted the right to carry a handgun (whose only purpose is to shoot people), and to determine if they have a legitimate need for such a firearm.

How many tears must be shed, before we can hear people’s cries? How many deaths will it take till we know that too many people died? How many Columbines, Virginia Techs and Tucsons will it take. The answer is there…. if we only bother to listen.

                

Why Legal Gun Owners Ought to Support Gun Violence Prevention

It has been just over a year since I, along with eleven others, were arrested for our direct action against Colisimo’s Gun Shop. We had focused on Colisimo’s because ATF statistics had indicated that his shop was a major source of illegal guns used in crimes. As it turned out Mr. Colisimo profited greatly from the straw purchasing process that gets illegal guns in to the hands of street criminals, causing harm and fear to many law-abiding citizens in urban neighborhoods. In September the US Attorney agreed with us and shut Mr. Colisimo down. The work of Heeding God’s Call continues as we are now looking to take similar actions against gun sellers in the Philadelphia area and even beyond.

One of the stranger experiences for me over this past year has been the number of legal gun owners who have accused us of wanting to take away their Second Amendment rights to bear arms. Some of these folks have responded to my blogs anonymously or written me private emails with their objections. Putting aside the argument whether that is what the founding fathers actually intended (for now the Supreme Court in its twisted logic seems to believe they did), our issue is not with legal gun owners, but rather with a huge loophole in the gun selling process that allows for legally sold guns to quickly and without retribution get into the hands of people who use those guns in crime. We want common sense laws that say if a person has a gun lost or stolen, they should have to report it to the police. We want to limit the sale of handguns to one per month. That is it.

What I don’t understand is why legal gun owners would oppose such common sense laws. The argument they give, and their NRA sponsors feed them, is the “slippery slope” argument. If we limit handguns, pretty soon, we will want to take their hunting rifles and collector guns as well. Now I will admit, I want to take AK-47’s and other assault rifles off the open market, but I am not out to take away anyone’s right to own a gun. The fallacy of the slippery slope argument is that if there is a slope it’s going the way of gun owners not against them. In the last year Pres. Obama has authorized the carrying of concealed weapons in National Parks and on Amtrak trains - laws that had been in force since the Reagan era. See an MSNBC report from on these developments here.

The fact is all these illegal guns put gun owners in a bad light. Every time there is a shooting, it emphasizes again the lethal nature of our culture. Every time a cop is gunned down, a campus is shot up, or an army base terrorized (as has happened far too often in the past few years), it sends the message that people with guns are a menace to society. Now I don’t necessarily believe that, but I do know that having guns around makes everyone more vulnerable, and people with guns more dangerous. So if I was a legal gun owner, I would want to make sure that people who do such things would be prevented for taking such actions.

Even using the pro-gun argument that handguns provide security, wouldn’t it make sense to keep guns out of the hands of those who should not have them? If a gun is “stolen” or “lost” (the strawbuyer’s thinly veiled excuse for not having a gun they bought and sold to another), shouldn’t it be reported for the safety of all involved? If the pro-gun lobby is so concerned about safety, why not support efforts to keep us all safe?

Now for many I realize the issue is not just safety but also the “freedom” to own and purchase a gun. However freedom comes with responsibility, and while I trust that most gun owners are responsible, to pass common sense laws for the benefit of a whole community is also part of that responsibility. Responsible gun owners don’t keep loaded guns lying around their homes, so why do we allow illegal loaded guns in our communities? Responsible gun owners keep guns out of the hands of those not mature enough or stable enough to use them, so why do we have laws that allow such people to have guns in our neighborhoods?

Now I realize is that this issue will never be won by logic alone. For gun owners to rail against a group trying to stop gun shops that participate in straw purchasing defies logic. For gun owners to object to laws that will not limit them, but make it more difficult for illegal guns to get on the street, defies logic. When the slippery slope argument is used or when the NRA says that such laws will limit freedom, they aren’t spouting rational arguments, they are appealing to gun owners' fears that someone will take their gun away; for many gun owners the issue isn’t about logic but stirred up emotions. Furthermore, as I have said elsewhere in this blog, there is something deeply embedded in American culture that make the right to own guns as patriotic as mom and apple pie.

I am reminded of the Bob Dylan song “Blowing in the Wind” made popular years ago by Peter, Paul and Mary. While the song was a statement about the devastation of war, there is a line in there that speaks to our current struggle over the sale and use of guns

“How many deaths will it take 'til he knows that too many people have died?”

That’s the question that drives me and many others in the gun violence prevention movement to keep at it. Legal gun owners, if they thought straight about it, would and should join our efforts.

Guns, Health Care and the Meaning of Democracy

A sideshow to the ongoing debate about healthcare reform is the fact that protestors have now begun to show up with guns. If you haven’t seen it, you need to watch Chris Matthews’ (Hardball) interview with William Costic [I believe that was his name, but am not sure], the man who started the gun-toting process by bringing an unconcealed weapon to the Obama town meeting in Portsmouth, NH last week. My good friend Bryan Miller of Ceasefire New Jersey wants us to consider such acts as just plain “craziness.” However, I don’t think we can so easily dismiss them, for as Bryan goes onto explain if they are crazy, they are a very well orchestrated and organized group of crazies. As I listened to Mr Costic explain his views to Chris Matthews,I heard a man with a world view informed by a hyper-vigilant, individualistic, libertarian logic. When asked if he thought Social Security or Medicare were mistakes, he said “yes.” He openly admitted to voting for Ron Paul in the last presidential election. He spoke out of a very well thought out and largely coherent perspective.

These are the folks (mostly unknowingly) indebted to and informed by the political philosophy of the late Robert Nozick, who saw the government’s role in maintaining justice as protecting basic individual rights, and otherwise staying out of people’s business. Nozick considered taxes “robbery” and paying them “forced labor.” However, Nozick was no dummy; he taught at Harvard throughout most of his career, and his ideas are deeply embedded in the American psyche especially when people talk about individual rights. Before we dismiss these gun-toters as a “lunatic fringe,” we need to recognize that they have a coherent worldview, however distant it may be from our own.

Behind and beneath all the rhetoric about health care, gun rights and the like is a struggle over what it means to be a citizen of this country. The fears are being stirred up the media and corporate manipulators, but at the same time they are more than simply fears about people's financial future. I believe they are fears of a seismic shift in what it means to be an American citizen. I could not be further from the worldview of people like William Costic not only on the issue of guns, but also on what “rights” should be protected, and who gets to decide that. Yet, I have known people like him, and I sometimes despair of the widening chasm in our civic life between people like Mr. Costic and myself.

The fact that people can go to these town meetings, shout down the speakers, and then say it is their right to be “heard” in a democracy, seems bizarre to me. People don’t even know what they are talking about. For instance, I heard one protester berating his representative to keep the government away from my Medicare. Your Medicare comes from the government, dummy! Democracy relies on an informed public; that’s why the public education system is so vital to the health of a democracy. A democracy occurs when people can talk across their differences in a respectful manner. Democracy is not just about “being heard” but about hearing others as well.

Passing a meaningful health care reform bill will neither solve the dilemma nor end the tension. However, it raises again the fundamental questions about what it means to be citizens in a democracy, and even what a democracy truly is.

Democracy used to be defined by the old New England town hall meeting, where the citizens of the community would come together to discuss community issues, and then make decisions together. Today “democracy” has become a political weapon used to spread Western corporate interests around the globe. “Democracy” has become the media circus we have seen in these so called town hall meetings over the last month. Regardless of how the health care reform bill is resolved, the deeper questions remain as to what our “rights” are and should be, and what values and truths are worth fighting for, no matter how difficult and painful the struggle.

Resurrection Hope on Spring Garden Street

On Good Friday, April 10, about 100 people gathered near Colismo's Gun shop to commemorate the death of Jesus, and its connection to the countless meaningless deaths due to gun violence. Folks from all walks of life gathered to say that illegal guns and the straw purchasing that lets these guns onto the street needed to end. Several local preachers spoke, as well as two mothers who had lost their sons to gun violence. We were led in songs that spoke of hope. We prayed for the those who had died due to gun violence in the previous year by name. We were called to commitment and action to end this scourge. James Colisimo, the gun shop owner who had refused to sign the code of conduct that wold allow him to more readily identify straw buyers in his shop was called out by name to act. The shroud that hung on the cross was laid on a enlarged gun and coffin, saying death to the means of destruction not to more victims. We ended the service by marching in front of the gun shop, singing "Lord, Listen to your children praying", an enlarged version of the code of conduct being held in front of us. Four police officers stood in front of the shop, "protecting" Mr. Colismo from this spiritual onslaught.

Altogether it was an inspiring gathering, a sign of hope that the violence can end. This gathering had a feel and a color that was more diverse, and included not just concerned white folks like me (personally distant from the violence) and folks who were and have been on the front lines of this struggle for a long time. However, the presence of the mothers reminded me of (1) the struggle is a long one (these mothers had been speaking out since the early 1990's); and (2) the pain and suffering of those who have lost loved ones or been maimed by guns is also long. However, my prayer is that they found comfort and felt the hope I felt in that gathering.

On Good Friday, we stand in the face of Death, to anticipate Death's defeat. As the speaker that day, Bishop NewKirk of Harold O.Davis Memorial Baptist Church, said, just because guns are legal, when young people die needlessly, they are not moral. Like slavery, like the Native American Genocide, like the Japanese-American internment during WW II, selling guns to straw buyers is "legal" but not "moral." The instruments of death, by some twisted NRA, Second Amendment logic, are legal, but in this age when gun men kill 13 people in a Binghamton Immigration center, and 3 police officers in Pittsburgh, and 318 people in one year in Philadelphia; those guns may be legal, but they are not moral.

I believe the laws in PA will be changed to limit the sale of handguns to straw buyers - its only a matter of alot of effort and time. I believe the NRA can be revealed for the fraudulent front for the gun manufacturers that it is. I believe that gun dealers like Colismo's, that will not be accountable for their business will be exposed and disgraced. Hope is on the rise. Death will be defeated. This was the feeling and message with which I left the service that day. Indeed, there was hope of resurrection on Spring Garden St on Good Friday!

(Many thanks to Kemah Washington for his pictures of that day!)