Another Major Colorado Mass Shooting Reignites Gun Control Debate in America

Back in the spring of 1999, following the wave of shock in the aftermath of what then seemed to have stopped the nation in it's track - namely, the school shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado - it seemed like sensible gun control laws would come to fruition. The shock value was not quite on the level of the September 11th attacks which followed fairly shortly afterwards, but it actually was relatively close. Sometimes, it is difficult to remember such a time, when Americans were, in fact, truly and seriously and sincerely shocked by a mass shooting like that. Maybe it was that this happened in a very typical, suburban community, or maybe it was the scale of the horror (at the time, it was the worst school shooting in this nation's history). Maybe it was the fact that two otherwise seemingly normal teenagers, both just literally weeks away from graduating high school, actually worked together and plotted this attack for literally a year, sending clues that seemed rather obvious and quite alarming in retrospect. Maybe there were other factors involved, including one seriously injured kid being dragged out of a second story window, an image captured by news helicopters that were on the scene. Maybe it was how long it took the police to finally clear the building.  Who knows?

All I can tell you (or remind you, if you were old enough to remember that event) was that it did shock and horrify a suddenly morbidly fascinated nation. It seemed that, for about a week afterwards, the nation (and possibly the world) spoke of almost nothing else. Yes, it was that big of a news story.

If you told me then that mass shootings would become a kind of normal in the United States shortly thereafter, starting in fact that very year and continuing for literally decades to come, I think I would hardly have been the only one to be shocked and horrified by this. In fact, there likely would have been stunned disbelief. 

Yet, that is exactly what has come to pass. Mass shootings have become so normal, that we talk grimly about how the United States seems to be getting back to normal after the year of the coronavirus crisis once we get seven mass shootings in a span of a week in 2021. Indeed, this is the grim reality of the United States today, that we have collectively, shamefully come to view such ridiculous, absurd, senseless mass shootings as the new normal. 

Once again, we are shocked by the horrific headlines emerging from suburban Denver. This was the third major mass shooting in the Denver area that saw at least 10 or more people killed. The first was the Columbine school shooting, in the town of Littleton, in 1999. Then, 13 years later, there was the Aurora mass shooting in a theater, during the opening night of the new Batman movie. Now, nine years after that, we have yet another mass shooting in another part of the greater Denver area, in Boulder (which is, actually, a major city in an of itself). It was a pair of kids who were responsible for the school shooting in 1999. It was a man dressed as the Joker who was responsible in 2012. Now this time, it was a man in his early 20's who got picked on for having a Muslim name and indeed, being a Muslim, who was responsible for this mass shooting. 

Some right-wingers make a point of separating the shootings committed by Muslims, such as the one in San Bernardino, California a few years ago, or the one at the nightclub in Orlando, Florida in 2016, or now this one, as somehow quite different than other mass shootings. Why? Because when you put the word Muslim in front of the killer's motive, it seems especially sinister, somehow. More sinister, apparently, than some well-to-do nutcase amassing a huge arsenal of weaponry and then renting a strategic hotel room in a swanky Las Vegas hotel and then shooting up hundreds of people down below, who were attending a crowded concert. More sinister, somehow, than some lunatic going into a small church in Texas and killing 26 people shortly thereafter. More sinister than another troubled young man in Connecticut killing his mother and then going into the school where she worked and killing 20 little children and 6 staff members. More sinister than some teenager shooting up another high school in Florida, killing 18 people. More sinister than another troubled young man shooting 30 classmates at Virginia Tech. More sinister than some lunatic shooting up a political rally in the parking lot of an Arizona community some years ago. More sinister than another young white male going into a predominately black church in South Carolina and shooting nine people, apparently hoping that his actions would inspire other white supremacists and spark a civil war. 

Here, I should point out that I did no research on these older mass shootings. These were just by memory, because they were some of the most horrific and memorable mass shootings that temporarily grabbed headlines and sparked new gun control legislation debates - debates that ultimately went nowhere. And here we are now, yet again, after another mass shooting. The seventh mass shooting (defined as shootings in which there are four or more people killed at one time) in seven days, spread out across the United States. Other than the mass shooting in Atlanta last week, I cannot even tell you the other five mass shootings in between the one in Atlanta and this one in Colorado. And I could not even begin to tell you all of the mass shootings that I missed. Some are vaguely coming to mind, like the one at the naval base some years ago. Or the school shooting in Jonesboro, Arkansas, which actually preceded Columbine, and where again, two kids were responsible (they pulled a fire alarm and then shot kids who were standing around outside). There have been mass shootings in schools, in colleges, in offices, in post offices, in malls, in churches, in parks, in parking lots, at night clubs, on the streets and roadways. There have even been mass shootings at military bases. 

There have been racially motivated mass shootings, such as the one already mentioned by a young white male who went to a black church and killed nine unarmed people. Before taking him into the station, the police stopped at a Burger King, because the young man was hungry. There have been mass shootings directed against Jews, specifically, in Pittsburgh and Jersey City, just to name two off the top of my head. Different motivations, different places, but usually results that are similar enough. 

Year after year, we see more such mass shootings. What differs are the names and motivations of the shooters, the numbers of their victims, and the location of the shootings themselves. They have become so commonplace, that only the very deadliest ones really dominate our national headlines for any length of time. It almost seems like it is all about numbers. We really grow collectively morbidly fascinated once the carnage reaches in the teens and especially the twenties. Beyond that, it apparently well and truly qualifies as a major mass shooting that we should pay attention to, as if the others are just somehow less significant.

It may sound like I am approaching these with callous indifference, but I am not. I am calling it as I see how our American society seems to think of these things. A mass shooting which kills five or so people will hardly raise eyebrows nationally anymore, unless there is some unique circumstances involved. These days, to seriously get the attention of most Americans, it seems that we have to have 10 or more people dead.  

Once again, I have seen an article describing how another country, facing a similar problem, found a way to more or less resolve that problem. The specific article attached is about Australia, but there have been similar stories of countries successfully limiting, if not outright ending, mass shootings following horrific incidents. Because these kinds of incidents have happened in numerous other countries. Just off the top of my head (not doing any online research, in other words) I can remember major mass shootings in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, France, Germany, Norway, and the United Kingdom. Surely, I am forgetting at least one or two other countries, admittedly. But the point is this: you very, very rarely hear about multiple mass shootings in other countries. Only in the United States are such mass shootings considered part of the norm. Either they are doing something right, which we can learn from, or there is something about Americans, or American culture, that is truly different. But again, these mass shootings did happen in other countries, but those countries did something in response to them. Something more than offering mostly hollow "thoughts and prayers," in other words.

Apparently, this time may indeed be different. President Joe Biden is considering taking executive action on gun control, which goes beyond what any previous president has done. You can bet there will be a strong reaction, quite possibly a violent reaction. Would it even be surprising? After all, this is the United States, where violence seems to be accepted as somehow normal.

Personally, I do not even know what to say or think anymore. This just keeps happening, and it keeps happening here for a reason. Why is it that these incidents largely stopped, or at least were more or less contained, in other countries, but never, ever here? Many Americans - tens of millions, it seems - truly believe that the answer to ending gun violence is to bring even more guns into our society. You know, because that has worked so well to this point. If it were indeed true, then you would think that our American society, which has more guns than any other nation in the world, and where there are actually more guns than people (sadly, we are the only country in which this is true), would be the safest place in the world. 

Yet somehow, this is not the case. 

You might almost think given that fact, as well as the success that other countries had when they took these incidents seriously enough to actually enact common sense gun legislation, that perhaps some measure of gun control would work. So maybe Joe Biden will go ahead with some executive order on gun control, although if he does, it seems likely to me that this will in turn garner an all-too predictable violent response. 

It all feels so maddeningly familiar, so repetitive, like a broken record. We seem to get stuck with the same song and dance when it comes to the gun debate in this country. And I should point out here the famous line, about how the definition of insanity is to do the same thing, over and over, and expect different results. 

Below are the links to the two articles I used in writing this particular blog entry, which I hesitated to even write about. Indeed, few things are as frustrating or maddening to talk about on my end as the gun debate in America. It has become so repetitive, because we follow the same cycle, over and over again, to a problem that keeps recurring, over and over again. Little to nothing of any meaning has been done to address this problem in the past few decades, and I would be surprised if something were seriously done this time around. Even if Joe Biden does pursue executive action, in the very best case scenario, it will last exactly as long as it takes before we get another gun rights advocate (read, another NRA-sponsored Republican) in the White House to reverse this, possibly on day one of the new administration. But for what it is worth, the first link is how Australia addressed regular mass shootings and seemed to largely curtail them. The second link is about how there were seven mass shootings in seven days in the United States earlier this month. 

How Australia Ended Regular Mass Shootings: Gun Reforms After 1996 Massacre Could Be Model for U.S. by Democracy Now, March 24, 2021:  

https://www.democracynow.org/2021/3/24/australia_gun_violence_frank_smyth?fbclid=IwAR39-nts9XO-Wwzz7scUeiGgu-EfpMt3zATuw7m7pCGOFsk2QF83PFALLYg       

The Colorado attack is the 7th mass shooting in 7 days in the US By Josh Berlinger, CNN, March 23, 2021:

https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/23/us/7-mass-shootings-7-days-trnd/index.html