Accept the reality of mass shootings: this is what you wanted
By Mike McGann, Editor, The Times
Don’t bother sharing your “thoughts and prayers.”
The truth is, the slaughter of 49 innocent people in Orlando Sunday is exactly what you chose.
Just as you chose the slaughter in Charleston, Sandy Hook, Aurora and dozens more. You also choose the shootings in Coatesville which of late seem to be a monthly event.
Before you sputter in protest that you didn’t want anyone to get shot, you, a Republican majority in Chester County, have repeatedly voted for elected officials backed, cowed and funded by the National Rifle Association. They, in turn, have fought any limits on guns — Assault Weapons (oh, oops, in politically correct language, we must call them “long guns” rather than the more accurate “slaughter machines”), universal background checks and the like.
So, say what you want — but it’s just words. Your actions reveal your real opinion.
Don’t you dare mourn, offer prayers or condolences. You enabled this and need to own it. The blood is on your hands because this is the outcome you wanted.
And your sophisticated arguments such as “But, terrorism” are equally full of crap. The killer in Orlando was mentally disturbed, under FBI surveillance and expressed radical positions and had deep issues with gay people — but there was no way to stop him from stopping by his local shop and buying an AR-15 with an extended mag.
Before you spout off some laughable nonsense about Second Amendment Rights — just stop. It’s bad enough you’re lying to us, but, for God’s sake, stop lying to yourself.
The entire rights argument has been nothing but a big lie. Rights have never been threatened — never. Despite the claims that President Barack Obama was going to take your guns away, the past seven years have seen more guns sold than during any similar period in history. Estimates suggest that there are nearly 300 million guns in America.
This is now and has been for a generation about nothing more than money. When the gun industry backed a hostile takeover of the NRA in the late 1970s, it was about selling more guns, regardless of the consequences. Follow the money.
Its been about using fear as a profit center and you fell for it. A cottage industry of lobbyists, media types, lawyers and public relations’ people have sucked up to the gun rights lobby like remoras, and they, too, profit from death. Your politicians — from state legislators to Presidents — either don’t care or are afraid of the NRA and take their money and vote for their narrow agenda.
And you keep voting for them.
So, no, you don’t get to mourn. No. No.
If you had any intellectual honesty, you’d celebrate the victims as surrendering their lives for the cause of freedom, but maybe deep down you know what a load of rubbish that is.
The blood is on your hands. Live with it — that’s more than the 49 victims in Orlando can say, or for that matter the thousands of others who will die in the U.S. this year. Or, most likely, the teen boy whom probability suggests will be shot to death this summer in Coatesville, probably with a gun purchased through a loophole.
Be honest. Own it. This is what you chose.
Can you live with that?
* * *
Meanwhile, in Harrisburg: the Roman Catholic Church is strong-arming politicians to prevent an extension of the statute of limitations for child molesters and the institutions and organizations that protect them.
Despite the fact that the state House of Representatives passed the bill by large and bipartisan margin, the bill to extend the statute of limitations — needed because so many of the victims were kids at the time and have only come to terms with what happened to them many years later — seems likely to die in the state Senate, as the Church and Archbishop Charles Chaput have ramped up efforts to battle the bill.
Church leaders have gone so far to as have elected officials attacked in their own parishes — overtly political behavior that should be illegal given the church’s tax-exempt status.
Again, just to recap: the Roman Catholic Church is working to protect child molesters and restrict the rights of their victims, kids, molested by priests.
I come from a Roman Catholic family (my great uncle was a priest), but long ago found the many contradictions, sexism and cruelty of the church incompatible with the teachings of Jesus Christ. But were I still a member, this would be the end for me.
If you continue to attend mass, continue to send your kids to Catholic schools, you’re supporting child molesters over their victims — consider that this Sunday when you’re sitting in your pew feeling all holy. Or, maybe you can vote with your feet — stay away. Pull your kids out of school. Let them know why.
You could continue to do nothing. But just like with the gun issue, don’t express sadness for the victims. Don’t say how awful it is.
Because you are enabling it, you own it.
Can you live with that?
