![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/07/25/colorado-gun-sales-surge-after-james-holmes-dark-knight-rises-massacre/
This is the part that saddens me. The massacre in Aurora was the work of an isolated lunatic. Predictably, the US has coalesced around the idea that more guns and less restrictions on them will make people safer. It's insane and unsupported reasoning, but the NRA has so pervasively tainted the discussions on gun control that Americans simply will never enact anything close to sane restrictions. Support for gun control laws are at their lowest, and thanks to Citizens United, the firearms manufacturing industry has announced that it will explore options to support the NRA's ongoing campaigns against any meaningful control.
As I mentioned elsewhere, Al-Qaeda got it wrong. The best way they could have taken as many American lives as possible was to pour funding into the NRA.
However, the part that saddens me is the next theatre shooting isn't going to be another lunatic with a copycat bent. It will be a 'tragedy'; during a movie, someone will stand up to use the washroom at exactly the wrong time, when a loud noise goes off from the soundtrack or an usher trips against a metal mop bin and creates a jarring sound. That person may even have something in their hands that give it just the wrong silhouette in the darkness. And someone in their seats, rattled and expecting the worst, is going to start shooting at their target.
The press will report it as an unfortunate incident. The shooter will tearfully explain how they thought they were in danger and would never have threatened an innocent life if they'd known. If you're lucky, the only casualty will be the target, and not the girl who happens to be sitting near him, or worse, another armed person returning fire. The theatre will close, maybe the corporation owning it will suggest new restrictions, which the NRA will immediately challenge as an infringement of 2nd Amendment Rights, and once again, the fruitless debate will die on the vine.
That's the tragic part - that those deaths will ultimately mean nothing. They won't serve as a warning or a wake-up that the US's gun culture is out of control. It will be just more added to the tally which will continue to climb to fuel a business agenda.
EDIT: http://www.gq.com/news-politics/blogs/death-race/2012/07/nra-grades-and-congress.html - The NRA's control of your democracy. Enjoy.
This is the part that saddens me. The massacre in Aurora was the work of an isolated lunatic. Predictably, the US has coalesced around the idea that more guns and less restrictions on them will make people safer. It's insane and unsupported reasoning, but the NRA has so pervasively tainted the discussions on gun control that Americans simply will never enact anything close to sane restrictions. Support for gun control laws are at their lowest, and thanks to Citizens United, the firearms manufacturing industry has announced that it will explore options to support the NRA's ongoing campaigns against any meaningful control.
As I mentioned elsewhere, Al-Qaeda got it wrong. The best way they could have taken as many American lives as possible was to pour funding into the NRA.
However, the part that saddens me is the next theatre shooting isn't going to be another lunatic with a copycat bent. It will be a 'tragedy'; during a movie, someone will stand up to use the washroom at exactly the wrong time, when a loud noise goes off from the soundtrack or an usher trips against a metal mop bin and creates a jarring sound. That person may even have something in their hands that give it just the wrong silhouette in the darkness. And someone in their seats, rattled and expecting the worst, is going to start shooting at their target.
The press will report it as an unfortunate incident. The shooter will tearfully explain how they thought they were in danger and would never have threatened an innocent life if they'd known. If you're lucky, the only casualty will be the target, and not the girl who happens to be sitting near him, or worse, another armed person returning fire. The theatre will close, maybe the corporation owning it will suggest new restrictions, which the NRA will immediately challenge as an infringement of 2nd Amendment Rights, and once again, the fruitless debate will die on the vine.
That's the tragic part - that those deaths will ultimately mean nothing. They won't serve as a warning or a wake-up that the US's gun culture is out of control. It will be just more added to the tally which will continue to climb to fuel a business agenda.
EDIT: http://www.gq.com/news-politics/blogs/death-race/2012/07/nra-grades-and-congress.html - The NRA's control of your democracy. Enjoy.
