There is something incredibly wrong with the way we relate to guns in this country. I know this is a hot-button issue and maybe I have little education or right to an opinion. But, a blog is a bully pulpit of sorts, for anyone who will listen. Indulge me my little argument.
I grew up in a house with a stocked gun cabinet. My dad kept a gun beside his bed--a loaded gun--because (as Dad put it) what was the point of an unloaded gun? My English born brother-in-law and my American husband go target shooting on the 4th of July, just to celebrate their right to do it in the United States of America. I learned to shoot a .22 calibre rifle when I was 12. I didn’t like it much--it was loud and dirty and the kick hurt me. I’m a terrible shot, a fact that my father lamented almost often as my mother lamented my complete lack of skills in the kitchen. She failed to teach me how to cook--he failed to teach me how to shoot.
Lest my liberal friends ask me to turn in my bleeding-heart-liberal card, I must confess that there are no guns in my house today. As I said, I don’t enjoy shooting and I don’t desire to defend myself. It is possible I’ll regret it, but I feel safer without guns than with them. That being said, I never worried about the guns in my father’s house. He knew what he was doing and was taught to use and respect them by his father and grandfather.
However poor my target shooting, I did learn some important things about guns from my dad. I learned that they are serious, that they deserve your attention and respect, that you never point a gun at something you do not fully intend to shoot, that guns are for killing. I have plenty of friends who enjoy target shooting and hunting. I don’t begrudge them their leisure activity, any more than I expect them to be angry that I ride horses. But, just as my horse is intended to be ridden, guns are intended to shoot and kill. My dad taught me to be honest about guns. I think we’re missing that honesty and open dialogue today.
Now, this part may sound a little conservative--brace yourselves… I believe we are missing an honest relationship with firearms in this country. Kids learn about guns on t.v. and video games, and most of them have no context for them outside of that. They do not learn the deadly power of them at the side of their elders; they see them wielded by gangsters and cops. My father’s generation watched shoot-outs in westerns and then learned to hunt respectfully with their grandfathers. Kids were able to balance the fantasy of shooting the bad guys with the reality of watching an animal die at their own hand. Young people today watch crime movies and then go play Black Ops. They don’t hold a gun and realize its power until they pick one up in anger. The violent video games and the lack of exposure to the reality of firearms wield a double-edged sword of indifference to gun violence.
The gun lobbyists have done a huge disservice to this country, as well. Of course, “guns don’t kill people; people kill people” and of course a person can kill another person with a knife, a candlestick, or a noose. (I learned all of that playing Clue.) But, let’s be honest and call guns weapons. What other object designed solely to kill can be owned by an average citizen? I don’t see rocket launchers, bombs and tanks at Wal-Mart. There is a problem with violence in this country. Guns DO kill people, and to say they don’t trivializes the entire discussion.
We have lost our ability to have a conversation and retreated to separate political camps, reinforced by separate friends, separate magazines and separate t.v. news stations. We have forgotten how to live with neighbors who think differently from us and how to compromise for the common good. Just because I am upset by another shooting doesn’t mean I am going to make you turn in your guns. Just because I own guns does not mean I am uneducated, fearful, or building a private militia. To paraphrase, it isn’t the gun that’s the problem, it is the unreasonable fear and the inability to discuss it.
I don’t know what the answer is. I do know that my father would be shaking his head at the number of children killed by gun violence. I do believe that a person would not have to give up his private right to bear arms in order to make this country a little safer for school children. I do know that retreating to separate political camps and reinforcing opposite opinions is not helping this nation at all. Until we begin speaking respectfully to each other about issues and stop spouting thoughtless propaganda on social media, we will not find an answer at all.
