Woke up this morning to news of another mass shooting. I hate that we have become so accustomed to these incidents that the news really didn’t take over the media until it became known that this is the worst mass shooting in U.S. history–again. Thinking of all those who now have to struggle with the loss of their loved ones.
Updated 6/14/2016
Fortunately Lin-Manuel Miranda did not run out of words, and I hope he never will. If you didn’t see the Tonys on Sunday night, his first acceptance speech was a sonnet to his wife and son and to the victims of the Orlando shooting:
“My wife’s the reason anything gets done
She nudges me towards promise by degrees
She is a perfect symphony of one
Our son is her most beautiful reprise.
We chase the melodies that seem to find us
Until they’re finished songs and start to play
When senseless acts of tragedy remind us
That nothing here is promised, not one day.
This show is proof that history remembers
We lived through times when hate and fear seemed stronger;
We rise and fall and light from dying embers, remembrances that hope and love last longer
And love is love is love is love is love is love is love is love cannot be killed or swept aside.
I sing Vanessa’s symphony, Eliza tells her story
Now fill the world with music, love and pride.”
If you are so inclined, you can watch the live reading here.
I am done with moments of silence. If anything is to change, we need more noise, enough to make the NRA and other gun rights fetishists take notice instead of pivoting the conversation. If you wish to write to or call your representatives and senators in Congress, you can find contact details and a form letter here. I don’t think gun ownership needs to be prohibited to prevent the absurdly high incidences of accidental shootings by children and massacres like this–we just need better gun laws. The second amendment is quite specific in its wording–“well-regulated.” Nowhere does it say that everyone in the U.S. can and should have as large and sophisticated a personal arsenal as they can afford.
It is heartbreaking. And the fact that cultural attitudes toward gun control continue to be informed by fear-mongering lobbyists and not by facts is as depressing as it is infuriating.