I guess I don’t understand the charm of handguns.
From the Chicago Tribune:
Two people were shot, one in the head in the Loop late Thursday as thousands of people streamed out of downtown after the city’s Fourth of July fireworks display and the Taste of the Chicago.
Both shootings occurred about 10:40 p.m. roughly a block apart, Chicago Fire Department spokesman Larry Langford said.
This is as good as time as any to reflect once again on the proliferation of guns in our society. The clock has only recently passed the midnight hour here in Chicagoland, and already two are dead.
I spoke with a local member of our police force yesterday evening. I asked him, informally, what he thought of last week’s Supreme Court decision striking down the ban on handguns in Washington, D.C. Did he think there should be more gun control?
He said, as I might have expected, that the current laws should be enforced.
And I agree.
The problem in our society is not that we have too many guns. It’s that we use them too many damn times. We need to control ourselves. We need to find more effective ways of handling conflict. We need to learn how to channel the rage we feel sometimes.
Yes, the answers lie in the schools, in the media, in the churches, in the family, in the neighborhoods, in congress, in state legislatures…, and many other places as well.
But the answer to gun violence begins the next time any one of us feels angry, and every time after that as well.