Why the Boston Marathon bombing?
Why Newtown? Why Aurora? Why Virginia Tech? Why Tucson? Why Columbine or
Oklahoma City? Even if we understand why there may be a few solutions
that fall within our ethics, practices, and laws as western democracies,
but it is worth our effort to keep pursuing avenues while respecting
the limits we place on ourselves. That is the dilemma and search for the
right balance we now face.
The alternative is to become so
paralyzed by unacceptable solutions that we become tacitly willing to
accept these acts of terror and mass murder as the price we pay to
freely pursue our happiness. It appears we are inadvertently reacting
like the character in Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Slaughterhouse-five ,
accepting every horror of violence and tragedy with the mantra “… so it
goes.” We slap down any proposed solutions that fall short of a
cure-all, or we claim any solution is not worth the price in dollars and
restriction of our democratic rights.
Pinning blame to answer the question “why”
is the easy part. Immediately after Boston we looked for those to
blame... the FBI, the CIA, Russian intelligence for not giving us more
information. We know motivation of other perpetrators: anti government
paranoia, festering anger at childhood difficulties, parental mal
practice, social alienation, inability to assimilate, mental health
disease, a twisted Muslim or Christian preacher, perverting religious
beliefs to rationalize the killing of innocents and doctors, and
reaction to drone attacks and US invasions and occupations. There is no
one cure any more than there is one event or one cause that motivates
terrorists and mass killers.
There is one common thread that describes
the bombers and the shooters. They are young males. However, so long as
we subscribe to our Constitutionally guaranteed freedoms, we cannot put
all angry young males in shackles. We cannot assume that every young
man, Muslim, anarchist, or Neo Nazi, is a threat and preemptively deny
them rights without any proof they have concrete plans to act out their
aspirations.
Modern media brings unprecedented
attention to the horrific deeds and political and religious causes.
Media coverage serves as the gasoline fueling the perpetrators’
bonfires. We cannot ban media coverage. But we can continue to insist
that victims stories’, bravery of the responders, and a Boston Strong’s
resolve not to succumb to fear get equal time. It is the best way to
send a message that acts of violence are futile and counterproductive
tools to advance causes or to gain glory.
We cannot ban every weapon young men can
access or ingredients for bombs cooked up in their mom’s kitchen . . But
we can reduce the number of the incidents. We can make existing
barriers of access to weapons administratively more effective while
still honoring the second amendment. Failing in the Senate was an
amendment to provide greater access to mental health services and early
identification and intervention of potentially violent children and
individuals. That proposal should be revived.
We need to resist the temptation to
exploit the immigration debate by advocating banning all Muslims from
entry to the US. By perpetuating hatred and fear, we only incite more
home grown terrorists already here. We pride ourselves as being a
melting pot nation and it is in our national security interest to
resurrect those values. Case in point: the good relations Canadian
police had with the Muslim community resulted in tipping police, who
thwarted a train bombing last week.
Some solutions are indeed limited by
Constitutional constraints or by how some narrowly construe those
constraints. Expect acts of violence in the future. . and ‘so it goes’.
Nonetheless, other solutions are still worthy to pursue to limit the
carnage and the number of incidents.
The above is my column in the Sky Hi Daily News today
FOOTNOTE: The proposal by Colorado's Governor John Hickenlooper to beef up mental health centers and set up a hot line, one approach that would help identify and help with early identification and treatment of potential mass killers, is still wending its way in the state legislature (HB 1306). With Democrats controlling both houses, the chances are it will pass. However, even this approach has unified opposition from the GOP, with their voting against it at every opportunity. Their reasoning is that such legislation that would restrict guns to those with a mental health issue could discourage those people from seeking counseling, per the newspaper, The Colorado Statesman, April 26, 2013.
That is a lame argument if there ever was one since the bill would give greater chances for family members and friends to get potential mass killers into treatment. The alternative: "so it goes"...more Auroras and more Columbines than would otherwise would happen if the legislation passes.
