Highbrow Magazine - ban guns https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/ban-guns en Should Seniors Face Tighter Gun Controls? https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/5960-should-seniors-face-tighter-gun-controls <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Sun, 08/21/2016 - 16:20</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1seniorsguns.jpg?itok=OBI61Msa"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1seniorsguns.jpg?itok=OBI61Msa" width="480" height="360" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p><strong>From the <a href="http://www.silvercentury.org/polFeatures.cfm?doctype_code=Feature&amp;doc_id=4114#.V7n-RtQrKt-">Silver Century Foundation</a> and reprinted with permission by our content partner New America Media</strong>:</p> <p> </p> <p>Richard Swift grew up in the era of John Wayne and Gene Autry, cinematic cowboys whose armed antics drove his daydreams. He had a BB gun years before the first whiskers sprouted on his chin. At 12, he got a .22-caliber rifle that he’d lug around the hills and fields of his rural southeastern Pennsylvania burg, shooting targets and learning to hunt.</p> <p> </p> <p>“Mostly, I was just shooting things that were there, like a stick floating down the creek. I’d shoot bumblebees if they settled on a limb. I’m sure I made a few snakes disappear. Any kind of small, challenging target—it was about trying to hit what you were aiming at,” Swift reminisced.</p> <p> </p> <p>His fondness for firearms didn’t fade as he aged. As a young man, he joined the Delaware National Guard, his shooting skills so honed by then that he competed in marksmanship matches on the National Guard’s army rifle team. Later, as a banker, he armed himself for protection as he delivered cash between bank branches.</p> <p> </p> <p>He’s now 67 and retired, and those days are long behind him. He hasn’t carried a gun in years and doesn’t hunt anymore either, his age having robbed him of the stamina needed for stalking animals over arduous acreage. Still, he has no plans to dispose of the three pistols, two shotguns and three rifles (including that .22 he got as a kid) he has collected over his lifetime.</p> <p> </p> <p>“If you’ve collected and cherished something all your life, you’re hesitant to just get rid of them; there’s a sense of self that’s in that stuff, and you like the things you like to stay around you,” Swift said.</p> <p> </p> <p>Besides, he added, his guns make him feel safer “simply because of the environment and the way the world is changing.... I’m not as fast and agile and strong as I used to be, so I need an edge in case, God forbid, I encounter a depressed teenager or a religious zealot with a gun. I’m not the kind of person who will hide under a table listening to some crazy person reload his gun two or three times.”</p> <p> </p> <p>Swift is far from alone in the fact that his ardor for arms hasn’t abated with age.</p> <p> </p> <p>Older Americans have the highest gun ownership rates in the United States, with firearms in 40 percent of households headed by someone age 50 to 64 or age 65 and older, according to the Pew Research Center. And a disproportionate number of older Americans apply to carry concealed weapons, according to a 2012 study in the American Journal of Public Health. The reasons for such trends vary: older Americans tend to have more disposable income with which to buy guns; they’ve had a longer time to amass an arsenal; and many invest in arms as a way to counter the physical vulnerabilities that can come with aging.</p> <p> </p> <p>Whatever their reasons, the rate of older Americans with firearms is expected to rise as the population ages; the United States has 45 million residents age 65 or older, a demographic that’s likely to more than double by 2060, according to census takers.</p> <p> </p> <p>Such numbers have caught the attention of gun manufacturers and supporters. Constitution Arms, a New Jersey-based manufacturer, created a triggerless “Palm Pistol” specifically for older customers. The $1,350, single-shot firearm is “an adaptive aid intended for seniors, disabled or others with grip limitations due to hand strength, manual dexterity or phalangeal amputations,” according to the company’s website. And The Armed Senior Citizen, a monthly column in Concealed Carry Magazine, proved so popular, its author, Bruce Eimer, compiled the columns into an e-book covering such topics as “Bear Arms in a Wheelchair” and “Arthritis and Defensive Handgun Training.”</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Should Rights Outweigh Risks?</strong></p> <p> </p> <p>Still, some aren't as comfortable with the idea of so many older adults owning guns, considering certain risk factors that can accompany aging.</p> <p> </p> <p>“When I think about older adults and access to guns, the thing that immediately springs to mind is their incredibly high rates of suicide—and suicides from guns in particular. From a public health perspective, that’s a really big concern,” said Shannon Frattaroli, PhD, associate professor in the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.</p> <p> </p> <p><br /> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/1gunculture%20%28Toasty%20Ken%20Flickr%29.jpg" style="height:434px; width:650px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>Older adults generally have higher suicide rates than other age groups; nearly 10,200 Americans age 60 and up died from suicide in 2013, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). And while the incidence of major depression among older adults (estimated at 1 to 5 percent for those living independently) isn’t as high as other demographic groups, depression rates rise to 13.5 percent for those who require home healthcare and 11.5 percent for older hospital patients, according to the CDC.</p> <p> </p> <p>Other trends make suicide an alarming risk, especially for older men. While women have higher rates of mental disorders like depression and of suicide attempts, men are more successful at committing suicide than women, experts and statisticians agree. That’s largely because men (who are three times as likely as women to own guns) most often use guns to take their own lives, a quicker and more lethal method than the poisonings and pills women prefer, according to Scientific American.</p> <p> </p> <p>White men 85 and over are especially at risk: the CDC reports that that group commits suicide at four times the rate of the general population.</p> <p> </p> <p>Suicidal people can become homicidal, adding another layer of potential heartache to an already thorny issue. An elder-abuse and domestic-violence researcher studied 225 murder-suicides among couples with at least one partner age 60 or older for a 2007 paper published in the journal Clinical Interventions in Aging; the author found that firearms were most often used to carry out the violence in the cases she studied.</p> <p> </p> <p>“So much of the dialogue around guns in this country has been around crime, and lately, mass shootings. And the older population is not part of that. But when you look at the suicide issue, it’s impossible to ignore older Americans,” Frattaroli said. “With that in mind, any conversation about guns has to include a conversation [about] gun ownership among older adults. There’s definitely more to be done on that issue in the United States.”</p> <p> </p> <p>Beyond suicide and depression, another looming mental health issue worries experts when it comes to older adults with guns: dementia.</p> <p> </p> <p>One in three older Americans die of Alzheimer’s disease or some other dementia, according to the Alzheimer’s Association. So what if an older neighbor, relative or patient begins showing signs of diminishing mental capacities—and he or she has guns?</p> <p> </p> <p>“If someone has frontal lobe dementia, which impacts behavior, they could be at a greater risk of using that firearm to harm themselves or others as they misinterpret their environment,” said Cher Ann Kier, a licensed clinical social worker and geriatric mental health specialist affiliated with the University of Washington Northwest Geropsychiatric Center. “Dementia often causes feelings of paranoia and delusions, especially in the earlier stages when [patients] believe people are stealing from them—when in actuality, it is often that they misplaced an item or put it somewhere ‘safe’ but then can’t recall doing so. Impulsivity, behavioral dyscontrol and angry outbursts can all come on suddenly and without warning and could result in gun violence.”</p> <p> </p> <p>Physical challenges that accompany aging also can impede safe gun handling, from a loss of visual acuity, fine-motor dexterity and hand strength to decreased reaction time and impaired hearing, experts agree.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Read the rest <a href="http://www.silvercentury.org/polFeatures.cfm?doctype_code=Feature&amp;doc_id=4114#.V7n-RtQrKt-">here</a></strong>.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>From the <a href="http://www.silvercentury.org/polFeatures.cfm?doctype_code=Feature&amp;doc_id=4114#.V7n-RtQrKt-">Silver Century Foundation</a> and reprinted with permission by our content partner New America Media</strong></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/seniors" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">seniors</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-control" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun control</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/purchasing-guns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">purchasing guns</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-violence" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun violence</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/nra" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">NRA</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ban-guns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">ban guns</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Dana DiFilippo </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Google Images; Wikipedia Commons; toasty ken (Flickr)</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Sun, 21 Aug 2016 20:20:50 +0000 tara 7109 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/5960-should-seniors-face-tighter-gun-controls#comments Bring Back the Ban on Assault Weapons https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/5869-bring-back-ban-assault-weapons <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Wed, 06/15/2016 - 20:36</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumbanguns%20%28KeepSchoolsSafeDOTorg%29_1.jpg?itok=KS6-SdcD"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumbanguns%20%28KeepSchoolsSafeDOTorg%29_1.jpg?itok=KS6-SdcD" width="480" height="334" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p><strong>From our content partner <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2016/06/editorial-bring-back-the-assault-weapons-ban.php">New America Media</a></strong>:</p> <p> </p> <p>There are moments when as a member of the press we must leverage our collective voice, to push our nation’s leaders to act in the interest of the communities we serve. This is one of those moments.</p> <p> </p> <p>In the early morning of June 12, a gunman in Orlando, Florida entered a gay nightclub and massacred 49 people in what is the worst mass shooting in U.S. history.</p> <p> </p> <p>Most of the victims were still in the prime of their youth, individuals – many of them from the LGBTQ community – who represented the hopes and dreams of the diverse communities from which they came. Those dreams have now been cruelly snuffed out.</p> <p> </p> <p>As the <em>New York Times Editorial</em> board put it, the United States is the only nation where the term “mass shooting” is preceded by the phrase “yet another.”</p> <p> </p> <p>It need not be this way.</p> <p> </p> <p>FBI authorities had tracked Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old Afghan American born in New York, months before the attack. He was nevertheless able to purchase a cache of weaponry including an AR15, an assault style rifle carried by members of the U.S. military, in the week prior to his killing spree.</p> <p> </p> <p>The military-grade AR15 fires 800 rounds-per-minute or 13 rounds-per-second. The semi-automatic version carried by Mateen and other perpetrators of mass shootings has a magazine capacity of 30 rounds and can fire bullets as fast as the shooter can pull the trigger.</p> <p> </p> <p>Assault style weapons like the AR15 have but one purpose, which is to kill en masse. They have no place on America’s streets.</p> <p> </p> <p>Much has been made of Mateen’s professed allegiance to terror groups, his history of domestic violence, and his alleged homophobic leanings. All of these must be and indeed are being investigated as possible factors fueling his rampage.</p> <p> </p> <p>But what made the Orlando tragedy all too possible – in fact likely – was the ease with which guns like the AR15 are bought and sold in this country.</p> <p> </p> <p><br /> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/orlandoviolence_0.jpg" style="height:351px; width:625px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>Data show that up to a million AR15s are purchased every year by U.S. civilians. Estimates put the number of assault style weapons now in circulation as high as 8 million. A reporter in Philadelphia chronicled her experience in acquiring an AR15, noting it took all of 7 minutes between when she showed her driver’s license, passed her background check and walked out gun in hand.</p> <p> </p> <p>Prior to Orlando, the AR15 – which the NRA has dubbed “America’s Gun” – was used by shooters in San Bernardino, California (14 dead, 22 wounded); Newtown, Connecticut (26 dead, 2 wounded); and Aurora, Colorado (12 dead, 70 wounded).</p> <p> </p> <p>“We have to make it harder for people who want to kill Americans to get their hands on weapons of war that let them kill dozens of innocents,” said President Obama in televised remarks Tuesday. The president angrily noted that individuals who can be placed on a no-fly list are able to purchase the kind of weaponry one normally associates with a war zone.</p> <p> </p> <p>While an assault weapons ban will not prevent future tragedies, and while it will not address the daily violence that is a tragic hallmark for far too many Americans, it will help begin to turn the bloody tide of mass shootings that is all too quickly becoming the norm in this country.</p> <p> </p> <p>Such bans already exist in California and several other states, though the lack of similar bans in neighboring states undermines efforts to curb their presence.</p> <p> </p> <p>Which is why action is needed at the federal level.</p> <p> </p> <p>Already leaders in Congress, including California Democrat Dianne Feinstein, are beginning to call for a return of the 1994 ban on assault weapons sales that was allowed to expire in 2004.</p> <p> </p> <p>New America Media, which for more than two decades has worked with ethnic media to highlight the issues most important to America’s diverse communities, supports these efforts. We call on our leaders in Washington on both sides of the political aisle to come together and act now to pass sensible gun control legislation that removes these weapons of terror from our streets.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>From our content partner <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2016/06/editorial-bring-back-the-assault-weapons-ban.php">New America Media</a></strong></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/assault-weapons" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">assault weapons</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/orlando" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">orlando</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/orlando-shootings" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">orlando shootings</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ban-guns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">ban guns</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/congress" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">congress</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">The Editors</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">New America Media; Google Images</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Thu, 16 Jun 2016 00:36:02 +0000 tara 6989 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/5869-bring-back-ban-assault-weapons#comments Reflecting on Boston and the Need for Stricter Gun Control https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/2443-reflecting-boston-and-need-stricter-gun-control <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 10:47</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumguncontrol%20%28Slowking%20Wiki%29.jpg?itok=kBO2VE5m"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumguncontrol%20%28Slowking%20Wiki%29.jpg?itok=kBO2VE5m" width="480" height="360" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p> <strong>Opinion: </strong></p> <p>  </p> <p> On the morning of Thursday, April 18<sup>th</sup>, I read the day’s headlines over breakfast and saw to my disbelief that the gun control bill expanding background checks had been defeated by certain senators, despite being supported by 90 percent of Americans. Though I live in Cambridge, Massachusetts, a very safe and gun-free city neighboring Boston, this total failure to do the bare minimum for gun safety sickened me.</p> <p>  </p> <p> I didn’t know any victims of gun violence myself, but I did know that more than 30,000 Americans are killed every year by guns. After seeing my city recently come together so passionately to mourn the three people killed in the Marathon bombing that Monday, I couldn’t help but wonder why more people – especially the senators who voted against universal background checks – weren’t equally affected by these other 30,000 unnecessary deaths. All I could do was shake my head and shrug, close my laptop and head to work.</p> <p>  </p> <p> During my lunch hour that day, I had an appointment to get my own criminal background check. I’d been in the process of becoming a volunteer at the public library to teach a small ESL class on weeknights. After showing someone my license and filling out a piece of paperwork, I was finished. The friendly HR director told me it could take anywhere from two days to two weeks for the results to come back, and then I could start teaching my class. Though I didn't mind the mild inconvenience, I felt a nagging annoyance on my way back to work. If I was required to get a background check and waiting period to simply volunteer, why weren't those buying assault rifles required to do the same? I wrote a passive-aggressive Facebook status about the irony of it all, and felt that I had done a service. But by the time I got back to work, checked my emails and got a coffee, I had probably let it go.</p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/mediumbanguns%20%28KeepSchoolsSafeDOTorg%29_1.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 417px;" /></p> <p>  </p> <p> Later that night, I was woken up by the sound of one of my roommates crying in the hallway. Dazed, I got up to see what was wrong. When I was told, I thought I must’ve still been half asleep. I was sure there was some mistake – things like this didn’t happen on everyday work nights, to nice girls like us, in neighborhoods like ours.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Sean Collier was the MIT police officer who was shot by Tamerlan Tsarnaev that night. He was also my roommate's fellow worker at MIT, her kickball teammate, and a beloved friend. Without a second thought, we threw on sweatshirts and drove our roommate to the Mass General emergency room; through the maze of police cars and blocked roads, we were unaware that Sean’s situation had anything to do with the Marathon bombers, or that we were essentially driving through a manhunt.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Though earlier that day I thought I was properly angry or annoyed about the lack of gun control in our country, those earlier emotions were nothing compared to the numb awareness I felt during that night’s car ride, silently navigating through red and blue flashing lights, unable to say or do anything other than hand my friend every tissue I had on me. I was only an observer of a tragedy, but there were real victims out there, and also sitting right there next to me. And those affected must feel more helplessness than anything I am able to imagine – an anger and disbelief which you can’t shrug off and just let go.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p> <em>Kimberley</em><em> Tolleson, a contributing writer at</em> Highbrow Magazine, <em>is author of the Literary Flashback column.</em></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/boston-bombers" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">boston bombers</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/boston-bombings" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">boston bombings</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-control" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun control</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/need-gun-control" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">need for gun control</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ban-guns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">ban guns</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/senate-and-gun-control" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">senate and gun control</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/background-checks" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">background checks</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kimberly Tolleson</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Fri, 17 May 2013 14:47:30 +0000 tara 2872 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/2443-reflecting-boston-and-need-stricter-gun-control#comments Gun Violence Survivors Speak Out Against Lack of Strict Gun Control Laws https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/2335-gun-violence-survivors-speak-out-against-lack-strict-gun-control-laws <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Wed, 04/10/2013 - 09:29</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumbanguns%20%28KeepSchoolsSafeDOTorg%29_0.jpg?itok=M9hKNaET"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumbanguns%20%28KeepSchoolsSafeDOTorg%29_0.jpg?itok=M9hKNaET" width="480" height="334" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p> From <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2013/04/time-moves-slowly-for-gun-violence-survivors.php">New America Media</a> and <a href="http://www.louisianaweekly.com/">Louisiana Weekly</a>:</p> <p>  </p> <p> Ismail Watkins was on his way to see his son when he was shot in the neck. He was walking down the front porch steps of a house near Lincoln Road in Northeast Washington, D.C., when a guy came up behind him and said, “Give it up.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Watkins, who thought it was a cousin or friend joking with him, started to turn around but did not get very far before he heard and felt the gunshot. His whole back locked up.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “I felt like I was in the matrix,” Watkins said. “And I got real numb.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> He remembers everything that happened as he was laid on the ground. A friend’s father took off his shirt and pressed it tightly against his skin to stop the blood gushing from Watkin’s neck. His cousin, who was with him, kept telling him, “You gon’ be alright.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Watkins remembers thinking, “Let me just get to the hospital.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> He was taken to Washington Hospital Center, where he remained for 18 days before he was transferred to MedStar National Rehabilitation Hospital. He was paralyzed. “I was messed up,” Watkins said.</p> <p>  </p> <p> He will never forget that day. It was March 6, 1998. Just two days earlier, Watkins had been set to start a new job working in the stockroom at Hank’s Warehouse.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “Why did this happen when I’m about to be on the right path?” he recalls thinking at the time.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The National Rehabilitation Hospital where Watkins was sent hosts a weekly support group, called the Urban Re-Entry Group where gun violence victims can share their experiences and support each other as they transition back to their lives.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Even though he now seeks therapy at the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore, Watkins has been attending the support group for 15 years and is still a regular attendee. The group includes patients who have been disabled for over a decade, and those who have been hospitalized for months. With the current national debate on gun control and gun violence, members of the group say that survivors of gun violence are often not considered.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “They really forgot about the people that survived,” said one member who goes by the nickname Uni. Uni has been in a wheelchair for 13 years. “If you don’t advocate for yourself, they don’t give a f—,” said Uni. “People don’t know what we gotta go through when we wake up in the morning.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> The group members discuss the difficulties they go through daily like bathing, using the bathroom and transportation. They gripe about D.C. sidewalks without ramps for wheelchairs.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “When you want something, that’s when it will hit you. When you want a drink of water or want to get some food,” said Earl Council. “But I try everything before I call my wife or my kids.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Several of the members say that they are regularly in pain. Watkins said he dreams about walking again.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Alfonzo Moore, who has been in a wheelchair for one year, still has a hard time accepting his situation. “Sometimes,” he said. “I wish I was gone.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> The group members who have been in the wheelchair longer, including Watkins, tend to have a different perspective.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “It gets stressful sometimes but you gotta keep going,” Watkins said. “Keep smiling. I don’t even get mad anymore.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Said Uni: “I don’t use the word can’t. I know I can do it. I’mma try.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> One thing all of the group members do agree about is the uselessness of current debates on new gun control laws. Since the December school shooting in Newtown, Conn., gun control has been at the top of the White House agenda and at the center of media discussions, including a proposed ban on military-style assault weapons and universal background checks for firearms purchases.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “Gun violence ain’t gonna stop,” Moore said. “Criminals will get guns regardless. People who carry guns don’t care about no license.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/2banguns.jpg" style="width: 500px; height: 279px;" /></p> <p>  </p> <p> There is bitterness and anger among some in the group, a feeling that the toll of gun violence did not matter in the United States when the bodies suffering where largely those of black males.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “None of this was going on when we were getting shot,” Uni said. “They didn’t say anything until these white kids got shot.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Watkins said that gun violence has been a problem his whole life. He estimates that between 200 and 300 people were killed by guns in his Northeast neighborhood off of North Capital Street and Rhode Island Avenue when he was growing up.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “On New Year’s people used to be like, who’s the first one getting killed?” he said.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Watkins said one of the hardest things about being a gun violence survivor is the stereotypes people attach to him. People automatically think that he is a thug or involved with the drug world.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Watkins was shot during a robbery by someone he knew. The gunman was identified by a woman who lived in a house next to the one where Watkins was shot. Watkins said the shooter’s family visited him in the hospital in the days following the shooting, but he never revealed to them that their relative was responsible for him being there.</p> <p>  </p> <p> According to Watkins, the shooter was eventually killed while in prison for another offense.</p> <p>  </p> <p> However, before his death, Watkins had his cousin—who was serving time at the same prison as the shooter—show him pictures of Watkins taking a few steps with his walker.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “That was my revenge,” Watkins said. “I wanted to let him know, you can’t hold me down.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> <em>This article originally published in the April 8, 2013 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.</em></p> <p>  </p> <p> <a href="http://www.louisianaweekly.com/">Louisiana Weekly</a></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-violence" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun violence</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ban-guns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">ban guns</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-violence-survivors" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun violence survivors</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-control" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun control</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-control-laws" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun control laws</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/newton-connecticut" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">newton connecticut</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/obama" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Obama</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/obama-administration" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Obama administration</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-lobby" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun lobby</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Amber Ravenell</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">New America Media</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Wed, 10 Apr 2013 13:29:14 +0000 tara 2660 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/2335-gun-violence-survivors-speak-out-against-lack-strict-gun-control-laws#comments A Country's Sympathy: Lessons Learned From the Tragedy in Newtown https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1922-countrys-sympathy-lessons-learned-tragedy-newtown <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Mon, 01/07/2013 - 10:02</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumconntragedy%20%28AFP%29_0.jpg?itok=RLRuHmKu"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumconntragedy%20%28AFP%29_0.jpg?itok=RLRuHmKu" width="480" height="295" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p>  </p> <p> <strong>Commentary</strong></p> <p>  </p> <p> In the past few weeks, there has been a vast spectrum of reactions to the shooting in Newtown, Conn. Some people responded quickly with acts of generosity and kindness, sending flowers and coffee and stuffed animals to Newtown; others offered their sympathies through Facebook and Twitter; and still others looked on in silent shock. It is not overstating things to say that this horrible tragedy—which left 20 children and eight adults, including the shooter, dead—has swept through America and touched every single citizen of this country. The tragedy has had the effect of an electrical current, and each and every American has felt some volts pass through them. For some, it was only a few volts. For others, it was galvanic, and everything since that fateful Friday has existed in a surreal state of aftermath. If we take the time to truly look at the heterogeneous grieving process of Americans to this unfathomable tragedy, we might find an opportunity to learn and grow as a country.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The first group of mourners expresses that passing, depthless shock, as if they are cognitively blindsided but remain emotionally apart from the tragedy. They express disbelief—again only an admission that their cognition is perplexed and disoriented by something so out of the ordinary—but never connect that shock and awe to sincere, vulnerable emotional inroads. Their routine is minimally disrupted, if at all; their attitude and dialogue are pierced for a moment or two, but not substantially altered; and they are emotionally and ideologically unchanged. This group restricts their response to the tragedy, their "grieving," to the initial cognitive impact. The slaughter of children and faculty at a quiet elementary school is shocking and appalling. End of story.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The second group feels the volts running through them as an activating agent, a catalyst for change. These are the bloggers who immediately publish posts calling for a ban on semiautomatic weapons; the Facebook users that post exasperated calls for gun control, as if they have been publicly vying for new legislation for years.  They are the journalists, columnists, and commentators who immediately attack politicians, lobbyists, and the organizations that allegedly collude with them. In short, this group politicizes the tragedy. But contrary to a popular assumption, most of them are not seeing the event in these terms for political gain. "Political gain" is one of those rhetorical counterpunches, like "class warfare," that is stretched far beyond its useful merits in public dialogue.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Those journalists and Twitter and Facebook users do not have a surreptitious agenda when they see an unspeakable mass shooting, made possible by a military grade .223 caliber rifle, and call for political action. They are simply thinking pragmatically. They immediately assess the causality of the event, which goes something like this: This killing spree was only possible because the killer lives in a country where powerful automatic weapons with large magazines are available to almost anybody; without that environment and unique combination of freedom and accessibility, this simply would not have happened. These people are the pragmatic sympathizers. They are not content to passively commiserate and abstractly wonder, out loud or in thought, if things could be different in their country. They fundamentally believe that a human reaction must be concrete and tangible, especially when it is a reaction to such calamity and horror.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Then there is the third group that feels the current of human suffering pass through them. This group is perhaps the most poetic, the most soulful. When they heard about the shootings in Newtown, their reaction was not restricted to the cognitive sphere, nor was it immediately transferred into action and the desire for change. They heard about the little children, teachers, principal, and school psychologist, and let the reality, the absoluteness of it all sink in. This is the distinguishing quality of their sympathetic nature: they are patient and do not rush to solipsize the event, either as a cognitive object or a call to arms. They try to accept and conceive of the event as a reality autonomous from their own. They actually try to imagine the horror that has befallen the Connecticut town; they consider deeply what the families of the victims are going through. They open themselves up emotionally, willingly imagining that it was their child, their sister, their mother at Sandy Hook Elementary School. This is, of course, what it means to feel compassion and empathy.</p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/mediumbanguns%20%28KeepSchoolsSafeDOTorg%29_0.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 417px;" /></p> <p>  </p> <p> But how often do we really stop and think about what is behind these emotions, which rarely crop up in contemporary culture? Empathy requires that we use patience and imagination to actually fathom the suffering of another person.  This is one of the higher forms of sympathy, because it is an earnest attempt to behold the consciousness of another person. The horrible irony of such a thing, though, is that although we believe we are thinking compassionately and selflessly, we still remain in the comfort and convenience of our own minds. We are still to some dangerously selfish extent solipsizing the tragedy and losing grip of its excruciatingly painful reality <em>outside</em> of our own minds.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The tragedy in Newtown should provide a lesson in sympathy to us all. No matter what we feel and how we choose to handle those feelings, we should at least know that, theoretically, we have a responsibility to others, and that responsibility can inform and inspire the inchoate sympathies we all feel at one time or another in our lives.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Let's start with this simple maxim: Everything we do in our lives is implicitly self-serving until it explicitly is not. In other words, all the emotion, grief, and compassion we feel, and the attempts we make to imagine the anguish of the victimized families, are only self-serving thoughts and actions until we commit a concretely selfless act. We are capable of experiencing the gamut of emotion, an internalized histrionic theater. We could feel existential terror from realizing that if this happened in Newtown, Connecticut, then it can happen anywhere; burning indignation from accepting that Adam Lanza will never stand trial for his crimes; or vicarious heartbreak when we consider that many parents have been forced to bury their children in the days following the tragedy.</p> <p>  </p> <p> But in these forms, sympathy is completely ethereal, no more substantial than a daydream or a fleeting reminiscence. As much as these thoughts <em>feel</em> noble, they require nothing of the thinker, and fail to accept the realities outside of one's own consciousness. Because once we accept those realities—of the inconsolable parent who must wake up every morning knowing that her child will never come back, the father who remembers, over and over, how kind and generous his daughter was, and the mother who wonders if she will someday see her son in heaven—then we must also accept our responsibility to them.</p> <p>  </p> <p> We become selfless through actions, not thoughts. For all the different thoughts that can run through our minds after a tragedy like the one in Newtown, so there are just as many actions that can be carried out. Americans that live nearby can drive to Newtown, pay their respects, and contribute to one of the many kindhearted memorials that have been started throughout the town’s thoroughfare. They can make a concrete ideological change in their lives by giving up their guns through a local buyback program. Or they can give money to the various Newtown funds that are providing assistance to the bereaved families and planning to build a permanent memorial in the town. Imagine if every single American put just one dollar toward the cause of creating a memorial for the 26 victims shot down in Sandy Hook Elementary School. That amounts to more than 310 million dollars. Some of the more utilitarian-minded people might find fault with this sort of investment, believing that 300 million dollars could be put to better, more functional use. But in times like these we come together not as fellow citizens under the auspices of the same government, or at the mercy of the same economy. We do not act because we are beholden. We act because we feel compassion, that gossamer emotion that is nearly indiscernible in the myopic march of autonomous lives. Compassion is not some superfluous evolutionary digression, like a second kidney in a genome’s search for symmetry. It is central to the meaning of life. But if it is left only as a thought, a wilting dream in our minds sustained by the alluring chimera of sanctimony, then we will have betrayed it.</p> <p>  </p> <p> In Newtown we find a compelling opportunity to distinguish between the kind of sympathy that matters and that which does not. To quote John Donne, when the bell tolls in Newtown, it tolls for thee. Those empathic feelings deep inside of us affirm this. Those sensations are assured by human nature. What we do with them, however, is up to us.</p> <p> <strong>Author Bio:</strong><br /> <em>Mike Mariani is a contributing writer at</em> Highbrow Magazine.</p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/newton" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">newton</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/connecticut" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Connecticut</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/adam-lanza" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">adam lanza</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-control" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun control</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-violence" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun violence</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ban-guns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">ban guns</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/obama" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Obama</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/assault-weapons" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">assault weapons</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Mike Mariani</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">AFP</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Mon, 07 Jan 2013 15:02:35 +0000 tara 2148 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1922-countrys-sympathy-lessons-learned-tragedy-newtown#comments How Social Media Reacted to the Tragedy in Newton, Conn. https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1892-how-social-media-reacted-tragedy-newton-conn <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/media" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Media</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Thu, 12/27/2012 - 13:36</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumconntragedy%20%28AFP%29.jpg?itok=U1lgc3OR"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumconntragedy%20%28AFP%29.jpg?itok=U1lgc3OR" width="480" height="295" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p>  </p> <p> <em> I've been a writer and commentator for 20 years and have published from </em>NY Times<em> to </em>Mother Jones<em> to </em>LA Magazine<em>, but words failed me when I heard news of the horrific massacre that took place in Newtown, Connecticut, leaving 28 people dead, 20 of them children. <br /> <br /> The conversation on social media has been mostly about guns and gun control. So I am reposting what friends are posting on Facebook.</em></p> <p> <br /> <br /> "Too many innocent people have died over the "right to keep and bear arms". The language of the second amendment states, "A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed". Ok, so this right was intended for an individual or militia to aid the military in case of defense. I haven't seen one news story about this right being used in such a manner. Seems like one reason we preserve this right is because irrational fear by gun owners. Well, if the gun owner has such irrational fear, then we can also argue some mental instability and cognitive dissonance, which should disqualify them from ownership in the first place. Then we have those who preserve this right because it is an “American Tradition”. So what if it’s an American Tradition. Slavery, indentured servants, and women’s suffrage were all American Traditions that were abolished for clearly being against the greater good. It's time for a constitutional upgrade.."<br /> <br /> <br /> "I think a moderate gun-owner's organization could poach membership from the NRA, and also pick up people who own guns but aren't NRA members. It might well lobby against cities' attempts to ban handguns, as clear violations of the 2nd amendment. It would NOT lobby against restrictions on assault rifles, or any other astonishingly sensible gun control measure."</p> <p> <br /> <br /> "If you don’t want to propagate more mass murders, don’t start the story with sirens blaring. Don’t have photographs of the killer. Don’t make this 24-7 coverage. Do everything you can to not make the body-count the lead story, not to make the killer some kind of anti-hero. DO localize the story to the affected community and make it as boring as possible in every other market. Because every time we have intense saturation coverage of a mass murder, we expect to see one or two more within a week."</p> <p> <br /> <br /> "There have been a ridiculous number of random public shootings this year-3 or 4 times the usual number. If I were a paranoid conspiracy theorist i would think that the government was staging these to take away guns from private citizens. Seriously, there has been a shooting every 15-30 days. Why so many more than in previous years?"</p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/mediumbanguns%20%28KeepSchoolsSafeDOTorg%29.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 417px;" /><br />  </p> <p> ‎"If roads were collapsing all across the United States, killing dozens of drivers, we would surely see that as a moment to talk about what we could do to keep roads from collapsing. If terrorists were detonating bombs in port after port, you can be sure Congress would be working to upgrade the nation’s security measures. If a plague was ripping through communities, public-health officials would be working feverishly to contain it. </p> <p> <br /> <br /> "Only with gun violence do we respond to repeated tragedies by saying that mourning is acceptable but discussing how to prevent more tragedies is not. But that’s unacceptable. As others have observed, talking about how to stop mass shootings in the aftermath of a string of mass shootings isn’t “too soon.” It’s much too late."</p> <p> <br /> <br /> ‎"Guns don't attack children; psychopaths and sadists do. But guns uniquely allow a psychopath to wreak death and devastation on such a large scale so quickly and easily. America is the only country in which this happens again -- and again and again."</p> <p> <br /> <br /> "More than mental health issues, more than a culture of violence, it's the type of weapon used that is the difference between life and death. Guns are extremely lethal, meant for killing. They should be under extreme regulation..."</p> <p> <br /> <br /> <br /> "I'm seeing FB friends posting their shock at how this is possible in America -- that we're a better people, a better country than this. </p> <p> <br /> <br /> I understand this reaction, but I think we also have to get real: As much as we want to think of the U.S. as exceptional -- and yes, there are many ways in which we are -- there are things about this nation, this nation we love and love to celebrate, that are horribly and INCOMPREHENSIBLY backwards. </p> <p> <br /> <br /> One of them is our f-----g obsession with guns, and the vast, vile lobbying industry that has sprung up around it. These are America, at our least beautiful. When will we simply say...enough?"</p> <p> <br /> <br /> "I am saddened again by the American two gun society. I can hear the NRA already...it’s not guns that kill children, it’s children who kill children...or if all the teachers and students had freer access to guns, they would have nailed the shooter before he killed so many...I mourn these children and all the children who are falling though the cracks of our very violent two gun society, and endlessly warring world.."</p> <p> <br /> <br /> "Twenty-two children injured [in China by a knife wielding assailant]. Versus, at current count, 18 little children and nine other people shot dead. That's the difference between a knife and a gun.</p> <p> <br /> <br /> ...For parents, siblings, and families whose lives have been forever changed (or ended), deepest sympathies. For us as a nation .... I don't know what to say."</p> <p>  </p> <p> <strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p> <em>New America Media editor Andrew Lam is the author of "Perfume Dreams: Reflections on the Vietnamese Diaspora" (Heyday Books, 2005), which recently won a Pen American "Beyond the Margins" award and "East Eats West: Writing in Two Hemispheres." His next book, "Birds of Paradise Lost" is due out in 2013. He has lectured and read his work widely at many universities.</em></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/newton-connecticut" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">newton connecticut</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/adam-lanza" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">adam lanza</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-control" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun control</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ban-guns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">ban guns</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/massacre-newton-connecticut" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">massacre in newton connecticut</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/nra" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">NRA</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-violence" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun violence</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Andrew Lam</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">AFP</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Thu, 27 Dec 2012 18:36:43 +0000 tara 2104 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1892-how-social-media-reacted-tragedy-newton-conn#comments Stop the Insanity: It’s Time to Ban Guns and End the Violence https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1862-stop-insanity-its-time-ban-guns-and-end-violence <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Tue, 12/18/2012 - 10:19</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumbanguns%20%28KeepSchoolsSafeDOTorg%29.jpg?itok=f9ppQR2V"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumbanguns%20%28KeepSchoolsSafeDOTorg%29.jpg?itok=f9ppQR2V" width="480" height="334" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p> From <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2012/12/sandy-hook-school-massacre-presents-fresh-challenge-to-president-obama.php">New America Media</a>:</p> <p>  </p> <p> A compassionate and tearful President Obama minced no words following the Sandy Hook, Connecticut school massacre and demanded action. Though Obama did not specify what action he had in mind, the action that has and will again spark colossal debate is how to crack down on the manic and senseless gun violence that has caused indescribable pain and suffering for so many victims, and now those victims are the innocent of innocents, elementary school children, their teachers, and their grieving parents, relatives, and friends.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The usual suspects were quick to pounce with their by now silly and facile, “guns don’t kill, people kill” pap line. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who has long loudly called for Obama and Congress to enact new and tougher gun control laws, quickly jumped back into the gun control fray and made the same call again. As the names and faces of the children and the others gunned down in the horrific school massacre become known, a legion of voices will also demand that gun control be shoved back on the White House and congressional table. This is where things again will get thorny.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The assumption is that the NRA and the gun lobby is so all powerful, and financially well-heeled, that it can beat back any congressional move to impose tougher restrictions on gun access. It’s certainly done a masterful job at that. The NRA did not issue an official statement on the massacre, other than a terse one liner that it would wait until all the facts are in. But that didn’t stop other gun control opponents who worked the blogs and websites vociferously denouncing calls for tougher gun laws, and geared up for a round of talk show appearances to tout their view.</p> <p>  </p> <p> But the NRA’s money, political clout, and the saber rattle of gun control opponents is only part of the reason that tougher gun control laws, no matter how many heartbreaking massacres occur, face a hard uphill climb. The tipoff on that came during the recent presidential election. Obama and Romney were briefly challenged by Bloomberg and gun control advocates to advocate and propose new gun curbs. This was prompted by the Aurora, Colorado theater massacre. They demurred. The issue quickly dropped off the political radar scope. The reason for the dodge had nothing to do with Romney’s well-known NRA membership and opposition to tougher gun control laws. Nor did it have anything to do with Obama’s seeing the issue as an unnecessary wave of the red flag in front of millions of gun owners in what was then thought to be a potentially close presidential reelection battle.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/MediumObamaPhoto_4.jpg" style="width: 500px; height: 334px;" /></p> <p>  </p> <p> Both simply recognized that gun ownership is a fact of American life and a rigidly protected constitutional right. During his stint in the Illinois legislature, Obama’s major concern was cracking down on illegal gun sales, and the spread of and access to semi-automatic weapons. This does little to keep guns out of the hands of loose screws such as alleged Aurora shooter James Holmes and Sandy Hook school shooter Adam Lanza. In the White House Obama has simply followed the precedent of nearly all presidents and that’s to leave tougher restrictions on gun sales and trafficking to the states. Some states have passed laws that ban assault guns and high-capacity ammunition magazines, limit the number of gun sales, require child safety locks on new guns, and outlaw the sale of cheap handguns.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The huge drawback to the state-by-state gun action is that it does not significantly limit the massive trafficking in guns across state lines. It also doesn’t begin to address the question of how to identify and then prevent the legions of human ticking time bombs that do not have a criminal record and for all intents and purposes appear to be normal functioning individuals from legally purchasing and even stockpiling weapons, and that includes weapons of mass destruction. Ultimately only Congress can pass a uniform federal standard to restrict the manufacture, sale and transport of guns.</p> <p>  </p> <p> This is where the fight begins and unfortunately has quickly ended. The first ending was Congress’ failure to reauthorize the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban which expired in 2004. Congress has been virtually mute on any gun curbs in the years since then. This did not mean that gun control bills weren’t written and introduced. They were in every Congress session. But not one piece of gun control legislation made it to the House floor. The 112th Congress was no different. None of the proposed gun control curbs even made it out of a house committee.</p> <p>  </p> <p> This in no way means that gun control curbs are dead in the water in perpetuity in Congress. Obama has called tougher gun control laws “common sense.” This signals that if there is enough public outcry and push that one or more of the gun control measures could finally make it out of a house or senate committee. Obama is not running for re-election and does not have to look nervously over his shoulder and worry about enraged gun owners raking him over the coals for putting his White House muscle behind one of the bills.</p> <p>  </p> <p> That and the eventual passage of fresh gun restrictions would at least send the right signal that the gun lobby is not invincible and that millions of Americans want and demand anything that will at least potentially head off the next rampage.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p> <em>Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He is a frequent political commentator on MSNBC and a weekly co-host of the Al Sharpton Show on American Urban Radio Network. He is the author of How Obama Governed: The Year of Crisis and Challenge. He is an associate editor of New America Media. He is the host of the weekly Hutchinson Report on KPFK-Radio and the Pacifica Network.</em></p> <p>  </p> <p> <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2012/12/sandy-hook-school-massacre-presents-fresh-challenge-to-president-obama.php">New America Media</a></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/sandy-hook" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">sandy hook</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/adam-lanza" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">adam lanza</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/nra" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">NRA</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-violence" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun violence</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ban-guns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">ban guns</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ban-handguns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">ban handguns</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/president-obama" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">President Obama</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Earl Ofari Hutchinson </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Tue, 18 Dec 2012 15:19:08 +0000 tara 2061 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1862-stop-insanity-its-time-ban-guns-and-end-violence#comments Wis., Colo., Tragedies Show Immediate Need for Stricter Gun Control Laws https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1456-wis-colo-tragedies-show-immediate-need-stricter-gun-control-laws <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Wed, 08/08/2012 - 18:46</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumwisconsintragedy%28AP%29.jpg?itok=rIVXyH1G"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumwisconsintragedy%28AP%29.jpg?itok=rIVXyH1G" width="480" height="322" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p> Firstpost.com, News Analysis, Lakshmi Chaudhry, Posted: Aug 07, 2012</p> <p>  </p> <p> From <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2012/08/us-gun-laws-majoritys-will-thwarted-by-minoritys.php">New America Media</a> and FirstPost:</p> <p>  </p> <p> “The gunman is worse than the one at the theatre a couple of weeks ago because he targeted an entire community," said a worshipper who witnessed the tragic shooting at his local gurdwara in Oak Creek, Wis., Aug. 5. The shootings killed seven people, including the gunman, and critically wounded three people, including a policeman.</p> <p>  </p> <p> As a claim, it is open to debate. The body count was higher in Aurora, Colo., so was the number of injured. Hate crimes carry a greater penalty in the United States, but it is a fool’s game to pit one tragedy against another.</p> <p>  </p> <p> What matters more is what the two shooters shared in common: the possession of lethal weapons. The kind that allowed one individual to wreak disproportionate harm, take multiple lives in a matter of seconds, allowed him to live out his most violent fantasies. Focusing on the “hate” angle distracts from the far greater crime: the appalling state of gun laws in the United States.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Guns don’t kill people, people kill people -- or so goes the tired argument used by anti-gun control advocates to dismiss any call for stricter legislation. And their Republican supporters like Mitt Romney are quick to define every shooting rampage as the work of a “deranged person.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Let’s focus on the man holding the gun, they insist. On his CNN program, Global Public Square, Fareed Zakaria exposed the emptiness of this argument, using data to devastating effect. “The United States stands out from the rest of the world not because it has more nutcases – I think we can assume that those people are sprinkled throughout every society equally – but because it has more guns,” Zakaria points out. The United States is the only country to have more than 70 guns per 100 persons in the entire world. The precise number: 88. Yemen is a distant second at 54.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The other numbers are just as damning: “We have 5 percent of the world’s population and 50 percent of the guns. But the sheer number of guns isn’t an isolated statistic. The data shows we compare badly on fatalities, too. The US has three gun homicides per 100,000 people. That’s four times as many as Switzerland, 10 times as many as India, 20 times as many as Australia and England.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> And yet, conservative commentator George Will insists: “The killer in Aurora, Colo., was very intelligent and farsighted and meticulous. I defy you to write a gun-control law that would prevent someone like this with a longtime horizon and a great planning capability from getting the arms he wants. I just think that this is a mistake.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Sikhs in Oak Creek should be grateful that their shooter wasn’t quite so “very intelligent and farsighted and meticulous.” He didn’t bother to assemble an entire arsenal before he went on a rampage. But here’s the more important point: he could easily have done so under existing U.S. law.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The legal arguments against gun control are equally specious. There is no U.S. constitutional right to carry an assault weapon that shoots 100 rounds. “A lot of gun owners would agree that AK-47s belong in the hands of soldiers, not in the hands of criminals — that they belong on the battlefield of war, not on the streets of our cities,” declared President Obama in the aftermath of Aurora. Most polls confirm they do.</p> <p>  </p> <p> As the press watchdog group, Media Matters, points out, contrary to the conventional wisdom touted by TV talking heads, three in five Americans support reinstating the nationwide ban on assault weapons that expired in 2004. Other polls show that 86 percent support a criminal background check for all gun buyers; 63 percent are for a ban on high capacity magazines or clips; 69 percent support limits on the number of guns a person can purchase within a certain time frame; 66 percent support a national gun registry.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/2mediumwisconsintragedy%28AP%29.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 440px; " /></p> <p>  </p> <p> And yet there has been no significant effort to institute sensible limits on gun ownership in the United States.</p> <p>  </p> <p> While many see gun violence as symbolic of America’s uber-macho cowboy culture, it is also indicative of a core flaw in modern democracy, which has become captive to minority interests. In India, most citizens agree on the urgent need for stricter measures to curb corruption — but to little avail. So why do we repeatedly see the will of the majority thwarted by a small number of influential people?</p> <p>  </p> <p> One reason is that all political debates are framed in polarizing extremes by media outlets — especially television — that thrive on conflict. The damage is incalculable and became evident in the trajectory of the anti-corruption movement in India. We were either going to embrace the Hazare version of the Lokpal bill or have no anti-corruption legislation at all. The gun debate similarly sets up a false choice: either ban all guns or remove all curbs on ownership.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The media also like to reduce all politics to personality. “The narrative almost always gets formed around the insanity, the extremism of that particular assailant and not a broader discussion of the number of firearms or number of fatalities due to firearms. That doesn’t do much to change public opinion. Immediately the discussion shifts back to ‘He called himself the joker and he had red hair,’” observes Dhavan Shah, a communications and political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison</p> <p>  </p> <p> In India, the press was only too glad to focus on Anna at the expense of the broader (and more boring) issue of corruption. Does he advocate whipping alcoholics? Is he senile? Is he fighting with Arvind Kejriwal? Soon enough, Team Anna goes from hero to zero, and anti-corruption legislation is declared DOA. The outcome is always a stalemate that favors the status quo.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The other reason is the self-serving nature of politics and politicians. No one wants to do anything that will jeopardize their career or their party or — in India — their personal wealth.</p> <p>  </p> <p> “When there is an extraordinarily heartbreaking tragedy like the one we saw, there’s always an outcry immediately after for action. And there’s talk of new reforms, and there’s talk of new legislation. And too often, those efforts are defeated by politics and by lobbying and eventually by the pull of our collective attention elsewhere,” said Obama in his Aurora speech. And yet he too has no plans to propose new gun legislation in a re-election year. Be it corruption or gun control, there is a silent bipartisan consensus to do nothing.</p> <p>  </p> <p> A third reason is public apathy (as Obama gently puts it, our “attention,” or lack thereof). Sure, we all want things to be better, but not enough. Americans won’t take to the streets to change gun laws despite nearly 20 mass shootings a year.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2012/08/us-gun-laws-majoritys-will-thwarted-by-minoritys.php">New America Media</a></p> <p>  </p> <p> <em><strong>Photos: AP.</strong></em></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/wisconsin" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Wisconsin</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/oak-creek" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Oak Creek</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/sikh-temple" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Sikh temple</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/wisconsin-shootings" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Wisconsin shootings</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-control" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun control</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/nra" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">NRA</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/aurora" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Aurora</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/violence-united-states" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">violence in the united states</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gun-laws" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">gun laws</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ban-guns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">ban guns</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/obama" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Obama</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Lakshmi Chaudhry</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">AP</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Wed, 08 Aug 2012 22:46:20 +0000 tara 1369 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1456-wis-colo-tragedies-show-immediate-need-stricter-gun-control-laws#comments