BY Bill Reagan
There has to be a solution, some kind of compromise, a way to prevent these senseless killings. Like so many other issues, the conversation around gun violence and gun control descends into name calling and ideological line drawing. Each side condemns the other without even listening to the other’s point of view.
There are two kinds of listening. One is to respond. The other is to understand. As with so many other controversial topics, we often listen only to respond, discarding the validity of the other’s point of view. It is amazing how dogmatic true believers on either side become when challenged about their assumptions. Most challenges are met with a change of subject. Racism, politics, terrorism, mental health and religion become the straw men. And debate is defeated by ideology again.
Then some one, somewhere else in the country buys an assault rifle and massacres another seventeen or twenty-six or fiftyeight people. It is not good enough that people get indignant with each other about the debate. It is not good enough to fall back on liberal or conservative ideology. It is not good enough that by our indignation and ideology we let these evil people get away with murder.
It is time to compromise. Time to make assault rifles so hard to get that only the most experienced, trusted, sober experts can use them. Time to make background checks so rigorous that no criminal or mentally impaired person can slip through the cracks. The international monetary and financial systems are completely computerized. There are so many safeguards in place that everyone has the reasonable expectation that a credit card used anywhere in the world will be protected from fraud. Surely it is possible to develop a system of computerized background checks so thorough as to weed out those who have no business using firearms without impinging on the right to own them. It is more important to protect human life than to protect money.
Rights come with responsibilities. Individual gun owners have the responsibility to use their firearms safely. Our Second Amendment rights require our collective responsibility, to prevent the abuse of those rights. The right to free speech is strengthened by laws restricting libel and slander. Restricting people who are not mature enough or responsible for themselves, or who do not possess the character and integrity to use firearms from owning guns strengthens the rights of those who possess the qualities for responsible gun ownership.
We, collectively, as a nation could have prevented these murders. We could have found a reasonable compromise after Columbine. Our inaction is tantamount to murder.
Bill Reagan is executive director of Loaves & Fishes of the Rio Grande Valley.
