Thoughts on school shootings

 

My grandson did not go to school today. There was rumor that a student, with a record of accusations against him, had said he would shoot up the school today. Every parent’s dilemma. I am not sure how the rumor spread, but I gather the principal sent out an email saying there would be officers at every door, and students would be safe. His parents talked to other parents who were keeping their children home and decided to be safe. In their shoes, I would have done the same.

You never expect the problems of the world to come up close and personal, but this one has. I am left with questions, as I’m sure my grandson and his parents are. The young man who made the threat is allowed back in school Wednesday. What will happen then? What steps will the ISD take to ensure student safety? It would be easy to say that by then his bravado will have faded, and maybe he’ll do no more than swagger. But there’s no assurance. Not only do I want my grandson safe, I do not want our beloved high school—all four of my kids went there—to become the next in line to achieve notoriety for a shooting.

Columbine hit us all by surprise. It had never occurred to me, and to most, that students would take guns to school and shoot their classmates. The very idea was appalling, the reality beyond belief. But then it kept happening. And after Sandy Hook and Parkland and too many others, each time we said to ourselves, “This is the one. This surely will galvanize people into action, and we’ll get reasonable gun control measures.” But it never happened, and I don’t want Paschal to be the latest, “This is the one.”

Why don’t we get a handle on this? In what other country, civilized or not, do students shoot each other. Easy—and probably right—to blame the NRA. But these days, the NRA is broke and wheezing out its death rattles—or I hope so. Still legislators won’t vote for gun control. Senator Grassley, that troglodyte from Iowa, voted against a recent bill because it would unfairly punish gun owners. Unfairly? How about killing kids unfairly?

Senator Chris Murphy, a vocal gun control advocate, has said that even the control he pushes for won’t solve the problem. We have a culture of violence in this country that is unequalled in the world at large. The statistics are appalling. Every day in the United States 316 people are shot, 106 killed, twenty-two of them children under seventeen. Every year, 115, 561 people are shot. And yet, a member of our national legislature sends out a Christmas card showing him, his wife, and four children grinning while holding assault rifles, designed for one purpose only and that is to kill other humans. Their Christmas prayer? Santa, bring us some ammo. How, in a free country, can we censor such incredible stupidity.

In schools, it seems to me though I have no statistics, the shooters are often the nerdy kids who don’t fit in—they are not minorities, they are not the “bad” kids, they are the unnoticed. Do we begin with counseling? How do you know what kids are silently calling for help? Ethan Crumbley, of the recent Oxford, Michigan shooting, drew pictures and left messages that were an obvious cry for help. Maybe the answer in part is more education for parents and school administrators.

School shooting are a complex problem, one that nobody seems to come to grips with. I am not opposed to guns for hunting, maybe for self-protection in your home. But assault rifles? Concealed carry? Open carry in restaurants and grocery stores (what in heaven’s name are they afraid of)? Yes, hunters should have their rifles, but any self-respecting hunter would never use an assault rifle against a creature. So it seems to me reasonable gun control, with strict background checks and control over sales, is one answer.

And another is a stepped-up surveillance/detection program in schools. Surely our schools can do a better job of knowing their students, spotting the troubled ones, working with them for prevention, not punishment after the fact. That’s a point that conservative legislators don’t want to get: we need prevention much more than punishment.

My grandson is an ordinary (well of course I think he’s extraordinary) fifteen-year-old boy. He has friends at school, he enjoys school (sometimes more than others), his friends, and golf. He has a great future ahead of him. He will go to school the rest of the week, and I will hold my breath. But I can’t put him in a bubble.

We are all at the mercy of a world gone wacko.