The Massacre In Orlando

In the early hours of Sunday morning, a man stormed into a gay nightclub in Orlando and committed what is now the worst mass shooting in American history, killing 50 and wounding 53, many seriously, reportedly using an assault rifle and a handgun. Let’s be clear – whatever tangential ties this man had to terrorist organizations, this was a hate crime. It is clear that he apparently had a problem with gay men and that this gay nightclub was a specific target as opposed to the generalized violence of terror. And it also appears as though there may have been a failure at the FBI who had investigated this man at least two times before. We will obviously learn more details about all this in the days ahead.

Sickeningly, we will now have to hear the specious arguments from the NRA and gun rights advocates saying that, if only someone in the club had been carrying a gun, the carnage could have been minimized. Well, you may believe that the Second Amendment gives you the right to carry a gun, but it certainly does not and should not REQUIRE me to have a gun when I want to go out for a fun evening with friends. And, of course, statistics show that having firearms in your home actually INCREASE your chances of death or serious injury.  We will also have to hear the pathetic argument that citizens need the ability to arm and defend themselves against the tyranny of government. Seriously, here has never been an armed group in history of this country that successfully defended themselves when the full force of the government came down upon them. In 1860, one third of the 33 states actually tried and were defeated after four bloody years of battle. So, if 11 states combined couldn’t do it 150 years ago, your stockpile of a handful of guns is certainly not going to stop the government today.

Sadly, this is just another of the worst mass murders in the United States that I have seen in my lifetime.  I am old enough to remember when a deranged ex-marine went to the top of the tower at the University of Texas and shot 49 people, killing 16 nearly 50 years ago. And, despite enormous efforts, the ability to restrict guns or ammunition has not gotten any better since then – in fact, it’s probably gotten worse. Guns have gotten more powerful and arguably easier to obtain and magazines hold more and more ammunition. So, I’m highly skeptical that this latest outrage will actually result in any progress on gun control. If the massacre of defenseless children at Sandy Hook could not move this Congress and this country to take action, I doubt that this weekend’s carnage will, especially since the targets were young gay men. And that is truly a sad thing to say. Until we have major shift in Congress or in the Supreme Court’s ridiculous reading of the Second Amendment, this weekend’s bloodshed will, sooner rather than later, be eclipsed by another worst mass shooting sometime in the future. And, shamefully, as a country, we seem to have chosen to do absolutely nothing to stop that.