The Shit Happens Doctrine

Nearly two weeks after the Pulse nightclub massacre, I still don't know what to write.  I am unsure of exactly what I want to say or how to say it.  This attack stirs so many emotions within.  Probably because it hits three of the big ol' hot topics we like to argue about: Gays, Guns, and God.  As we mourn the forty-nine victims, most of us are seeking places to channel our outrage.  An act so heinous, so awful, sends us searching for understanding.  We want to know why, we want to know how, and we want to know how we stop it from happening again.  We lash out in frustration, looking for someone to hold responsible, looking for an easy solution.  We blame the NRA, homophobes, politicians, preachers, and Muslims.  Everyone has an angle.  Everyone wants his or her brand of justice.  We "like" memes, post links, and yell at the idiots on television.   Of course, there is no simple answer.  Not one we want to hear anyway.

Of the three big "G" issues involved, Gays is by far the easiest for me to reconcile.  I've written about my feelings on homosexuality before.  Love who you love. The real tragedy is that many homosexuals live in great fear every day, not just on mornings after events like Pulse.  Sadly, fearing ridicule and judgement seems on the low end of a spectrum that runs all the way to being afraid of being murdered because you were born differently.  Some want to celebrate America as this beautiful melting pot, but only if they can control the ingredients.

That brings me to Guns.  The big "G" with which I struggle the most.  I don't struggle with my personal feelings about guns; I abhor them.  I think most of our gun violence directly correlates to a fetishist attitude that guns are awesome and necessary.  An attitude that leads to casual behavior and an ambivalence towards the real repercussions guns carry.  Whether a country fella carries because it makes him tough or an inner city gang banger carries so he looks hard, the gun culture is a foolish exercise that is swallowing us up.  To the responsible gun owners who shoot only for hunting and sport, that keep your guns secured when not in use, that don't carry on your hip like some sort of Barney badass, I applaud and thank you.  Unfortunately, we don't hear enough about you.  Frankly, the dipshits who can't be trusted with their guns are becoming far too prominent.  Toddlers pulling unsecured pistols from purses, idiots brandishing weapons in church to de-escalate a dispute (good thinking!), Chicago men killing each other at a staggering rate - it's enough to make you go crazy.  I know, I know, I know-guns don't kill people, people kill people.  Really, though, it's people with guns that kill people.  Introducing a gun into a dispute can send it from zero to sixty in the blink of an eye.  Guns have one function: destroy the target.  That is why I hate them.  Too often the ramifications are only thought of after the trigger has been pulled.  My store stocks thirty-nine gun magazines on the newsstand.  Granted, that's fewer than the knitting/crocheting section, but Granny is unlikely to wield a half-finished scarf as a murder weapon.  The magazines glorify violence and stoke fear.  They make guns seem like the best solution.  When we celebrate guns, they become mainstream.  When guns become mainstream, we become less vigilant with their use.  When guns are normalized, when the destructive power is made casual, guns seem like the best solution.  So, yeah, I'm not a fan personally.

You know what, though?  I don't make the rules.  That is where I struggle with Guns with a capital "G".  My personal wish that guns would not be fetishized, celebrated and carried in grocery stores at some point intersects with my belief in the Second Amendment.  I don't pretend to have all the answers.  I'm not advocating taking guns away from most gun owners.  Just because I don't think you need an armory in your home, doesn't mean you shouldn't be allowed to have one.  However, something has to give.  If I have to jump through bureaucratic hoops to legally drive (operate a potentially dangerous death machine), you can jump through some bureaucratic hoops to purchase a gun (a potentially dangerous death machine).  Let's close the gun show loopholes.  Let's have mandatory background checks and waiting (cooling off) periods.  Let's require safety courses.  Let's strike a balance between restricting criminals/the mentally ill from purchasing guns and upholding the second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens.  The tired argument that usually follows is that criminals will always find a way to get guns.  True.  Maybe, though, we can limit the criminals that do.  Maybe we can save a life by restricting someone with a history of domestic abuse from purchasing a gun.  Maybe we can use common sense to help.  Maybe, instead of clinging to divisive soundbites and old rhetoric, we can find the middle ground. 

I used my third "G", God, mostly because I like alliteration.  In relation to the Pulse massacre, I mostly mean the holy war between ISIS and the West.  While I am much more likely to die by handgun violence, I am more frightened of ISIS.  Domestic attacks done in their name really are terror inducing.  Terror has come to our shores in a fashion we are not accustomed to.  Our enemy is incredibly difficult to fight because he is incredibly difficult to find.  We have gone from fighting an army "over there" to fighting terrorists trained "over there" to the guy from "here", the guy walking next to you at Disney World, wanting you dead.   No longer is ISIS recruiting American jihadists to come train at their camps before going forth to destroy.  Now, with only an internet connection and a Twitter feed, they recruit American citizens to attack other American citizens.  ISIS seemingly says, "Go kill a bunch of your neighbors.  We don't really care how you do it, whatever works best for you,  just make sure you tag us in the Instagram so we can take credit!"  How in the heck are we supposed to combat that?

I don't have a good answer on what we should do, but I know a few things we shouldn't be doing.  We shouldn't be dropping indiscriminate bombs.  Unless we are willing to turn the desert into a sheet of glass, we are not going stop the ISIS that way.  We shouldn't use attacks like Pulse as cover to close our borders and be bigots towards all Muslims.  We shouldn't consent to unfounded, generalized wire taps, email searches, and other government overreach.  We shouldn't continue to play the World's policeman, alienating in the process.  We have neither the stomach, nor budget for perpetual war.  We can not continue to incite the very hate that fuels our enemies.  

We may be the lone superpower, but in the Middle East, the United States, just a kid at 200 plus years old, is meddling in affairs that have existed far longer.  It has taken me a long time to come to the realization that maybe the world is just the way it is.  Maybe only time can heal.  Maybe slow tectonic shifts beyond our control are the only forces of change.  Whether across the globe, or in our own backyard, we can not fix everything.  Maybe some things are not to be fixed.  Maybe to live in a free(ish) and open society we must realize that sometimes awful things will happen.  Call it the Shit Happens Doctrine.  I know it sounds callous on the surface.  I know it is of little consolation to the victims of the Pulse attack, or San Bernadino, or Oklahoma City.  It would be of no consolation to me were my family involved.  I don't like it one bit.  I simply fear that no amount of restriction, no amount of legislation, no amount of aggression will ever make us "safe" enough. 

There are, however, things we can do outside of government intervention on any of these three Gs.  We can show empathy.  Maybe we make an effort to know our neighbors whether they be white, black, gay, or Muslim.  We can further educate about the dangers of guns.  I will continue to rail against the fetishists, or, as my friend calls them, "ammosexuals", asking them to stop celebrating the gun culture that takes us on a road to nowhere.   We can demand our preachers and imams promote peace instead of division.  We can set aside the politics of fear.  We can maybe, just maybe, invest a little faith in each other.  Perhaps, together, we can highlight the humanity in Humanity.