“Sixty-eight percent of U.S. citizens believe that ‘better mental health screening’ would help to reduce the number of school shootings, but one has to ask what’s considered mentally healthy in our spiritually-anemic, sick society.” — Richard Martin Oxman
Relationships and loyalties within a family are the strongest and most important ones, say most people. [Pause.] Yes, blood is thicker than water. Loved ones should be real with one another.
A right-of-center NPR report on the recent school shooting in Florida paralleled left-of-center coverage on several counts, one of which has to do with a sin of omission. That is, both left out the fact that nothing’s going to be done about school shootings without dealing with the violence abroad that the U.S. inflicts on other countries. Gun legislation, at best, can only serve as a positive drop of sorts… midst the bucket of blood we guarantee will fill to the gills with our bombing and arms sales around the world.
The NPR show pointed out that the Parkland horror was “the greatest loss of life at a school since Sand Hook,” and posed the question, “Is this the new normal?”.
Everyone should balk at such talk. Balk, blanch and vomit. For even talking that way takes us further away from what I’ve underscored in my first paragraph above. Neither gun legislation, gun-searching radar devices… nor special-training sessions for students and faculty should take precedence over our focusing on our abominable policies abroad, our general violence overseas and our mean-spirited official punishment of certain domestic demographics, which often includes intentional, gratuitous cruelty.
I didn’t come across any mainstream media outlet journalists who even touched upon what I’m spotlighting here. And unless schools start discussing how local violence is greatly contingent upon our federal policies and history our bucket of blood will overflow — simultaneously — as our potable water runs out.
We should all start being real with one another.
Rachel Oxman can be reached at [email protected].
