How Much Will It Take?

I’m not against guns because one person’s sword is another person’s shield but I have one question to ask and it should be taken seriously. It’s a question that I’ve been wondering for the past couple of years now and that question is, “What is it going to take?” What is it going to take to make people in the United States realize that there is something wrong with our views on mental health? There was a mass shooting at Umpqua Community College located in Roseburg, Oregon. Several people are confirmed dead including the shooter while 20 others are wounded and currently hospitalized.

People are already talking about stricter gun control laws which is typical considering the situation and as usual, nothing is getting done. A couple of years ago, Gabrielle Giffords who was a member of Congress for Arizona was shot in the head by a deranged individual and survived. In Aurora, Colorado, a maniac armed to the teeth walked into a theater during a midnight show of The Dark Knight Rises and murdered over 20 people. On December 14^th, 2012 at Sandy Hook Elementary School, a psychopath walked in and executed 20 innocent children and four adults. If the sight of dead children doesn’t make you think there’s something wrong with society then what will?

We’ve been talking about gun control for decades and nothing happens but that’s not the issue because if someone wants to commit murder, a gun isn’t the only option. There are several different ways that person can do it. I have no doubt that there are countless sites that can show you how to make whatever you’re looking for which is disturbing in itself if you really think about it. So why is the United States only focused on one method of killing? Certain people think it’s too easy to get guns in this country and others think the laws are strict enough but nobody is asking, “Why do people want these guns?”

Instead of focusing on the weapon, focus on the hand that controls that weapon and why it’s being used in the first place. We need to teach people to focus on the signs that someone may be a danger and report them in order to prevent these incidents. The shooter at Umpqua ranted about doing something terrible before it happened and we just found out about it. The shooter of the theater in Aurora claimed that he was “The Joker” from Batman. If you’re wondering why I’m not mentioning their names is because the last thing I’m going to do is recognize the madmen.

If someone goes into a store and is buying a rifle with a scope because they live in the country around a forest and animals then I’m going to go with the belief that it’s for hunting purposes. If someone is buying a small handgun to carry around because they live in a bad neighborhood then I’m going to believe it’s for protection. But if you walk into someone’s house and that person has a whole armory in a suburb then maybe that should raise a red flag right there. Now maybe that person just likes to collects guns or maybe he might be planning something. I don’t know and what’s worse is nobody seems to know what to do because unfortunately, this happens way too much.

This country has become accustomed to hearing about gun violence so much that we’ve become almost numb to it. Every day we hear about someone getting gunned down because of some reason but I don’t blame the gun any more then I would blame a truck because the driver was drunk. I blame the driver because just like the murderers mentioned above, they all weren’t in the right state of mind and someone should’ve paid attention to the signs. We need to start paying attention to the people around us because that one call could be the difference between help or homicide. Too much has been taken already.