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| Thanks Mother Jones for the picture. |
On August 5, 2012 a man entered a Sikh
temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, started shooting, and killed 7 people, including
himself. The Sikh temple shooting in Wisconsin came less than a
month after a man opened fire in a crowded theater in Aurora,
Colorado, killing twelve of the seventy people he injured. Most
Americans can name five mass shootings with a similar narrative. The
Wisconsin, Aurora and other shootings have motivated us to ask
questions of our society and ourselves. Unfortunately, we focus so
myopically on the particulars of a single case or on finding a simple
answer, that we cannot see the overarching problems that connect
multiple events. We avoid asking open, complicated questions that
could potentially result in a shift of responsibility, conflict, and
introspection. I fear we are asking questions of little consequence,
and that it is the answers to the questions we do not ask that could
stop these problems from growing and blossoming into a meadow of
macabre societal wildflowers.
The questions that are asked during
these events are generally closed, yes or no questions, demanding
simplified answers, offer little or no discussion, avoid perspective
and the answers to which we think we already know. The Wisconsin
shooting has us drowning in questions like; Should we restrict guns
more? What if one of the victims had a gun? Should we be doing more
outreach between religious groups? How pervasive is racism? The
Aurora shooting was followed by media questions like; What role does
the violence in media play in real life violence? Should guns be
sold online? Should we be allowed to look up bomb making techniques
on the internet? After the Columbine shooting in 1999, the questions
were: Are violent video games to blame? Should we ban trench coats
from school?
Alas, those questions are
discussing the color of the paint of a house on fire. We should be
asking larger questions about this phenomenon. We need to ask
questions for which we do not already think we have the answer. What do the
Sikh Temple shooter (2012), Fort Hood shooter (2009), Aurora shooter
(2012), Wisconsin shooter, Virgina Tech Shooter (2007), Luby's
Massacre shooter (1991), the six postal massacres and shootings
between 1983-2006, and Columbine shooters (1999) have in common?
What role does being socially ostracized play in their motivations?
Is marginalization more than just a painful social experience, but a
serious act that causes serious mental distress and may in the long
term lead to psychosis in some people? Why are we seeing these
shootings in the US and not in other countries with a similar number
of guns per person? What role does the lack of mental health care
play in the mass shootings?
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| Map of mass shootings in America since 1982 (58) create by Mother Jones |
We do not ask deeper questions because
their answers may highlight the responsibility of a society to care
for its citizens and how we have failed to fulfill our
responsibilities. It may actually prove that neglecting or writing
off completely our social and societal responsibility has deadly
consequences. All these questions, all of which probably have a
better chance at actually ending shooting events, are not about the
shooter - they are about society and our personal, social, and
financial responsibility to the people with whom we share a society.
We can no longer afford to sit
comfortably in our sanctimony when we watch these events unfold. It
certainly will hurt to look deeper, but it will hurt less than the
heartbreak we feel every time we see the images of the dead in these
shootings and the grief we share with the families of the dead.
As much as it dings our ego, as hard as
it is to admit we do not know the solution, as much as we fear the
answers – we must start asking questions that we do not already
know the answers to or questions that may challenge our most deeply
seated philosophies. It is not until we abandon the search for
confirmation of our own ideas that we may actually find the ideas
that find meaningful solutions.
Fort Hood
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_hood_shooting
Aurora Shooting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Aurora_shooting
Virgina Tech
Going Postal Massacres
Luby Masacre
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luby%27s_massacre
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