By Louise “Lou” Fischer–
It’s been almost 10 years since the unfathomable and fully preventable slaughter of 20 young children and six adults in Newtown, Connecticut, and here we are again. Within the period of barely two weeks, we are heartbroken and sending thoughts and prayers to families in Buffalo, NY; Uvalde, TX; Tulsa, OK; Philadelphia, PA; and probably somewhere else by the time this column goes to print.
In 2017 and 2018, I wrote three articles about the need for gun control. I stopped writing about the topic because it was too depressing and I didn’t believe I had anything original to say, but after recent events, I’ll say it again: we need national gun control laws that raise the minimum age for gun sales, strengthen background checks, include red-flag laws, and that completely ban high-powered, military weapons of mass-murder such as assault rifles and high-capacity magazines.
I have my own personal story with guns and shooting. I grew up in a bedroom town in Connecticut (coincidentally, only 20 miles from Newtown), where BB and pellet guns were considered safer than skateboards and pogo sticks. When my father, who has no athletic ability, entered the Army, he realized target shooting was the one sporty activity in which he excelled and he stuck with it.
We spent many weekends blasting away at paper targets at the local gun range where he taught me how to shoot and how to handle a gun safely; I never hunted because I can’t even kill a spider. In high school, I joined a competitive shooting team and trained five days per week where I progressed through the NRA-administered marksman qualification program and achieved the rank of “Expert” at the age of 17. I was recruited by the military and top college programs and had an outside chance to participate in the 1980 Olympics as an alternate. Rather than dedicate four more years to a demanding discipline, I chose a more traditional college path and “retired” from competitive shooting.
I loved the sport of shooting and I support regulated ownership of limited-capacity sport and hunting rifles. I’m not convinced that people should own handguns; studies show an increase in suicide, homicide, domestic violence against women, and accidental death among children in homes where a handgun is present. However, that “ship has already sailed” and it is not ever coming back, so the best we can do is to lobby for much stricter regulation including mandatory safety classes with annual renewal and the requirement for all handguns to be stored in childproof lock boxes.
We need swift and severe policy change to end mass shootings and that starts with a full ban on assault rifles and high-capacity magazines. Raising the age of purchase from 18 to 21 is not enough; there is no earthly reason for anyone outside of law enforcement or the military to own an AR-15 style assault rifle other than to efficiently kill as many human beings as possible in a short period of time.
Despite support by the majority of American voters for federal gun control measures, in the aftermath of recent shootings, Republicans reverted to their playbook of offering “thoughts and prayers” to the families and the ridiculous idea of arming teachers and providing more guards at schools. Didn’t they learn anything from the recent failures of well-trained, professional law enforcement “good guys with guns” to stop the carnage in Buffalo, Uvalde, and before that, Parkland, Florida?
Ask Aaron Salter’s family how that worked out; he was a “great guy” with a gun, a well-trained 27-year veteran of the Buffalo Police Department who gave his life because his handgun was as useful as a spitwad and plastic straw against an 18-year-old gunman with a deadly assault rifle. Talk to the grieving parents of Uvalde—the armed school resource officer was not even on campus and when he did show up he passed the gunman, mistook a teacher for the perpetrator, and while initial reports noted he “engaged” with the suspect, this was contradicted by later reports confirming the gunman was not confronted before entering the building. While we’re at it, how useful was Deputy Scot Peterson, the armed school resource officer currently charged with seven counts of child neglect, three counts of culpable negligence, and one count of perjury for hiding while 17 students and teachers were killed in Parkland, Florida, in 2018?
It is a ridiculous equivalence to even discuss arming teachers when law enforcement professionals were powerless to stop mass shooters armed with assault rifles. Loaded firearms readily accessible in a school full of curious children? That will most certainly do more harm than good once the body count from accidental deaths starts piling up.
The fantasy of gun competence perpetuated by video games is a fallacy. When I competed in a controlled, safe environment with no one shooting at me, I still had to contend with nerves and stress that impacted my aim and skill. My partner, Amy, is an elementary-school music teacher. While she could probably learn how to shoot (she is from Texas; it’s likely in her DNA), in the chaos of an active shooter situation, with children screaming and her heart racing four times faster, there’d be no way she could be a perfect shot, and even so, if she went up against an assault rifle, that pistol would be no better than chucking a xylophone at the shooter or conking him on the head with a ukulele. It’s unrealistic to assume that the problem of mass school shootings will magically go away by arming teachers.
Nothing has changed in Congress, and if anything, Republicans are more dug in and have loosened restrictions on gun control. As I say in almost every column, “elections matter,” and now it is literally a matter of life and death because, until we have a true Democratic majority in the Senate, Republicans who love their guns more than they love their children will continue to accept the murder of innocent people as the price for their vision of freedom from any form of gun control.
For more information and to get involved in ending gun violence, check out the following:
Moms Demand Action: https://momsdemandaction.org/
Students Demand Action: https://studentsdemandaction.org/
Louise (Lou) Fischer is a Former Co-Chair of the Board of Directors of the Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club and has served as an appointed and elected Delegate for the State Democratic Party. She is a proud graduate of the Emerge California Women’s Democratic Leadership program, was a San Francisco Commissioner, and has served in leadership positions in multiple nonprofit and community-based organizations.
Published on June 9, 2022
Recent Comments