Much of my week consisted of school, school, and more school. Not very exciting so I'm not even going to try to make it sound that way at all. However, despite the rather boring and busy week, I was finally able to go home and relax for a few days. It just so happened that both my uncle and aunt from Cody, and my fiancé were able to make it home that weekend as well! So, the weekend was a good one, consisting of relaxation and fun moments with family and friends.
Spotlight of the week:
I think that I am going to begin labelling this section as the spotlight of the week because I decided that if there is a big news story that needs to be covered, I will cover it. If there is a week where the news is the same old Trump said something nasty or whatever, I'm going to focus on the positive for that week.
But this week we do need to talk about the biggest news story so far this year. As most of you know, if not all of you, there was a mass shooting in Parkland, Florida at a high school that claimed 17 lives. Some of these lives were students, and some were teachers. And of course, my prayers and thoughts are with the families of the victims, and with everyone grieving from this tragedy throughout the world.
You may ask me if I had a good week, and I did personally. Nothing went wrong and really classes flowed smoothly to me, but boy did this mass shooting make me sick. We're talking about a high school, who was just about to be released for the day, getting shot up by a former student. I cannot imagine the sadness and anguish this situation caused for students and teachers alike. I have been combing the news for any information on why the shooter did what he did, why he targeted his old school, and most importantly why this continues to happen in America.
As I have been writing throughout the week, I've been watching the reactions from both the right and the left. It is your typical argument of "gun's aren't the problem" and whatever else, we will get into that later. But, the most amazing thing about this shooting was the response from the students themselves. The students should be mourning the loss of friends and teachers, but instead they are planning marches of Washington, holding rallies crying for changes to gun laws. In my short 20 years of life, after a mass shooting, I have never seen this reaction from the victims. For that I applaud them, it is maybe the most courageous action a group of victims could take.
Lawmakers don't feel the same way though. Tomi Lahren tweeted that the "Left" needs to quit politicizing these incidents and give the families and victims time to grieve. Here is the thing, why wouldn't you talk about an issue when it happens? We need to talk about it now because if we don't, nothing will get done and the situation will be forgotten. Why do you think the Civil Rights Movement or the American Feminist Movement (in 1960, for women's equality) were so successful? They didn't let the issues of our nation be forgotten. Now is the time to do something about mass shootings, whether it be to institute gun laws or increase mental health availability.
Speaking of lawmakers, it's funny how many of them are funded by the NRA. This directly correlates to their reactions to mass shootings and talks of gun control. You guessed it, they offer only their prayers and condolences, which will never be enough. It's quite clear that politic funding is more important than the well-being of Americans.
As I said earlier, this past week has been filled with talks of gun control and how we can shape the law to stop these mass shootings from happening. Now at this point, you may be saying that no law could've stopped what happened in Florida. If the shooter wanted a gun, he would have got one. This may be true, there obviously is no way of knowing, but wouldn't that argument apply to drugs? Why do we have laws in place that make drugs illegal when it just happens anyway? The same goes for murder, rape, and really any other criminal activity. I think the argument here is that the gun in this mass shooting, and many others, was bought legally. Just from this simple statement, you should see there are flaws somewhere in the gun buying process. Why not increase the waiting period to buy a gun, require stricter background checks, or require a mental health screening before the purchase is complete? These actions might make buying a gun more of an inconvenience but it could save lives too.
Lot's of the Republicans are saying that we need to put guns in the teachers hands, this will surely stop gun violence. Well I don't know if you are from Wyoming, but in my state there is currently a push to cut the much needed education budget. Where do you suppose lawmakers are going to fit purchasing guns, ammunition, body armor, etc. in this budget? Not only that, the expense of training staff to use firearms will cost too much. My mother is a school teacher, my fiancé is going to be a school teacher, my brother is a school teacher, I know there is no room in an already tight budget to arm school employees. The same goes for hiring employees to do strictly that. Not only this, but most mass shooters are suicidal in nature; therefore, threatening them with death won't stop their attack from starting.
I stand with the victims of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in saying that gun laws do need to change. Now, I'm not saying that we need to disarm America, I'm an avid hunter and that would go against everything I believe in. But, we need to institute laws that make these semi-automatic rifles of all kinds, not just AR's, less powerful and less likely to be used in a mass shooting. Why do you need to have a 30+ round magazine when target shooting? By having these magazines available to the public, you decreasing the amount of reloads necessary to gun down a mass amount of people. This is precious time victims could be using to escape. Why do you even need a semi-automatic gun at all? I hunt, I kill everything I need to kill with a bolt-action rifle, and much like shooting from a long distance, using an semi-automatic rifle to mow down an animal takes the sport out of it. Obviously, there are many areas that need to be looked at but Democratic lawmakers and people like me are certainly not wanting to disarm our country, just looking to make it less deadly.
I know this will cause a stir throughout my Facebook feed and elsewhere, and will cause people to want to comment. I welcome that either here, on Facebook, or on Twitter. This doesn't mean that you can cuss me out for having an opinion, those toxic comments will be immediately removed. But if you want to have a reasonable, friendly discussion on our thoughts on guns, please comment.
I'm interested in what will change in the coming months surrounding gun laws.
If you would like to donate to help the victims and their families, here is a link:
If you would like to donate to help the students with their march of Washington DC, here is a link:
