I realized something on Friday. One death is considered a tragedy but more then one a statistic. In other words no one seems to give a damn. I know this post wil sound harsh but it's a fact. Here is why I think that.
Last week a S.W.A.T. officer in Los Angeles was killed in the line of duty. In other words he did his job where it was a distinct possibility it might happen. Now don't get wrong I know he is an absolute hero but he had a funeral (at taxpayer expense) that was better then a lot of Presidents and it was absolute overkill especially by the media who felt they had to cover the event.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,330872,00.html
But that wasn't the only tragedy of the week as there were many more violent multiple mass shootings that clearly won't get any coverage. Here are a few examples and these people WERE NOT doing a job that it was a possibility as these people were in the wrong place.
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/california/la-me-oxnard15feb15,1,1414535.story
This is a story of a child who was shot for the sole reason he was gay. Guarantee not much media coverage there.
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2008/02/15/niu
The mass shooting at Northern Illinois which will get coverage but in the end not as much even there.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-02-09-mo-shooting-victims_N.htm
The mass shooting last week in Missouri. Again very little coverage there.
And again I will comment to all you sick ass freaks who support gun rights how many more of these will happen until your minds are changed. Why is it so wrong to have mental testing and background checks for anyone who wants a gun and why is it so hard if you are convicted of murder to automatically get the death penalty with no appeals or any of that garbage which is also a waste of taxpayer money?
4 comments:
It's not that confusing when you realize that the driving decision about what is covered on the news is about ratings, not what's more important or significant.
On the gun issue, I agree as long as you don't start crusading that all guns should be illegal.
I will not say that because I know it will never happen. Whether you agree with me or not you know I try to be a realist. What I would do is simply give the stiffest penalties possible (yes that is death) in cases of murder I would charge parents who's kids use guns in crime and again I would have the most detailed criminal and psychological background checks (which the Republicans dropped with the expiration of the Brady Bill) around.
It's not just about guns - it's about how this country expects to treat the most seriously mentally ill people on the cheap. Many people with active psychoses have no health insurance, and are treated at community mental health clinics by grossly underpaid counselors and social workers, often fresh out of graduate school, with huge case loads (at one point just a few months after getting a Masters in Counseling, my case load was over 600 people, all of whom had a history of serious mental illness.)
I was at Virginia Tech this past weekend. They're still reeling from the shootings of last April 16th. A seriously psychotic male in his 20's was able to avoid treatment and purchase weapons without any checks, and then go on a horrific killing spree that still deeply affects literally tens of thousands of people. He was able to do this because there was no working system of checks on the gun purchases, no follow-up of court-ordered psychiatric treatment, and far too strict privacy safeguards and patient rights protections that allowed him to operate below almost everyone's radar.
Until we as a nation reform and adequately fund our systems of treating the most seriously mentally ill, these tragedies will keep happening, and if its not guns it will be knives or homemade explosives. What surprises me about the Virginia Tech shooting, the shootings at Northern Illinois university last week, and the Los Angeles shooting you write about, which was in my neighborhood, is that they don't happen more often.
That's the truth
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