I saw Lee Harvey Oswald shot on television. My sister, Betty, screamed. The TV was in the den...the back room behind the garage...the only one on concrete with a linoleum tile floor...it felt different under the feet...and sounded different, too. There was a big window to the backyard and a door on the side that opened for access to the backyard, which was fenced in. A simple and bucolic room, sparsely furnished in Danish modern style. We watched someone be murdered. It was horrifying.
This was on top of the horrifying event of the murder of a beloved President.
I woke up days before my high school graduation to the news on my little green and white transistor radio that Bobby Kennedy, candidate for President, had been murdered just the same as his brother. Not long after a civil rights leader had been murdered. Martin Luther King, Jr. At this point, I felt the world had gone mad.
I never really thought about how those events affected me. I was young, I felt lost, without purpose or direction. But was it the time or was it my personal circumstance? Both?
In the 70s I joined the gun control movement. I lived in Manhattan and my group was headed by a lovely professional couple. They happened to be black and they lost their only child, their daughter, to a random bullet. She had been an attorney. All of our meetings were at their beautiful and warm apartment. When John Lennon was shot in 1981 I quit. I lost the wind beneath my wings.
I grew up with "Father Knows Best," "Ozzie and Harriet," "The Donna Reed Show," "Leave it to Beaver." And in spite of the fact that my life did not meet the expectations of perfection that those shows depicted, I ate them up, I loved them and I believed them. I believed that people were good. I believed in the welfare of others, of everyone. I believed the myth that everything about America was the absolute best. Other countries were "interesting" but America was "the greatest land of all." Drive your Chevrolet through the USA, America's the greatest land of all!"
I knew Reagan was a mistake. I never knew a single person that voted for him, and yet, he won NY state. Another horror. That was the first time I stopped watching television news, at least when he was on....I could not bear the phony folksiness and carefully planned speeches. I couldn't stand the sight or sound of him. And then it began...the selling out of America.
All this while, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing was being done about the rise in gun violence. Nothing.
Sandy Hook was the last straw for me. I was a child in school. My child was a child in school. School was a safe place, surrounded by educated adults... who cared about us. School was a haven when your family was hell. School had food. Maybe just a hot bagel or a personal pizza...but there was food. And camaraderie. And safety. Always safety. Safety for me and I hoped for my child, although....her experience was markedly different as she got older.
Sandy Hook was the last straw. If a society of "good" people who care about the welfare of others allows ...I don't care how many...it was 20....it could have been one.....allows a 6 year old child to die by gun violence because that country is more invested in the NRA and the misinterpretation of the Second Amendment...(LEARN TO READ!!!) then that country is lost and doomed. That society is depraved.
I went to school and felt safe and rightfully so. Every child should have that right, most especially in the US in the 21st Century. Instead of these hideous events ending the day police were puking and photos would not be released because they were too grisly and upsetting showing 20 babies shot to death, shot to death in their safe haven....the violence continued to escalate. Americans now wake up to school shootings on a regular basis. No one is doing a damned thing about it.
Sandy Hook was the day America died for me. Sandy Hook and the lack of any action by anyone - in Congress, in Senate, at local levels...citizens in the streets....no, instead, we had a small bunch of nutcases say it was a hoax. A hoax. Please say that up close and personal right to the face of a parent who lost a child.
Now there are cops shooting at children. They shoot people's pet dogs. They shoot old men who are deaf and can't hear them. They shoot unarmed black males by the dozen. They shoot. Shoot first, ask questions later. Only it's too late for the dead guy, or gal, or child or innocent dog.
Access to guns increases gun violence. It is, it really is, that simple. It has been proven time and time and time again. I am sick of the insanity. I am sick of an ignorant minority determining policy. I am sick of the corporate takeover. Ah, but who cares? Nobody, apparently.
I grew up believing the Cleavers or something nearly like that was possible. Never in my wildest imagination did I think I would approach my later years living "The Hunger Games" but here we are. Here we are.
It seems to me that a society that allows, indeed enables, the death by gun violence of young children, unarmed people and pets is depraved and failing.
The human race is tragically flawed. We are about to pay the price for that.
This was on top of the horrifying event of the murder of a beloved President.
I woke up days before my high school graduation to the news on my little green and white transistor radio that Bobby Kennedy, candidate for President, had been murdered just the same as his brother. Not long after a civil rights leader had been murdered. Martin Luther King, Jr. At this point, I felt the world had gone mad.
I never really thought about how those events affected me. I was young, I felt lost, without purpose or direction. But was it the time or was it my personal circumstance? Both?
In the 70s I joined the gun control movement. I lived in Manhattan and my group was headed by a lovely professional couple. They happened to be black and they lost their only child, their daughter, to a random bullet. She had been an attorney. All of our meetings were at their beautiful and warm apartment. When John Lennon was shot in 1981 I quit. I lost the wind beneath my wings.
I grew up with "Father Knows Best," "Ozzie and Harriet," "The Donna Reed Show," "Leave it to Beaver." And in spite of the fact that my life did not meet the expectations of perfection that those shows depicted, I ate them up, I loved them and I believed them. I believed that people were good. I believed in the welfare of others, of everyone. I believed the myth that everything about America was the absolute best. Other countries were "interesting" but America was "the greatest land of all." Drive your Chevrolet through the USA, America's the greatest land of all!"
I knew Reagan was a mistake. I never knew a single person that voted for him, and yet, he won NY state. Another horror. That was the first time I stopped watching television news, at least when he was on....I could not bear the phony folksiness and carefully planned speeches. I couldn't stand the sight or sound of him. And then it began...the selling out of America.
All this while, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing was being done about the rise in gun violence. Nothing.
Sandy Hook was the last straw for me. I was a child in school. My child was a child in school. School was a safe place, surrounded by educated adults... who cared about us. School was a haven when your family was hell. School had food. Maybe just a hot bagel or a personal pizza...but there was food. And camaraderie. And safety. Always safety. Safety for me and I hoped for my child, although....her experience was markedly different as she got older.
Sandy Hook was the last straw. If a society of "good" people who care about the welfare of others allows ...I don't care how many...it was 20....it could have been one.....allows a 6 year old child to die by gun violence because that country is more invested in the NRA and the misinterpretation of the Second Amendment...(LEARN TO READ!!!) then that country is lost and doomed. That society is depraved.
I went to school and felt safe and rightfully so. Every child should have that right, most especially in the US in the 21st Century. Instead of these hideous events ending the day police were puking and photos would not be released because they were too grisly and upsetting showing 20 babies shot to death, shot to death in their safe haven....the violence continued to escalate. Americans now wake up to school shootings on a regular basis. No one is doing a damned thing about it.
Sandy Hook was the day America died for me. Sandy Hook and the lack of any action by anyone - in Congress, in Senate, at local levels...citizens in the streets....no, instead, we had a small bunch of nutcases say it was a hoax. A hoax. Please say that up close and personal right to the face of a parent who lost a child.
Now there are cops shooting at children. They shoot people's pet dogs. They shoot old men who are deaf and can't hear them. They shoot unarmed black males by the dozen. They shoot. Shoot first, ask questions later. Only it's too late for the dead guy, or gal, or child or innocent dog.
Access to guns increases gun violence. It is, it really is, that simple. It has been proven time and time and time again. I am sick of the insanity. I am sick of an ignorant minority determining policy. I am sick of the corporate takeover. Ah, but who cares? Nobody, apparently.
I grew up believing the Cleavers or something nearly like that was possible. Never in my wildest imagination did I think I would approach my later years living "The Hunger Games" but here we are. Here we are.
It seems to me that a society that allows, indeed enables, the death by gun violence of young children, unarmed people and pets is depraved and failing.
The human race is tragically flawed. We are about to pay the price for that.
