By Brian Lyman
It’s the guns.
They’re the constituents our elected officials value the most. To most of our lawmakers, guns need careful handling.
Not because they’re instruments of death, but because they’re holy and blameless chalices of liberty.
If someone uses a gun as it’s designed, the excuses begin.
What we need is more Jesus.
Alabama has some of the highest church attendance in the nation. It also has one of the highest rates of death from firearms in the country. More Alabamians died from gunfire in 2020 than in the whole state of New York, which is the size of four Alabamas (and where weekly church attendance is about half of ours).
The problem is how we raise our kids.
You’ve got families with problems all around the world. The difference is other countries aren’t so reckless about allowing kids access to guns.
When President Barack Obama said in 2015 that no other country in the world suffered the violence we do, Politifact swiftly moved in to correct him. Because while the United States had 133 mass shootings between 2000 and 2014, Germany had six.
So there, I guess.
It’s mental health.
This is always a great tell. The people who think guns will save us from big government want social services to save the guns.
The Alabama Legislature has tried to increase mental health funding in recent years. That’s good on its own. I could almost believe legislators were serious about applying it to gun violence if they hadn’t overwhelmingly voted last year to get rid of sheriffs’ ability to deny guns to people who shouldn’t have guns.
Yeah, but what about crime in (Random northern city, probably Chicago or New York)?
Hey, the classic Alabama dodge! Wonder if the people who use it know that segregationists defending Jim Crow used it, too?
To be fair, Alabama leaders do a good job of preventing our state from turning into a vibrant and welcoming place for people from around the world. (We pass anti-immigrant laws even though immigrants by and large don’t want to come to Alabama.) But guns always have a home here.
And they’re killing us.
It’s not just Dadeville, where at least four people were killed and 15 were injured in a shooting at a young woman’s Sweet 16 birthday party on Saturday. It’s not just Montgomery, where 19 members of the Class of 2020 died violently before reaching the end of high school.
It’s Alabama having the third-highest homicide rate in the nation, behind only the gun-loving states of Mississippi and Louisiana. It’s the use of firearms in two-thirds of Alabama suicides. It’s all the Alabamians who get hospitalized for gun accidents.
Above all, it’s the fact that guns are now the leading killer of children in the United States.
We are destroying our future. Literally.
And this isn’t a new development: firearms surpassed motor vehicle accidents to take that title in 2017. The federal government has required motor vehicles to have seat belts since 1968, and air bags since 1998.
We ought to be improving safety around guns. Instead, our lawmakers force us to live with firearms and all their dangers, whether we like it or not.
Imagine Alabama lawmakers seeing all the deaths caused by fentanyl and deciding, in the name of bodily autonomy, to make it easier to buy. It would be outrageous and dangerous, causing untold harm to families and communities, and adding to the health care costs in the state.
This is what they’ve done with guns.
Imagine Alabama lawmakers decided that driving a vehicle, being so critical to having a job in the state, meant that testing a person’s ability to operate a car was a dangerous infringement on freedom and made the only requirement to drive the ability to purchase a vehicle. You would drive a lot less on the roads.
This is what they’ve done with guns.
We have spent the better part of 30 years indulging the fear and paranoia of a small subset of gun owners who think they’re going to get killed every time they step out of their homes. We’ve allowed their terror – their paralyzing horror of facing any restriction on a dangerous weapon – to shape our public policy and our jurisprudence.
And so we made a world of fear and paranoia. Firearms flood into public spaces with unnerving speed, and we’re told that still more guns are the answer. Our children get traumatized by lockdown drills, and the only solution Alabama officials have is turning schools into fortifications, or teachers into soldiers.
Now, we can’t celebrate the start of a young person’s life without someone trying to take it.
Did parenting make this? Or a lack of prayer? Or poor mental health services? Or Chicago or New York?
No. It’s the guns.
Brian Lyman has covered Alabama government since 2006. He has worked at the Montgomery Advertiser; the Press-Register and The Anniston Star, and reported on many issues, from the death penalty to climate change to Alabama history. Lyman has won awards from the Associated Press and the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Human Rights. He lives in Auburn with his wife Julie and their three children. This commentary was published earlier by the Alabama Reflector, an affiliate of the nonprofit States Newsroom network, which includes the Florida Phoenix.
Bill C says
The author forgot the most specious, stupid, illogical, granddaddy argument of them all: “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” Here’s the corollary: “Guns don’t kill people, bullets do.” The shooter is totally innocent, just a bystander, regardless of the circumstances, the slaughter was beyond his control, because the bullets did the killing, not the shooter.
Foresee says
Guns have nothing to do with gun violence? That’s crazy!
Jimbo99 says
You know, it’s the people, not the guns. How much does a gun cost ? Anyone could just as easily go to a sports equipment or music store & buy sports equipment or an electric guitar for whatever the price of any gun costs to go make noise. Comes down to a choice of hobby as usual. Same holds for the drug abusers. They can buy their next fix of self destructive behavior or they can spend that on sports equipment or a musical instrument. Find a different hobby is the message.
Steve Robinson says
A lot of us thought that if Sandy Hook didn’t prompt a major change in gun laws, nothing would. Unfortunately, we turned out to be right. A recent article about the Sandy Hook team that investigated, catalogued and archived every piece of that mass slaughter asked whether releasing the crime scene photos from that day might create some change in Americans’ worship of firearms. This country’s obsession with guns is a deep sickness with no apparent cure. What are we to make of a country that loves its guns more than its children?
don miller says
explain lack of this many mass shootings by 20 somethings in the 60s 70s 80s when there were plenty of guns around then.
Shelly says
Have fun trying to keep guns from criminals.
Live free or die trying says
I would rather have everything we have in this country and freedom from tyranny than no gun deaths and to live as a victim afraid in my own home. I will fight for freedom here like I have in a far away desert…Biden and the democrats are trying to steal our freedom and it will not end up they way they think it will. If you want no guns go to California.
Saturday Night Specialist says
@don miller does bring up a valid point. Know what wasn’t around in the 60, 70, 80s? Abhorant, filterless, violent and graphic and even realistic video games. Filterless music. Filterless television murder drama. Filterless internet. All of which permeate and embed themselves in the young impressionable mind. We now glorify crime and water down punishment. Kids now think prison is a place to go and make new friends and acquaintences. Becoming viral for a few moments outweighs the perceived costs.
Yes guns are a big big problem, but it’s not really THE problem in a nation that socially and even politically rewards mayhem and violence. If you’re arguing that mental health is the issue, then I will argue that we have 320 million people that are ALL mentally ill in some capacity. At least that’s how the rest of the world sees us.
Skibum says
I love and adore my little ones, my babies. I will protect them, cherish them, and never let them be taken from me. This one here is MAC, my MAC-10 machine pistol, isn’t it a beauty?! Oh, and this one, I call ARI, my AR-15, so smooth when the trigger is squeezed and just a sweet-sounding killer. NIKI, my Kalashnikov AK47 is another beaut, a little rough around the edges but still so very fine, don’t you think? Now, I’m not bragging but of course I have more – but none finer or as special to me as these babies! I’ll always love them to death. What did you ask me? Oh yeah… well, of course I know about all the school shootings. The dead kids? Sure, sad. Thoughts and prayers given but not my problem – let’s get back to what we’re doing here. Wanna see some more of my precious babies? – Many Republican gun owners
Willy Boy says
Yes, the change in the societal psyche is likely attributable to many factors, but the old experiment of rats in a cage and just one too many breaks the proverbial camels back, and they all become enraged comes to mind. Mixed some metaphors there, but people seem to have become sick of each other.
The dude says
So drugs don’t kill people, people do and drugs shouldn’t be illegal.
Got it.
Deborah Coffey says
You need better FACTS.
https://time.com/4965022/deadliest-mass-shooting-us-history/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_shootings_in_the_United_States
Dave says
I own a few shotguns for quail and sporting clays and I have yet in my 66 years have I seen these guns shoot or harm anything themselves. And they seem to keep to themselves in the gun safe and don’t come out unless I take them out. Until out court systems get tougher on crime and stop letting so many criminals walk free with simple slap on the wrist there will not be any deterrents. I have yet to understand why doesn’t our school systems install metal detectors at the entrance doors where I person must walk into a room and until that person or persons in cleared they cannot enter the main entrance into the school. These are installed in our courts, Fed buildings.
So Why do courthouses have metal detectors?
In the 1970’s to tighten up on rules against weapons in the courtroom, metal detection devices were installed. Even on-duty police officers are forbidden to bring their service pistols past the metal detectors. Metal detectors and an x-ray system are effective weapons screening devices when operated effectively and correctly, and are of proven psychological value. I guess our children are not that important to provide the same level of security in our schools regardless of cost..
Edith Campins says
Once again, people seem to ignore the par of the 2nd Amendment that says “… a well regulated militia”. don’t see any of those around, do you?
Geezer says
The Swiss have plenty of access to guns, yet no mass shootings to speak of.
American society is sick. The Swiss are not.
It’s easy to see why, here are some of the societal antagonists and subversive elements:
Hate radio (a biggie) “They’re out to get us.”
Fox News (the brain-rot news channel)
Sean Hannity (human detritus)
Tucker Carlson (an ass that people stick their heads in)
Donald Trump (THE sign of intellectual decline that affects at least 49% of the country.)
Ron DeSatan (another moron who has haters under his spell.)
The US has become a nation of zombie idol worshippers.
Remember the Beltway Shootings?
Americans flooded the gun shops looking for Bushmaster AR15 rifles.
The very same semi-auto rifle that John Mohammed used on all those
innocent people. That’s SICK.
I have a large vintage gun collection. I collect Rolex and Omega watches.
I’m a techno-nerd. I’m a spendthrift. I love gold jewelry. I have a $40,000
stereo system. I collect LP records. I collect Snoopy soap dishes. I collect
typewriters from the ’50s. I have a massive library. I collect shortwave radios.
I have a Pentax SLR and lens collection. I collect Japanese fountain pens.
I refuse to use any of these things to hurt people or animals.
I’m also broke.
Sorry, I can’t tell you where I live. :-)
All this and I do not suffer from murderous ideation.
Hate and anger are wasted emotions and primarily hurt the persons harboring them.
I’ve been bucking convention since I’m a teenager (except for capitalism
and materialism).
I follow no one. I form my own opinions. I refuse to be part of a herd mentality.
I try to learn something new every day.
I do, however, like to shoot paper targets at my semi-annual shooting range excursions.
I tend to play my music at high decibels.
I disturb the peace with my typewriter habit.
I use captions when watching Forensic Files.
I love my dog.
I cry when I revisit the JFK assassination.
I like aged provolone cheese and Triscuits.
Why spend your life wanting to harm others?
Collect bottle caps if you’re bored.
Pogo says
@dumb mother…
Splain this:
https://www.google.com/search?q=parkland+shooter+maga+hat
Downtown says
Gun laws only restrict law abiding citizens from using their 2nd Amendment Right. Criminals , as we all know, do not follow the laws nor do people with evil intentions. A person can find hundreds of ways to commit mass murder, just as Jim Jones and his kool-aid poison, and no law will stop this. For anyone to think they have the ability to stop gun violence by passing a law is living in a dream world. It’s just not going to happen. Stop inflecting punishment on law abiding citizens and realize evil cannot be stopped by any law just like evil cannot be stopped by one of the Ten Commandments God put forth for man to follow.
James Mejuto says
A good and timely article by Brian Lyman .
There are several reasons why we have this sickness with guns and this reality will only get worse until we actually address this tragedy affecting our entire country from Washington State all the way down to our southern state of Florida . . . MONEY!
Citizens United and the Supreme Court is part of the problem.
We have a custom, a practice allowing anybody to contribute to any politician. ( all political campaigns should be tax payer paid and only for a short period of time . . . a month.) The Supreme Court refuses to prohibit all contributions from billionaires, companies and multi-corporations. Not one contribution such as money, gifts, vacations, etc. . . . not one should be allowed.
Jane Kranz says
Thank you for your common sense. Too bad that common sense isn’t common.
Herman says
Make guns illegal just like drugs, and make driving drunk illegal too, …. It works so well.
Pierre Tristam says
Tell me, what freedom, whose freedom, did you fight for in the Middle East? that of Iraqis, who are no less free today than they were in 2002? That of Afghans, who are back under Taliban rule? That of (let’s have a laugh) Saudi princes good with electric saws? Kuwaiti playboys? Emirati bigots? Even bigger laugh: That of the United States, where those two lost wars, plus the so-called war on terror, enabled the most significant reduction in civil liberties since the cold war? You have the right to your myths of course, including those involving guns. You do not have a right to fabricating alternative facts here. I’m sure Alex Jones would welcome you with open arms.
Pierre Tristam says
But Dick Cavett was around in the 60s, 70s and 80s, and a lot more accessible to a lot more people for a lot less money than video games today. So how come Americans were no less rampaging with humor then than they are now?
Laurel says
The number one killer of children: gunfire.
The number one killer of children: gunfire.
The number one killer of children: gunfire.
The number one killer of children: gunfire.
The number one killer of children: gunfire.
Oh right to lifers, why are you so silent on this subject? Should be simple, right?
Herman says
Hmm looks like someone is spreading misinformation and suddenly Flagler Live is ok with it. Fair an balanced NOT.
FlaglerLive says
Herman, this, from the Kaiser Family Foundation, may help explain why we’re not OK with trolling like yours: “Firearms are the Leading Cause of Death for Children in the United States But Rank No Higher Than Fifth in Other Industrialized Nations.” (Also, you might want to note that even Fox, those mighty fabricators, have abandoned the “fair and balanced” lie they peddled for so many years, and did so well before they lied about the election.)
James says
I think another trip down Marketstreet is in order.
https://youtu.be/sHkc83XA2dY
It doesn’t get more “west” then San Francisco in 1906… do you notice something? Where are all the guns you would think these people would be carrying? Did they have “concealed carry” back then… no… there were none, they didn’t feel the need to have them.
Just an observation.
By the way, another interesting observation, how many are NOT riding horseback… most are riding in carriages or wagons. And how quickly they’ve adopted to the automobile. It was and still is a very dangerous thing to ride a horse. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that being thrown from a horse was a leading cause of death back then. The automobile was not only a path to greater freedom through mobility (and an end to the subjugation of the horse) but safer… even by the standards of those primitive cars.
oldtimer says
It’s NOT the guns, good or bad America has always had a gun culture the difference is how society has changed. I know I’ll get hate for “going back to old times” but here are some things I’d like to share. In the 60s and 70s when I was in grade school and high school almost all households in our neighbor hood had guns, they were kept under lock and key and not left out for kids to “find” In high school the rifle club (yes there was one)brought 22s on the bus in cases and no one looked twice……we didn’t have mass shootings and fights were settled with fists not guns. So please explain what happened between then and now were the first impulse for kids is to grab a gun
James says
“… So please explain what happened between then and now were the first impulse for kids is to grab a gun”
I can’t honestly say oldtimer… it does seem that that is the case. But is it? Is it for most kids?
By the way, how many of the children at your high school were in the rifle club? Was it mandatory or an elective?
As for adults… fear… usually, whether real or perceived.
Just an opinion.
James says
“… What we need is more Jesus. …”
Perhaps he’d say…
Give a child a rifle and show him how to shoot it and he can feed himself for life. But perhaps it’s also… and unfortunately so… give a child a rifle and he might want to be a soldier some day, show him how to aim and shoot it and he’s (in the army now) already halfway there. After all, the longest journey does indeed begin with a single step.
I say “unfortunately so” because we still live in a world in which such sacrifices seem to be necessary.
The longest journey begins with a single step… but those combined steps grew and culminated in the “longest day.” Which ended the steps of others, who unfortunately had marched though the darkness of a long night.
And so it goes… it seems, the day and the night.
Just an observation.
oldtimer says
About 15 members, it was not mandatory
James says
By the way, railroad related fatalities were the leading cause of accidental deaths in 1906…
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/vsushistorical/mortstatsh_1906.pdf
… Mortality Statistics Table, Table III, page 86 (pdf page 88).
James Mejuto says
There are different ways our country can go ahead with gun control. Let those crazies continue to collect guns of mass slaughter but let’s use one way: Ban the manufacture of bullets for those guns. Close-down the bullets and stop small shops from starting-up.
James says
Yeah, I made a suggestion similar to the one you have made here on a different thread awhile back… I think on one in the wake of some school shooting. My suggestion was to limit clips for assault-style weapons to the firing range… didn’t go over too well.
Makes sense, but not to those in the hobby, sport, and/or “lifestyle” and/or “whatever” it is that these folks are a part of… perhaps it’s just too late to effect such a change.
That’s why I say (as perhaps Jesus would)… give a child a microscope… even a toy one. Show that child how to use it and perhaps that child will grow to marvel at the complex beauty of the world around him or her. Perhaps that child will become a doctor one day. Give a child a telescope, show that child how to use it and perhaps that child will grow to see the beyond just the horizon… and beyond the boundaries of his or her circumstances. Perhaps that child will grow to be more than what was ever expected of him or her.
Teach your children. Choose what to teach them… wisely.
Just an observation.