74 School Shootings
Since Sandy Hook
By John Viall
When will the gunfire
end?
Seventy-four school shootings in eighteen months.
There was another
school. This time the blood spilled out on the floor of a high school in
Troutdale, Oregon. We have now had so many school shootings — 74 since the
Sandy Hook massacre — that it can be hard to keep track. And that doesn’t count
planned shootings that were thwarted.
According to authorities, a San Antonio teen recently managed to sneak an AK-47
into his high school with “intent to commit a violent act.” His plan was foiled
when parents noticed the weapon was missing and notified police.
Certain aspects of all
these stories are the same. The blood is the same. The sorrow of families who
lose loved ones is the same. The shock of survivors who can’t believe it
happened is the same.
Guns don’t kill people. They just make it easier.
The reaction of the
N.R.A. is also the same. Wayne LaPierre will insist:
“Guns don’t kill
people!”
That’s true. They just
help people kill people.
In an emotional speech,
President Obama said:
“We’re the only
developed country on earth where this happens.”
That’s also true. You
can pick from dozens of stories. In April an Indiana man shot and killed his
wife in the parking lot at a Catholic school in Griffith, Indiana. The couple’s
two children watched. The blood was the same — although you could argue that
this shooting doesn’t “count” because it happened outside a school and not
inside.
But the blood was the
same.
Only the details
differ. Remenard Castro, the husband, had a history of violence.
He once threatened to beat his wife with a crowbar.
In Oregon yesterday,
the assailant carried a rifle into the school. Once inside he gunned down a
14-year-old student. A gym teacher was also wounded in the hip. Then the
shooter retreated to a bathroom where he committed suicide.
The blood was the same.
The sentiment of the
Police Chief, Scott Anderson, was the same. Anderson told reporters later:
“I’m very, very
sorry for the family and for all the students and everyone who will be impacted
by this tragic incident.”
The story is the same. It happens in America.
It didn’t happen in
Japan or Germany or Canada. It happened here.
The blood was the same last October in
Sparks, Nevada. There a middle school student shot and killed one teacher and
wounded two classmates. Michael Landsberry, the teacher, “probably saved lives”
when he approached the shooter on the playground. Landsberry had served a tour
of duty in Afghanistan. So he knew the power of guns in this situation. Guns
don’t kill people. That’s true. But a 12-year-old doesn’t kill Landsberry
either.
Not without a gun.
The blood was the same.
Only the details differ. In an interview with CNN, one of the wounded saw his
classmate — the shooter — approaching. “Please don’t shoot me,” the boy begged
recounting the tragedy, “please don’t shoot me,” he said. “I looked at him. I
saw [the gun], and he braced it and shot me in the stomach me.”
The blood is always the
same. It’s thick and red and dries fast in the halls and classrooms and on the
clothes of the dead and wounded. Only the details differ. We know twenty-six
teachers and children were massacred at Sandy Hook Elementary.
But did you
realize in one classroom where fourteen children and one teacher died there was
one survivor? A six-year-old girl rose from among the bodies when police arrived. The blood was
the same. Only the trauma of that child was different. Think of the nightmares
to come for that first grader.
Guns don’t kill people.
That’s true. But without his mother’s Bushmaster XM-15 rifle, Adam Lanza, the
shooter at Sandy Hook doesn’t kill 26 people either. He doesn’t have the chance
to spray a classroom with a semi-automatic weapon.
Guns only make it easy for
people to kill people.
In the wake of
yesterday’s shooting, the reaction of the N.R.A will be the same. Wayne
LaPierre will insist: you can kill people with crowbars and knives. You can
kill them with cars. You can kill them with a frozen loaf of zucchini bread if
you want to. That’s true. But it gets harder.
The blood is the same.
It was the same when Colleen Ritzer was murdered in a women’s bathroom at her school in Danvers,
Massachusetts this past January. In that case the 14-year-old accused in the
crime was armed with a knife. First he raped the 24-year-old math teacher. Then
he cut her throat and went to the movies.
The blood was the same.
And sure: knives don’t kill people. People with knives kill people. But for
mass slaughter guns are way better.
Since the shooting at
Sandy Hook there have been 74 incidents involving gunfire in our schools. You
can read about the LaSalle High School (Cincinnati, Ohio) student who brought a gun from home, carried it into a classroom and committed suicide. You can study up on the
Arapahoe High School shooting in Colorado. There the 17-year-old
killer shot Claire Davis, a classmate, in the head.
Davis died later.
The sorrow is always
the same. The shock is always the same. The blood always dries the same. And it
seems it is quickly forgotten.
You can take your pick.
You can read about the killer who kept a journal and expressed admiration for
the murderers at Columbine High and Virginia Tech. He killed or wounded three
students at a Seattle collegejust
last week. Don’t get confused, though. Don’t get mixed up trying to remember if
this was different from the shootings at other colleges — other high schools —
other elementary schools. You can check out the list if
you want to. It makes for sad reading.
The blood is always the
same.
Americans have purchased almost a million more guns since Obama
took office.
What else is the same?
Members of Congress, says President Obama, “are terrified of the N.R.A.” That’s
true. The N.R.A. will claim again that any attempt to register guns — or do
anything about the problem — is a direct assault on the Second Amendment. The
crazy people will say President Obama is planning to take away all their guns.
It hasn’t happened yet. It’s just going to happen. And soon!
Last year 21.1
million guns were sold in this country. That topped the record of 19.6 million set the year
before. (Records, like teachers and children, have been falling often lately.)
More than 16 million
guns in 2012.
Which topped more than
the 14 million plus in 2011.
And that topped the 14
million in 2010.
And that was more than
the 12 million in 2009.
Meanwhile, the story is
always the same. The blood is always the same. The shootings always happen in
America. Guns don’t kill people. They don’t. In this country, however, they
make it obscenely easy. And any attempt to do anything about it will be met
with fury by “gun absolutists” on the right.
Next week or next fall
when schools reopen the story will be the same. There will be more school
shootings in America. Just hope it doesn’t happen at your child’s school.
It’s time for a change.
John is an ex-Marine, a retired
teacher and currently at work on a book about education, called "Two Legs
Suffice: Lessons Learned by Teaching." He writes about education at
http://ateacheronteaching.blogspot.com/.