Gee: There are two sides to gun debate — love and hate

There were two mass shootings in America within 24 hours of each other. I just want to know, what is the exact number of people who have to die at one time before we actually make some changes to stop this?

This makes 251 mass shootings in the past 216 days, as they are defined by the FBI’s term of “mass murder.” That’s more than one a day. Isn’t this the kind of stuff we usually read or hear about happening in “less developed” countries like Iraq or Afghanistan?

Are hate crime numbers really on the rise?

In the 80s and 90s, we blamed such things on gang violence; mass murders were blamed on feuds between Crips and Bloods, drug dealers, or in later years, bullying. Isn’t this why so many bring up MS-13 — because they are afraid of violence?

More and more, these recent massacres are being committed by people who are echoing the messages sent and/or endorsed by our president. In May the president said we are being “invaded” by immigrants. The El Paso murderer said he wanted to stop “the invasion.”

We cannot allow all of these people to invade our Country. When somebody comes in, we must immediately, with no Judges or Court Cases, bring them back from where they came. Our system is a mockery to good immigration policy and Law and Order. Most children come without parents…

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 24, 2018

President Trump asked his rally crowd recently “How do you stop these people from crossing the border?”

“Shoot them!” someone screamed.

And he laughed. The crowd laughed, too.

I could never have imagined us sinking so low as a country and turning on each other like this. I try to logically find a reason for this. I can’t. We have no moral leadership in our government.

If this is America becoming “great again,” then I want no part of it. It has become clear that the value of human lives isn’t as important as the gun industry’s profit in the USA.

Are president Trump’s tweets infested with racism?

Toxic masculinity and white supremacy is a huge problem in America. We can’t pretend it doesn’t exist by throwing “mental health” at the issue of mass shootings. When there were Muslims that committed acts of violence, did anybody bring up mental health issues? So, why now? Let’s call it what it is: Right wing extremist violence is because of white supremacy.

Time to pay the gun industry

The gun industry is pushing messages of fear telling you that you should buy their products to be “safe” from all the violence out there.  But they don’t want a solution — they want more customers.

Comedian Chris Rock once joked that if bullets were $5,000 apiece, that would be a good start to curbing gun violence. But I am going to go a step further.

Gun violence costs America $229 billion every year, but the gun industry only makes around $51 billion. That is bad business folks. So what if we just gave $75 billion to the gun makers to not make guns? What if we did this for five years, and watched what happened?

Sound crazy? Maybe you should do a quick Google search on how much we give farmers to not grow certain things, or to not produce commodities like milk when the market is off.

What if we did something drastic as a country to stop the killing?

Because whatever it is we are doing right now isn’t working. While we point fingers at each other, people are pointing guns at us and pulling the triggers.

Love is the side that I hope you’re on. On this side, all of us are brothers and sisters together.

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