The United States was rocked to its core by the attacks of 9/11. It was horror beyond imagination. Yet years later, we are experiencing the escalation of Americans being “terrorized” right here in our free country. It is becoming apparent that although we are free to go where we please, at any moment we could be subject to a senseless, violent, heinous act of terror. At school, work, in a shopping mall, in the movie theater.
How can this be happening? Does anyone notice when something is about to go so terribly wrong that another citizen is making a plan to shoot at innocent people? It’s not just a question of guns. It’s so much bigger than that. A focus on guns is misguided, and has everyone in the country arguing about the wrong problem. Though I have never touched a gun and never hope to do so, I grew up in an era when my father had guns, and there were guns in nearly every pickup truck of my high school parking lot. No one worried for their safety.
I boldly suggest that one of the biggest problems is that people are becoming “disconnected” from real live human contact. Not only is no one noticing individuals going so far astray, but no one who has true human connections could take the lives of other humans.
It seems as though we are all in terrible danger. Now our enemies are not only beyond our borders; our enemies are an American culture full of excess, self-absorption, out-of-control media messages, loneliness and despair. Our enemies are apathy and desensitization to violence. How can we not be outraged? We are not free as long as there are people in our country who feel that they are free not only to carry weapons but to open fire at will.
It’s not just on television and in the newspaper. In a very real way, we could be terrorized anywhere, at any moment. This mortal danger is around the corner, beyond the next door that we open. The senseless killing is real, and it is not just happening in far away countries. We need to work together to find a way to reconnect as humans and take back our country, a country that is truly the land of the free, where every human being is treated like a true human being.