There was the news of the school shooting in Connecticut. I've hesitated to weigh in on that until more is known, though I do have strong feelings about it.
I've heard people blaming everything from gun policies to media coverage to lack of mental health resources, to more outlandish things, such as Obama, atheists removing God from the schools, lack of birth control, to poor parenting skills, hey, you can blame whomever you want to but really, if you want to point fingers, the real blame is in the mirror.
If you live in the U.S. and you pay taxes and vote, are a citizen, and are educated and/or intelligent enough to understand that there are multiple factors that contribute to this type of violence, you can point the finger in the mirror.
We're not doing enough. We're not vocal enough. We have our heads up our asses, busy texting, Facebooking, jabbering on the phone, watching the pornographic news coverage of events like this one on the TV and the Internet. And the lessons will be repeated until they are learned. I think it's time we learned. Which means, it's time to DO something and quit arguing and praying about it. Praying is a nice gesture, but it doesn't cut it.
Personally I think that the first three things I mentioned do play a large part in this, but the dust hasn't settled yet. Doesn't matter if the dust settles, it's time to act, because by the time the dust settles, there will be another shooting somewhere.
On Friday I went in to work a little four hour shift, just to help out and work until we closed. Just a quick little shift, make a few bucks, no big deal, right? Well, my first patient of the day coded, so that turned my little four hour shift into an action-packed couple of hours followed by a paperwork fest. Fortunately the patient is okay, for now, anyway.
I felt good both days, could have easily done more miles, legs felt good the whole time. It was cold because the humidity has been high, and there was no sunshine. Today I needed a good butt kicking so I texted Wheaties Boy and he texted me back to get my butt out the door. It helped.
The only question I have is, where's the snow?
4 comments:
I'm debating whether or not to enter the fray on the subject, but my main concern is people who think that just getting "troubled" people medical attention will solve the problem, as if all neurological problems and mental illnesses were completely treatable and somehow spree killers just fell through the cracks in the system.
I know that all the mental health care in the world won't solve the problem, but there are a lot of things we can do better. It's a multifacted problem and there are no simple solutions. There are no solutions to stop it completely. Seems like there are a lot of copycat actions and threats right after something like this. But we must be able to have a better way of identifying the potential for this kind of action...
Well, for what it's worth, I blogged about it today.
Steve, great post!
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