Our decades-long nightmare never ends.

by Therese Odell, posted in something else

What are we doing? When are we going to do something? Anything?

As you certainly know by now, 19 children and two teachers are dead in Uvalde, Texas after an 18-year-old man shot them in their elementary school yesterday.

This shooting happened a little over a week after ten people were murdered in a supermarket in Buffalo. This shooting happened a little over week after six people were shot and one killed at a Laguna Beach church.

And yet, we’ll probably do nothing.

My youngest child will be graduating from high school next week, and ever since December 14, 2012, a stone of fear would settle in my heart every morning when he and his older brother left for school. Every morning for ten years I’ve hugged them a little too hard and whispered a silent prayer to myself that they would be safe because that’s all I could do. I can’t protect my children when they go to school and our politicians — the Republicans, specifically — refuse to protect my children when they go to school.

Instead, the GOP would rather lash out at imaginary monsters in our schools like CRT or “grooming” by the LGBT community than confront the actual, very real threat of gun violence that we each face every day when we leave our homes, whether it be to go to the grocery store, or church, or to work, or school.

In a particularly sick twist, the NRA will be here in my hometown of Houston this weekend, just 280 miles from yesterday’s massacre. Republicans, including Governor Greg Abbott, Ted Cruz, and Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick will travel from Uvalde, where they offered nothing more than their “thoughts and prayers” to parents who had to submit DNA to be able to identify their babies, to the George R. Brown Convention Center so as to bend the knee before the blood-soaked gun lobby.

And the most infuriating thing about all of this is that there are common-sense measures we can take, things that most Americans — 90% of Americans! — agree on, including universal background checks and red flag laws.

But Republicans like my despicable senator Ted Cruz will insist that the only way to deal with gun violence is somehow more guns, before complaining that the other side is “politicizing” the issue — as if it’s not a political issue. And Democrats Joe Manchin and Kristen Sinema will promise to do everything in their power to pass legislation — everything except lift the filibuster rule to allow their side of the aisle to pass even the most meager of measures.

And thus we get nowhere. We do nothing. We wait for the next mass shooting.

There’s always a next mass shooting.

I’m trying to not sound defeatist, truly. We have an opportunity this November — just five months from now — to vote out of office these monsters who are beholden only to the NRA and trying to prove themselves to be the most pro-gun. We have an opportunity this year to rid ourselves of Republicans like Greg Abbott who not just refuse to do anything about guns, but ACTIVELY MAKE US LESS SAFE:

And it is incumbent upon all of us, we mothers and fathers who say those silent prayers and hug just a little too tight every morning, to make sure that we are registered to vote and then do so on November 8. It is the single most important thing we can do to keep our children safe.

But after ten years of doing nothing in the face of Sandy Hook, of El Paso, of Santa Fe, of Las Vegas, of Orlando, of Sutherland Springs, of Stoneman Douglas, of Tree of Life, of Thousand Oaks, of the Navy Yard, of Boulder, of Virginia Beach, of Buffalo … after ten years and over 2,000 mass shootings, is anything really going to change in this country right now?

I hope so. God, I hope so.

But I wonder.

8 thoughts on “Our decades-long nightmare never ends.”

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  2. Well Therese, it gives me a little hope that people like you are from Texas.
    I grieve with you.

    Reply

    1. Thank you, Debra. You know, I love my city, but every year, every day it becomes harder and harder to love my state. There is a part of me that is tempted to leave, but there’s a bigger part that refuses to be chased out by the extremists running the state. I resolved a few years back to stay here and fight to turn it blue. Or at least purple. We’re trying.
      -T

      Reply

      1. I’m a conservative and I don’t like how far right things are going. People please vote in your primaries. Stop allowing the most partisan 10% of the population to chose our candidates. Bring them back towards center instead of pandering to the extremes.

  3. We need to end bitter bipartisan politics with 0 compromise. Then we can find a real lasting solution. End the slippery slope argument for every issue and find common ground. Just look at Switzerland, they have lots of guns and no mass shootings! Perhaps we could follow their model? Oh and better mental health care. That is always needed here.

    Reply

    1. It’s a horrible fact, but school shootings hit harder after you become a parent. Sending you and your loved ones love, Josh.

      -T

      Reply
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