I sat down at my desk, gathered all my data, images, videos, and links. I was ready to make my point about the gun control debate. I spoke my words, cleaned up the audio... and stopped.
I pulled the plug.
I have major problems with either "side" of the debate.
The amount of fancy graphs and maps and percentages and laws... I realized it all misses the entire fucking point. And most of it is false. No amount of correlation will lead you to the answer.
On one hand, we have a crowd demanding change. A change in law, to control and limit the accessibility of firearms.
One the other, we have a crowd demanding change. A change in law, to free and proliferate the accessibility of firearms.
Neither of these crowds have the answer to the problem: violence used against innocent people.
No amount of law or freedom will affect this reality. No amount of enforcement, no amount of preparedness, will stop someone determined to kill.
So long as there are humans pushed to desperate ends, so long as there are individuals who prefer violence as a means to an end, we will not escape this reality.
We are raised in a culture of death. Some justifiable, necessary even; most... not. While self defense is the most viable option for the living, the only way to stop wanton acts of violence is to dismantle the context that breeds it.
And I have little hope mankind is ready for such a feat. We thrive on it. We feed on it.
The very debate breeds it.
All of us. Every day. We consume emotion, we consume our environment, we consume each other.
This is our human condition, but it need not be our damnation.
This does not mean we are powerless.
Quite the contrary... We have the ability to transcend this culture, but we do not, will not, achieve this through coercion or force. It can only be achieved by choice, by preference.
Increasing the cost of coercion can only go so far, as there are infinite ways to inflict harm.
No, we must find a way to reach our fellow man at their lowest and darkest points. The most isolated and misunderstood are the most vulnerable to worst ideas, and thus, they are the most likely vehicles to act out.
It's not about what "we" need to do as a society. It's not about telling anyone what they can or cannot have. It's not about control.
It's about decentralizing the human condition itself, and thus, minimizing the preference for violent coercion beyond any one individual.
Are we even capable? Is there an answer? Or as humans, are we just mad?