More thoughts & prayers... no real action.
Those words have become meaningless
Earlier this week, there was another school shooting in the United States.
I know, shocker… We’ve become numb to it at this point.
According to the Gun Violence Archive, there have been almost 400 mass shootings this year. That’s an average of more than 1.5 mass shootings every day.1
Pro-gun activists say it has nothing to do with guns, yet the US has had 57 times as many school shootings as the other major industrialized nations combined.
At least Georgia Governor Brian Kemp offered his thoughts and prayers.
Thoughts and Prayers. It makes me sick to my stomach. These politicians act like that have our best interests at heart, I don’t believe it:
I read the arguments on X and it boggles my mind.
People who are pro-guns are SO CONVINCED guns are not the problem. They say, “cars kill people, should they be banned too?”2
But why does a 14-year-old have such easy access to military-grade weapons?
Shouldn’t he be out playing with his friends? Oh, that’s right, kids these days have nowhere to hang out.
Sure there are a ton of gun stores in the vicinity of the school, but a 14-year-old can’t buy guns from these places. Idk, I’m not an expert on any of this, none of it makes any sense to me. I don’t understand how such a wealthy and advanced nation can still allow this to happen over and over again.
We’re stuck in this constant doom loop:
This idea of “Thought and Prayers” has become an absolute joke.
Comedian Anthony Jeselnik makes fun of the phrase in his 2015 “Thoughts and Prayers” routine: “Do you know what that’s worth, f***ing nothing”
This isn’t just a comedy routine, he’s stating the facts. Thoughts and prayers aren’t going to do anything to prevent another shooting from happening in the future.
In 2016, developer Mike Lacher made “Thoughts and Prayers: The Game”.
“America faces an epidemic of mass shootings” reads the title screen. “It's up to you to stop them … with the power of your thoughts and prayers.”
In the game you try to prevent mass shootings by pressing buttons that say “think” and “pray.” If you press a button that says “ban assault weapon sales,” you’re rejected and the screen reads: “Weak!”, “UnAmerican!”, “Pray harder!”
How many more prayers need to be said before something gets done?
How many more children and innocent people need to lose their lives before gun laws become stricter?
The Dalai Lama has tweeted that prayers alone won’t do anything.
Pope Francis has also talked about how prayers need to be followed by action:
“Prayer that doesn’t lead to concrete action is a fruitless and incomplete prayer”
One of the reasons I left the US is because I don’t think enough change will happen in my lifetime. Guns are now the most common cause of children’s deaths in the United States, and still, all politicians do is offer “thoughts and prayers”.
I don’t have kids yet, but when I do, I sure don’t want them to grow up in a place where weapons of war are celebrated as a god-given right.
End rant.
Until next time my friends,
<3 B
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Mass shootings are defined as those in which four or more victims are shot.
Car accidents can be an accident. Deaths due to guns are almost never accidents — they are almost always intentional misuses.
I will never send my kids to government run schools
What makes a person want to do something like that?
Must be many things… like the movie Joker… it’s a slew of things.
Even with guns out of the equation, the tortured soul would still remain.
I fear that mass media amplification of school shootings contributes to more of them.
I wonder, why schools? Is that where the shooters are tortured the most?
More questions than answers. I think it wise to go upstream to what’s creating the psycho criminals