The ones who control gun violence

I tried to muster some horror, some sorrow — any emotion, really — when I heard about the shooting deaths of eight people at an Indianapolis FedEx facility.

Honestly, though, I couldn't.

No disrespect meant to the Indianapolis victims but we've all been here before. People die at the hands of non-police gun wielders literally every day in this country.

I've written angry, frustrated posts again and again and again in this blog; search for "gun control" to see them. I just went over those posts, and the tragedy of our time is that from 2012, when I wrote the first one, to 2018, when last I was moved to comment, right up to today, not a goddamned thing has gotten better.

Why? Because too goddamned many of you are single-issue voters who will crucify your (generally Republican) elected representatives if they even gesticulate vaguely in the direction of legislation making guns a little more challenging to own. As I wrote in 2015:

The problem wasn't and isn't with the majority of us. It was and is with the minority that believes any regulation is an abridgement of the Second Amendment.

You folks are the ones who need to get over your absolutism on the subject of gun ownership.

You folks are the ones with blood on your hands.

And you folks are making the rest of us angrier and angrier, thus making us more, not less, likely to countenance drastic overreach in gun-safety legislation — maybe even Constitutional amendments. You should think about our concerns before we stop giving a shit about yours.

Okay, done speaking to the Second Amendment absolutists.

For the rest of us, since it would be foolish to wait for a come-to-Jesus moment among Second Amendment absolutists, our only option is to become as single-mindedly focused as they. If you live in a county or state whose elected officials fear the wrath of gun-rights groups (not just the NRA), you will have to become a single-issue voter. You must tell your representatives, "You will only get my vote if you work your ass off to make meaningful gun-safety legislation happen" at either the state or federal level.

(It will, of course, be a much more effective strategy if you can corral a few thousand of your family and friends to do the same.)

By the same token, you must work to defeat even your favorite representative if he or she is a Second Amendment absolutist or provides aid and comfort to them.

Incidentally, one sign that your representative has the wrong mindset is the beyond-stupid argument, "This bill wouldn't end gun violence". Of course no single law will end gun violence. No single law or safety measure has eliminated injuries and deaths from car crashes, either — but we have a lot fewer than we did. The same common-sense logic applies to gun-safety legislation, too. Pretending to hold out for a miraculous bill that would fix everything insults voters' intelligence.

The path toward a less bloody future is blocked by Second Amendment absolutists: they control the level of gun violence in this country through their irrational intransigence. If they can't be unburdened of their paranoia, the rest of us will have no choice but to match their fanatical zeal to defend their weapons with our own fanatical zeal to defend our lives.