Sanctimonious Solutions

"There exists in this country, sadly, a callous, corrupt and corrupting shadow industry that sells and sows violence against its own people through vicious, violent video games with names like Bullet Storm, Grand Theft Auto, Mortal Combat and Splatterhouse."
Wayne LaPierre, National Rifle Association executive vice-president

Not surprisingly, anyone listening in on this address on the part of the National Rifle Association, might have imagined it to be a mea-culpa, an admission of responsibility -- at least half-way through the declaration.  Since many people consider the National Rifle Association to be a callous, corrupt and corrupting shadow industry selling and sowing violence.

The sententious outing of the video industry is not without merit.  But disclaiming any and all responsibility for the proliferation and sanctification of the gun culture in America as a reflection of its founding principles is an exercise in perfidious dishonesty.  The American gun fetish has been groomed and enthusiastically supported by the gun lobby reflecting NRA values.

That the NRA executive vice-president gave condemnatory voice to the media for having "demonized lawful gun owners" while at the same time it "rewards [mass shooters] with wall-to-wall attention" is also not without a shadow of truth.  Human beings have a deep fascination with and interest in social malfunctions of this type; they both horrify and mystify.

His pious declaration of the moral superiority of the National Rifle Association is somewhat galling and gagging, but true to form in his assertion that, while: "some have tried to exploit tragedy for political gain, we have remained respectfully silent".  Silent simply because at that juncture, fresh off the horrific events, it was politically in their best interests to remain respectfully silent. 

"Politicians pass laws for gun-free school zones. They issue press releases bragging about them. They post signs advertising them. And, in doing so, they tell every insane killer in America that schools are the safest place to inflict maximum mayhem with minimum risk", he scolded.  This, then, is to become the new norm in America, that all schools at every level of the education system must be in lock-down mode, patrolled by armed marksmen.

This will represent the ultimate values in a free democratic society that extolls its virtues as a caring society prepared to launch itself into peace-keeping action to ensure that other, less democratic and hugely conflicted societies do not do huge harm to their civilian populations.  "Will you at least admit it's possible that 26 little kids - that 26 innocent lives might have been spared that day?" had an armed guard been in place.

He cannot even get the numbers right; twenty children, six adults, not taking into account the mother of the killer and the demented killer himself.  New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg got it right when he parsed the NRA statement: "Instead of offering solutions to a problem they have helped create, they offered a paranoid, dystopian vision of a more dangerous and violent America where everyone is armed and no place is safe."