Loss of the Innocent

Trigger warning: My anti-hunting friends may want to avoid reading this post

I own a gun. I don’t take for granted my right to own one. I use my gun for hunting. It’s a .270 Winchester. I hunt white tail deer and I’ve killed a handful of bucks with it, but that doesn’t mean shooting them is easy. You don’t just point the gun and have the deer drop to the ground. You have to find the deer in your scope, aim, and shoot it in the right place so that the animal dies immediately. 

If you miss, you have to reject the shell, slam another bullet into the chamber, find where the deer went, aim and squeeze the trigger again. This process is not immediate. If I have to shoot more than one bullet it’s going to take some time and my aim has to be perfect.

​This week, another school shooting tragedy. I can’t help but wonder if that shooter, and all the mass shooters before him, had to use a manual (not automatic or semi-automatic) gun like mine, how many more lives would have been saved. How much more time would a manual gun give potential victims to run and hide, or a hero to tackle that person to the ground?
Why does any civilian need an automatic weapon? What situation would require a non-military citizen of the United States to have an automatic weapon? Why are they even legal to sell and own? Why aren’t they banned?

The sad truth is our children are being murdered by people carrying automatic/semi-automatic weapons. Innocent children. Parents kiss their babies goodbye, and send them off to school to gain an education. They might have said goodbye with the promise of pizza and game night that evening. Or maybe planned on cooking their favorite meal or taking them to practice after school. Instead they’re planning funerals. Picking out tiny caskets, trying to wrap their minds around how they will get through life without their little one, how they’ll get through the next day, the next hour, the next minute, the next breath, without them. This has got to stop.

Gun reform shouldn’t be a red or blue issue, it shouldn’t be one staunch opinion or another based on your political party. Instead, we should all be banding together to stop the madness, the death and destruction.

I challenge anyone to give me a good reason why they need an automatic (or semiautomatic) weapon. I guarantee I’ll call bullshit.

Yes, as I said in the beginning, I appreciate my right to own a firearm. But since I’m not anticipating a zombie apocalypse, nor serving in the military, I don’t need anything beyond a manual gun. And I’m not sure why anyone else does either. Banning automatic and semi-automatic weapons feels like a no-brainer to me. Why isn’t there a bipartisan effort to ban those guns? If you own one, or plan to buy one, I implore you to think about how you would feel if somebody in your family was the victim of a mass shooting.

I don’t care what your political beliefs are, or whether or not you’re a proud card-carrying member of the NRA. What I care about is human life and common sense tactics/legislation that we could enact to help protect those lives. This insanity has got to stop. We need to find ways to prevent our children from being slaughtered. Yes, mental health is an issue. Poor parenting may be an issue. While any issue that contributes to someone becoming a mass murderer is bad enough, allowing them to be armed with an automatic weapon is like throwing fuel on a fire.

My apologies for the heavy topic of this month’s blog post, but it’s weighing heavy on my mind. If this article makes just one person stop and think, even just for a second about how they can help make the changes that are needed, to help us all get on the same page, then it was worth it. Till next time, dear readers.

*Note: Before the haters start coming at me picking at the details, any mention of “automatic weapon” in this article also applies to “semi-automatic” weapons. Whether you can repeatedly pull the trigger and fire several rounds, or simply hold the trigger to do so, both result in mass loss of life when in the hands of a shooter intent on taking multiple lives.

​