Much has to be done about it

The whole world is appalled at the atrocity committed in Newtown CT on Friday, December the 14th, 2012. Twenty children, six and seven years old, along with six adults, who were their teachers and psychologist, were killed by a young man who used a repeating high-powered rifle to carry out his insane plan. He killed himself as well. Children and their teachers must be protected against mentally deranged persons who satisfy their aggressions by invading schools and murdering students and teachers. People in public places need protection too.

We hear there must be effective laws governing the licensing of firearms, and that massacres must cease. We are told it is a complicated issue to resolve. Definitely so, and it involves not only the control of who owns a gun, but the way in which the minds of people are conditioned into accepting that carrying a gun is simply a way of life. Many people carry a gun, believing it is for their protection. At the slightest provocation, it is used to settle an argument. In Louis L’amour’s Wild West books, arguments were often settled when one or both opponents lay dead in the blood-drenched dusty street. It was an absolute waste of human life. Neither one would ever enjoy another sunny day or benefit others by his God-given talents. Children murdered in their classrooms will never have the satisfaction of graduating from public or high schools, universities or technical schools, developing their musical or sports talents, or of becoming successful in society. Their parents can never enjoy seeing them get married and have their own children.

We’ve experienced other atrocities in schools and have seen similar instances in public places. Not just the guns have to be controlled, which includes their manufacture, importation, sales and the gun clubs to which enthusiastic members belong, but it is necessary to condition the way of thinking of Americans and Canadians, and in fact of all people in our world. At one time, violence was condemned on television. Now it is rampant.

Gunfire is seen in advertisements for the most recent movie releases. It is to be considered an acceptable way of living, or might I change that to say it is accepted as a way to die…in gun blasts and a hail of bullets. Those movies are not born out of intelligent creativity, but from the expectation of moviemakers to make millions by exploiting the public’s insatiable desire to see the most shocking episodes to which they can be exposed. This kind of creativity is not born from intelligence, but from evil thinking. For those who attend movies or enjoy movies at home, there have to programs that are enlightening, to provide ways to spend evenings that will allow times that are unpolluted by violence, enabling everyone to think about life and eternity!

In other ways, young minds are conditioned to accept violence as a way of life and our attention must be given to eliminate those methods. Electronic games, designed to kill one’s opponent, are intriguing to receptive minds. Monster killers and robotic persons with various weapons are the toys designed so children can maneuver them to kill their opponent in one slash. Mind-conditioning methods designed to imagine killing one’s opponent have to be replaced with programs that will challenge minds in constructive ways. Teaching handiwork, music and sports would be an excellent substitute.

Stimulation of a person’s imagination to think of things that are edifying is more honorable than the excitement generated by fighting, or by teaching that violence is acceptable as a way of life. Psychologists remind us that erratic thinking is addictive, and it creates the desire for more of the same, but of increasing violence. A similar example is the feeding of one’s mind on pornography, which leads to the need for satisfaction in reality.

The whole aspect of training healthy minds and controlling gun laws doesn’t have to be as complicated as it seems. Everyone must resolve to develop a healthy mind and body, and appreciate all God has given us, and to help others who may not be as fortunate or who would appreciate a helping hand. All that would be better than to spend our time satisfying inappropriate desires and thinking how we should be protecting ourselves. We need to think positively, rather than negatively.

I too, in my piping career, have experienced playing for the funeral of a student who was shot in her classroom.  When my wife and I lived in Winnipeg, Canada, I was asked to pipe at such a memorial service.  A boy smuggled a long gun into the Technical School by hiding it in his pant leg. Innumerable families and friends of bereaved families suffer because society has not cracked down on the causes of atrocities. They will carry their sorrow for life.  We’ll be safer when people are conditioned to think differently about the causes of violence. The answer is not only to consider “guns and their control,” but it involves our complacency and how to rise above it.”

Please visit http://www.sandyhookpromise.org and make the Sandy Hook Promise today.  Promise to honor the 26 lives lost at Sandy Hook Elementary School.  Promise to do everything you can to encourage and support common sense solutions to make our communities safer from similar acts of violence.

Keith MacDonald, OD
The Church Piper