It's my fault!
by Jon Worley

Tuesday morning in Springfield, Ore., Kipland Kinkel shot his parents, laid a minefield around his house and then went to school and shot 23 people, killing one. A month ago, a 14-year-old boy shot a teacher at a school dance in Edinboro, Penn. Two months ago, an 11-year-old and a 13-year-old killed five and injured 10 more in a shooting at a Jonesboro, Ark., school. And that's just this year's honor roll.

There are a number of similarities in these cases. In all three, the suspects had ready access to guns and other weapons in their houses. That fact alone has many folks screaming for more gun control. Now, while I generally don't see the need to amass a massive arsenal, I don't buy that particular argument. See, if three young rapists all had ready access to Playboy before they committed their crimes, rational folks wouldn't call for Hugh Hefner's arrest. The same logic applies to the guns in these cases.

Jonesboro, Edinboro and Springfield are all cities (or towns) that are as much rural as urban. My guess is that a good number of kids in these areas skip a week of school in November or December to go hunting with their fathers or parents (yes, there are women who hunt). I know that the Michigan and Pennsylvania legislatures (both year-round assemblies) have "hunting breaks" when deer season comes around, and I would guess that other states have similar recesses. Fact is, a lot of kids grow up with guns, and the vast majority of them know how and when to use them.

And it is only at this point where I launch my salvo at the National Rifle Association. It is the official position of the NRA that without the second amendment (the right to bear arms), all of our rights are in jeopardy. In other words, if our rights get abridged in any way we don't like, we must "defend" our rights by shooting whoever or whatever is in our way. Now, most NRA people would say that I'm taking a specific and sophisticated political argument and taking it to its most illogical extreme. Not so. The most illogical extreme would be to characterize this position as "If you don't give me what I want, I'm gonna shoot you and take it anyway". In other words, armed robbery.

But none of these cases are about robbery. Kids generally don't need a gun to take what they want. A Star Wars figure, a packet of Tic Tacs, a Hanson CD. Those are the sorts of things kids want, and all they have to do is stick such things in their pockets. The kids who killed in these cases all did so out of a sense of revenge. By the time these kids pulled the triggers, no one could have undone the hurt they felt.

And that's where the NRA credo comes in. These kids were defending their honor, in one way or another. Blame John Wayne, if you want, although the Duke himself usually didn't play the vengeful character. But this code of revenge and retribution is one that goes unspoken throughout much of the country. I saw this code played out a number of times when my family moved to New Mexico when I was 12. One fight always led to another, and in a couple situations, they went on for three or four years. But even in the longest-running battles, the skirmishes didn't escalate to gunplay, even though nearly everyone had access to Dad's guns. I guess we had more sense.

This code of vengeance is applied liberally in our criminal justice system. Every week I hear another prosecutor say, "We have to make this person pay", as if a person can actually make reparations for taking a human life. Most people readily admit that their belief in the death penalty stems from the need for revenge, and if they don't, they're in denial. Our culture feeds on revenge, and now we are finally passing the feces from our entrails. Or, in almost the exact same spirit as Malcolm X's comment on the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the chickens have come home to roost.

Prosecutors in many kids killing kids cases like to blame outside influences. The band Marilyn Manson, Satanism in general, Stephen King and the movie "Natural Born Killers" have all been scapegoated in the last year. No one wants to believe that their own personal beliefs could have any relation to such horrible acts. "It's someone else's fault!" we all shout as we point fingers. Well, as it is becoming painfully clear, we have no one to blame but ourselves. Yes, these children are obviously emotionally disturbed. They do not process certain ideas and emotions in a normal fashion. They believe that if they kill what is bothering them, then their lives will be better. Revenge is mine, they say. Not so different from the crowd in Florida which celebrated the "Ted Bundy-cue".

Yes, it's horrible that children are taking guns and killing. Of course, crimes like these didn't become national tragedies until white kids began killing white kids. But that's a whole other argument, one that many folks have already quite rightly discussed. In all of these cases, we as a society need to take some more personal responsibility for these shootings. So, if you want to blame anyone, blame me first. And then turn that finger right around so it points at yourself. We might start getting at the roots of the problem that way.

Jon Worley shot a rabbit once. At least he thinks so. The blast from the 12-gauge didn't leave much other than some fur floating in the air.

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