For those who have not heard, 9:30 a.m today, a gunman (20 yr old) walked into a Newtown,CT elementary school (K-4th grade) and gunned down 27 people, 18 children are dead.
I feel so sick over this, My heart goes out to the families of the victims of this tragedy. I am scared for my own children who are at school about an hour away from where the incident occured.
why is it O.K for a civilian to have a semi-automatic gun? How, why?
Where are we safe...not at school, not at the mall, work or the movie theater!
When I wrote this post, I wasn't really trying to get political - more just grieving and questioning. When my son arrived home from school, I welled up inside and couldn't help but cry. He is 14 and the principal at his high school made an announcement and reassured the kids that they were safe. He said that they had a police presence at school today. He told me that he felt sad about what happened. My daughter arrived home a little bit later, she is 11 and didn't know anything about what happened. I talked to her and she felt safe when I told her that the shooter was dead.
I am having a harder time dealing with this than the kids.
its not guns that are the problem. its lack of care for mental illnesses. They have been looking at the profiles of the recent shooters and they are young men. Schizophrenia usually appears in the teens to mid twenties but there is no care for these people. Make changes? lets get these people the help they need and get them out of the population if they are a threat to others.
As I said in another post regarding this:
This is NOT THE TIME FOR POLITICS. We can all sit around and play "if only" but the sad fact is, 26 sets of families have been completely destroyed today. And, how are we ever going to begin to explain this atrocity to our children? And, think of all those that saw and heard the devastation and war that went on in that classroom today.
I say we band together, lift up prayers of support, strength and love to all of those families because by God, they are going to need it. I cannot imagine losing a child, but then to lose one in this way is beyond understanding. And, our children are not going to be able to get away from hearing about it, so we need to be ready for the questions, comments and anxiety they will be experiencing.
God bless those babies and their teachers and caregivers that are now angels in heaven. And may the families find the strength to carry on . . .
I think we need to consider the ROOT CAUSE of these problems, and handle it. The root cause is unhandled or wrongly handled mental illness.
People can go back and forth over the gun issue, but that is not the problem! Just a symptom.
Putting people on antidepressents and sending them home is NOT the answer! So many antidepressents or types of medication like that have warnings that the OPPOSITE type of behavior can occur, such as homicide or suicide. We need a better solution for caring for our mentally ill.
I have such a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach right now. Something must be done, I'm terrified of sending my daughter to school next week. He birthday is next week, Christmas is coming, I just cannot imagine someone hurting kids just because.
I remember being a teen, my parents divorce. I was hurting like hell, never EVER did it occur to me hurting other because it wasn't fair they were happy and I was not. What the hell, why didn't he go to the police station to open fire, he knew his a$$ would have been shot down as soon as he got past the door.
I won't even go into gun laws because it's not the place but this is happening more and more often and something must be done.
I just replied this in another thread:
"I was watching tv when the show cut off for breaking news.
I know I'm in TX but I got such rush of anxiety when I saw it that I had to go get my oldest daughter from school (5th grade); I know it was impulsive but I needed her home.
While I waited for her in the lobby a whole 2nd grade class walked in front of me following their teacher, all the children were very happy talking about cupcakes and waved bye when they saw me, I cried all the way home.
I cannot believe someone would do something like this, all those little kids...I cannot imagine what their families must be going through."
I'm sick over this too. It's just so awful. Growing up, these things NEVER happened in schools (in the 80's).... I never had a "lockdown drill" at my school, nowadays, every single teacher has been prepped on what to do in a lockdown and how to respond to a shooting. We practice them once a year at our school, just like the old fire drill and earthquake drill (for Ca residents) that you remember growing up.
This is just one thing that stood out to me in reading the accounts I've seen so far, all teachers responded exactly as we are all trained. What is wrong with our society that we have to train schools how to respond to these kinds of emergencies?
it seems as though everything we heard yesterday was about half true.
Even if we stop the manufacture and sale of all firearms in the world-right now-it would not stop people from obtaining and using guns improperly. More emphasis clearly has to be placed on mental healthcare-no matter what the cost-and the $4 trillion of legislation ( 1/6 of our economy) is not going to do this. Do you know how much security could be purchased for all the nations schools with $4 trillion? It should be and it could be and absolute impossibility for a gunman to get into a school-we need to wake up and handle it.
Just need to clarify what a semi-automatic handgun is - a self-loading firearm which performs all steps necessary to prepare the weapon to fire again after firing.
I think you may be mistaking his firearm with an automatic weapon. What he was carrying was a standard firearm also carried by police officers, military and many, many civilians. He had to pull the trigger each and every time he shot.
I, for one, carry a semi-automatic pistol everyday. And that is because I do not feel safe at the mall, movie theater, schools, etc.
At my son's school, you can't go into the school proper without being buzzed in. They have a camera where you show your ID, and they check it with the list of folks allowed access. If you aren't, you are told to go get proper approval. Last year, there was a bank robbery within two miles of my son's school. Instantly, three school systems in a 20 mile radius went on lockdown. I was bringing my son to school from a dentist appt, and didn't know until I got there. The Principal and three big burly assistants were guarding all the doors into the school.
This is why, although I had a knee jerk feeling to get my son from school now, I am waiting for the school day to be let out, as I feel safe with him there, knowing the staff are looking out for them.
My prayers go out to the families, and also to those worrying about their children.
There are so many different problems that cause this... I won't get into the guns/no guns aspect, but we also have to think of how we treat the mentally ill AND how the media covers these things.
Kids today seem to think that taking a gun to school and killing people or committing suicide is THE thing to do when being bullied. Why? Because one person did it and the media went ballistic... Then another person did it and the media went even more crazy... Then another person and another person and another person all with the media going coo coo over these lunatics. If the media would just STOP airing things like this... Far less kids would even consider it an option!
I was asleep until 1:30 today and when I woke up and turned on the TV, imagine my shock.....I just started to cry. Pulled my son to me and just hugged him. Just read the article that said the kid killed his mom this morning at home before going on this rampage and that's all they know right now. Surely this kid showed signs of being this f*cked up before today?!?!
I have been hearing on the radio about funds and collections already being started for the families. I plan on donating what I can. These families will never heal properly and the kids that made it out alive are permanently scarred. So very sad.
L., I am heartsick over this and my stomach is all tied up in knots over it. I can barely think about the gun issue right now. I am trying to deal with the thought that I probably know people involved. I don't have a list of names yet. I am so afraid to look. I came here on this site first, though I'm sure that doesn't even make sense.
Moms can't band together on this, to be honest. The gun lobby is far too strong. If you look at Senator McCain's daughter's stance on guns, I think it makes a great deal of sense. She disagrees with the NRA about certain key points. However, I don't think anything will ever change.
I don't know where to go with my feelings of sorrow and dread. It's like a little 9/11 for me, I guess, wondering how many people I know who are involved. Maybe that doesn't make sense, but it's the first thing I thought.
Let us allow the family members of those that have been killed set the laws. Meaning from all of the shooting victims in this country.
They can chair and make up the committees to decide these things.
They know best what the consequences are. I would trust their judgment and requests.. Will you too?
