I was standing the middle of downtown Springfield covering the March For Our Lives Saturday and it hit me like a ton of bricks.
The problem with this whole story is that people are more interested in figuring out the motive to the march rather than the underlying issue of it.
The problem is that there are too many people talking, from the media to the politicians. They are so many people talking, yelling at some point that no one has the time or the interest to try to find a solution to gun violence.
Aren’t the kids right though?
What’s wrong with their pleas?
What’s wrong with a parent sending their kid to school knowing that they will be safe?What’s wrong with the woman walking to the grocery store secure in the knowledge that she won’t be assaulted?
What’s wrong with the older man or woman wanting to sit in the park knowing that no one will bother them?
What’s wrong with the kids in the park just being kids?
What’s wrong with the student learning and the teacher teaching without the fear that what they are doing will be interrupted by senseless violence?
All together ---- NOTHING.
There isn’t anything wrong with any of that. But so many people are more interested in being heard than being part of the solution.
The President doesn’t help anything when he talks about the NRA. You can have a debate about guns without ever mentioning those three letters, one’s that polarize everyone. It is my experience in covering these things that once you mention those letters the issue becomes about them rather about the real problem.
The Media doesn’t help any either when they take the issue for its ratings value rather than its responsibility to lead a discussion on finding the solution. It never used to be that way.
And neither side of the issue really does itself any good when they proclaim in the first 15 seconds that the other side is wrong just because they are.
You can probably find a solution. It will involve give and take. It will be part be part of a national discussion where no one will feel that they got everything, but it will be a start and something that can be built on.
And, that is all the kids….that is all the people want.
They want to be kids.
And kids of all ages want to live in peace.