Tragedy in Tucson

I woke up today to hear that AZ Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was shot, along with Judge John Roll and many other bystanders. A psychopath went on this shooting spree at a Safeway down in Tucson at a small rally. Thankfully Rep. Giffords looks like she may pull through; Judge Roll and some of the others weren’t as lucky. What I hoped to see was a universal condemnation of the gunman as a lunatic and an outpouring of support for the families of those injured or killed. I hoped, but knew that it was too much. I knew I’d be disappointed, and I was right.

Not ten minutes after the shooting, people were already politicizing and pointing fingers. As Giffords is a Democrat, the fingers naturally all started pointing right – Palin seems to be the biggest target, because she said Giffords was a “target” in the election. Get that? Target! Like what you shoot at! She even put an image of crosshairs over AZ to illustrate this on her website! Obviously Palin called for her assassination! Obviously Tea Partiers are insane murderous psychopaths! Obviously people like that shouldn’t have guns! Oh, the humanity!

But wait. Markos from the Daily Kos ALSO referred to Giffords as a target with a bullseye over her district, with one of his co-bloggers saying she was “dead to me.“And Giffords is a blue dog Democrat, one that gets a lot of flak and anger from the far left for not being far enough left herself.

And wasn’t there a judge there too? Judge Roll? Didn’t he actually DIE in the attack? Why aren’t we hearing about him? The judge received death threats over his decision to certify a case where illegal immigrants sued an Arizona rancher for $32 million. He was under full-time police protection for a month.

And weren’t other people there too? A 9-year-old girl was killed too, with a confirmed death toll of 6 so far according to CNN and rising. What about them?

And who is the shooter? A quick look at his Youtube channel reveals that he’s a bit of an anarchist and an atheist, believes that money should go away, and that the government is trying to subject us all to mind control. He also lists the Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf as his favorite books. Not quite your normal Tea Party set of beliefs. In fact, he sounds like a raving, rage-filled – and possibly schizophrenic – lunatic. Which he is.

And that’s the point of all this spinning and twisting, isn’t it? One guy goes nuts and shoots a bunch of people, including a vaunted, important, larger-than-life person in Congresswoman Giffords. It’s a scary thought to a lot of people, that one man could change things that much. And so, like all the great conspiracies, they try to latch it on to a bigger picture. If it’s Palin’s fault, then there’s another larger-than-life figure to blame, a movement to demonize, a conspiracy at work. It’s not just one man, it can’t be. It can’t be so seemingly meaningless as that. Life can’t be that fragile.

But it is.

So people latch on to the part that interests them – not the injured people, not the dead judge or little girl – and politicize it, spin it, and try to make it anything but what it is: a single, evil man doing something horrible. Because if that can happen, then it can happen to anyone, and that’s just too scary to think about for some people. Bill Whittle wrote brilliantly about this idea a few years ago.

So please: take a step back and see this for what it is:  a crime, a multiple murder, a tragedy. Don’t try to spin this to your political belief system or make this about you. The blame lies squarely at the feet of the shooter. Instead, ask yourself: what can the community do for those families who were hurt by this? What can I do?

When this is becomes the natural response, instead of a full day of blameshifting and namecalling, then we’ll finally be getting somewhere. In the meantime, my thoughts and prayers go out to Giffords and the others injured, as well as the families of those killed.

2 thoughts on “Tragedy in Tucson”

  1. Yeah, as I was flipping from MSNBC to FOX to CNN, there was plenty of spin from both sides. So disgusting.

    My prayers are going out to all those who are suffering today. <3

  2. Well said! I want both extremes to shut UP and do something positive for a change, and stop using this horrible thing to puff themselves up.

    Absolutely heartsick about the dead an injured, hoping that those currently hospitalized recover fully, and the families and friends of those killed make it through this terrible time!!

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