Everybody talks about it. Everyone has a different answer for that question we all ask ourselves. What is the problem with our society? Is there a problem with our society? Obviously - we have these school shootings, government building suicide massacres, and crazed bombers willing to sacrifice hundreds of potential victims for their 'cause.' It shows some sort of flaw within our social structure, does it not? I love to hear what people say. For this reason, I give an answer/fact response to what most people consider the reason why these things occur.
1. No God in School - There are several things the Supreme Court has allowed within schools, as well as disapproved. Here, you will see the various landmark cases the supreme court ruled. If one has studied the law of school, or the rights of the students within the institution, one would know that God can exist in school. However, in all cases, it must be the students doing the praying, by themselves, without coercing others through the use of captive audience privileges (i.e. praying in a speech made as an assignment; leading prayer over the loudspeaker, and so on.). Students may pray, but to themselves or in a group of like-minded students without forcing others to participate through the use of peer pressure. This decision was made to protect the religious rights of every student attending the state supported facility. By not forcing a student to pray a Christian prayer against their will - say they do not pray the same way as Catholics, or Methodists, or Lutherans; Maybe they are Jewish, Muslim, Hindu or Buddhist - It is actually enforcing that student's right to pray on their own. School's may give a 'moment of silence' as a time for prayer, allowing their students to pray of their own accord. Whether or not they do so is their responsibility. If there is no God in school, it is because the students responsible for praying on their own are not doing so. Why? Are they not being educated at home what the religion they follow expects, or do they simply not wish to do something through the compulsion of religious guilt? Maybe we should be looking somewhere else. Maybe we should think about how socialization can be better delivered through a system of education that has now become the nanny for half of America's families. Maybe we should see what time those violent offenders went through school and what policies were in place during their tenure. That is a better place to start than No God in School. Things take time. Monsters aren't grown overnight. The change needed to end this will take generations to accomplish. Maybe we should be researching new ways to socialize our youth.
2. Gun Control - While this might seem an easy band-aid to put on the problem at large, it does not come close to addressing the real issue of what it is that causes this insanity to occur. But let's take guns - look at the amount of people trying to sell them to you. People are trying to tell you that you need them - they're for safety, to protect you from other people who have guns that want to steal your money. Thing is, how can you tell if a guy has a gun? Then, when you know he has a gun on him, how do you know if he's not going to pull on you at some point and try to rob you? Let's take two images: White man with a cowboy hat and a gun holstered at his side, and black guy in a Nike sports jacket with baggy jeans and Pumas - which one has the FOID card. Which one did you choose? I don't care, it forces a racial decision based on a prejudice built into our culture through images played out on what? Television and media. They show you the second image, with a gloc held sideways and left hand grabbing the crotch. They show you the image of the cowboy gunslinger trying to show off for his lady. But what if, in reality, the FOID card holder was the second image, not the first? Who cares? Both guys have the same potential to rob you with their gun. It's not the gun that's the problem, it's the person wielding it. When our society praises the use of guns on television and in movies - heroes solving problems by blowing stuff up, or shooting their antagonist to 'have the final say' - we end up with a society that has an insane passion for guns and violence. PG movies can have thousands of bullets fired, and hundreds of explosions - as long as they don't show sex, say the five no-no's, or show too much blood - any child can see them with a parent. Cartoons have heroes fighting epic battles to save the princess, or save the world, or preserve the whatever. Video Games have people shooting victims, killing for money, stealing cars and then going on drive-by's. We become so desensitized to the reality of violence, we laugh. When it happens in life, we wonder why such a thing could possibly happen. And people say gun control is the problem?
3. Mental Health - once again, we attempt to put a band-aid on a problem rather than find a solution, or attempt the solution. Why are so many of our children being diagnosed with depression? Why do so many go untreated? Perhaps it is due to the fact that many parents do not have access to psychiatric help. Perhaps it's the stigma of having a child with an 'issue.' Many parents who have disabled or exceptional children suffer from medical bill syndrome - as in, not having enough money to pay for treatment. They stretch themselves thin - having to have one of them with the child at all times. It becomes a trial of their lives. When such a student cannot be cared for in a certain way by the parent, they need to seek outside support. If they cannot afford it, they rely on family. If family cannot, and friends cannot either, it rests solely on the parents. It's like sitting on a time-bomb with bipolar or mentally affected children. If the child cannot be cared for appropriately in the first 3 years of its life, the stress on its body and mind can create mental issues in the future - such as severe depression and bipolar disorder. As most in our society either come from or exist in a single-parent family, the chances and risks of a child being exposed to parental arguments can imprint on it the emotional base of self. If a child is not fed properly and with nutritious foods, it does not receive the appropriate amount of vitamins and minerals to build a well-supplied brain and can have a mental health problem later in its life. Poverty does more harm to our Mental Health than anything else, and many people who need care are getting it from prison treatment facilities - which is far too late to have a real effect. We need to address the problem of poverty in the nation that controls roughly 80% of the world's wealth. Welfare is not the answer, it too is a band-aid. We need to address the problem of food nutrition in the parents as well as the kids. Who cares if the kids get a good meal at school if they go home to pop-tarts and hot-pockets? We need higher standards in our foods, and we need to adapt dieting to our psychiatric treatments to ensure proper mental support through food choices. Our stomachs may be full after a cheeseburger, but if the cow that created the hamburger was shot with steroids, fed with corn and slaughtered with a hundred others, chances are, that meat's not going to have much nutrition in its protein. The cheese was processed with loads of salt for preservation, and the bun is nothing but empty carbs and sugar for our body to handle. Twenty minutes after a fast-food cheeseburger, the hunger arrives again - because there were no nutrients received. Add the tomato, the onion, the pickle - and it makes up some - but they are so minute against the onslaught of calories from the cheese, meat and bun. Take a different burger, made with better meat, a thick tomato, a fresh onion, a whole wheat bun - the nutritional value increases. Organic farming could be a solution, one that would require millions of people to start working as farmers throughout the land. If our manufacturing jobs changed to growing organic foods instead of our stockpiles of guns and ammo, maybe we could nail two birds with one stone.
There are too many reasons to fully point out - but these are the three that are always mentioned in these horrific events. There is art in the argument - the way we all like point the finger at everyone but ourselves. Let's face it, we are all to blame for this - because we continue to do nothing about the root problem. We let it fade away until the next one happens, and then it starts all over. We act all high and mighty about our cause to bring gun control/mental health awareness/God in School to the forefront of politics - but it turns out that none of these can possibly prevent something like this from happening, ever. If someone wants a gun bad enough, they can find it - anywhere. Be in the right state, and you can buy it without questions. No matter how much we medicate the social problem, the patient can always choose not to take the pill. No matter how much we put God in school to repress our society with religion, there have always been violent offenders - they just use God's name as a reason for the act. Look at Manson, look at Jim Jones, look at 9/11 - all of these were inspired by people who wanted God's praise, or had God's plan when no else did. Religion is no cure, government is no cure, and medicine is no cure to this solution. Social reorganization is the solution to this problem - a restructuring of our priorities. Do we continue to build the weapons of war and march our kids to 'honor' and 'freedom'? Or do we finally put down our guns, our pills, and our Bibles, and look at what our neighbor really needs, rather than force upon them what we think they need. Let's turn our swords to plowshares; Stop glorifying war, and help build a positive society by supporting the people that need our resources - whether domestic or abroad.
