The diagnosis of mental illness took a great leap forward this last week. From the far side of the Pacific Ocean, Donald Trump was able to determine that Devin Patrick Kelley was mentally ill.
Of course, Kelley was white.
No one excuses mass killings as mental illness if the killers happen to have Arabic-sounding names, or have immigrated from an Islamic country. Such people are automatically classed as cold-blooded terrorists, who knew exactly what they were doing.
The excuse of mental illness seems to be offered only to white male Americans. Devin Kelley, who murdered 26 people inside a Baptist church last Sunday morning in Sutherland Springs, Texas. Stephen Paddock in Las Vegas. Adam Lanza at Sandy Hook Elementary.
They obviously can’t be in their right mind if they shoot fellow Americans, can they?
Thus we turn crime into a medical problem.
A matter of responsibility
Asked about possible gun control legislation, U.S. Senator Ted Cruz told reporters, “We don’t need politics right now.”
He’s wrong. Politics is precisely what we need right now.
I contend that U.S. legislators, at all levels, and the gun industry should be charged as accessories to murder.
The legal principle is clear – those who enable someone else to commit a crime share responsibility for that crime.
Courts have ruled that the tobacco industry may not evade responsibility for what users did with their product. Big Tobacco has paid billions of dollars to states and provinces as compensation for the health costs that resulted from smoking cigarettes.
The gun industry similarly provides a product which causes untimely and unnecessary deaths -- roughly 35,000 deaths in the U.S. every year. But in 2005, the U.S. Congress passed the Protecting Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) which granted the gun industry immunity from civil liability for the unlawful use of guns.
Like Big Tobacco, the gun industry has long known the harm its products can cause. Nevertheless, it has continued promoting and marketing a dangerous product. As a Truthout opinion piece said, “Guns, like cigarettes, are a public health crisis in the United States.”
Congress passed that legislation. Congress has repeatedly refused to consider legislation to control gun sales and gun use.
Misguided faith
Congress, instead, has put its faith in prayer.
The U.S. Pretender assured Sutherland Springs, from a golf course in Japan, “All of America is praying to God to help the wounded and the families of the victims.”
In the hours after Kelley’s rampage, TV video clips showed small circles of survivors joining in prayer on the green lawn outside First Baptist Church.
There could be no doubt about fervency of those prayers. They knelt. They wept. They held each other. Some even bowed their foreheads to the earth.
But praying for what? The video didn’t record their words. Asking God to make sense of the killing? Asking God to undo the deaths? Asking God for vengeance against the killer?
All I can say with any confidence is that God not prevent the shooting from happening.
Asked how he makes sense of the tragedy in which his own daughter died, First Baptist’s pastor Frank Pomeroy said, “I don’t understand, but I know my God does.”
Misplaced faith
The CBC’s Paul Hunter interviewed survivors. He noted that not one person – not one! – even mentioned gun control: “Not even a whisper that maybe guns are part of the problem, that toughening gun laws might be a part of the solution.”
Public opinion surveys routinely report that 80 per cent of Americans believe in God – however vague their notion of who or what God is.
Paul Hunter’s interviews suggest that at least as many Americans believe in guns.
Or maybe the two are the same thing. Guns and God are both about power. The power I don’t feel I have as a person, I can get through a gun.
I wish I didn’t feel impelled to write about American politics and American killing. I can’t help it. We in Canada experience too much spillover from what happens in the U.S.
The day after the massacre in Sutherland Springs, a police officer in Abbotsford, in B.C.’s Fraser valley, was shot and killed. By a man from Alberta, a province that sees itself as Texas North. Using a gun to defend a car he stole the day before.
I’m not suggesting that one crime is directly connected to the other. But the resort to guns as a solution to personal problems is like a toxin, seeping across the border, infecting us all. I cannot discuss that toxin in isolation from its source.
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Copyright © 2017 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups encouraged; links from other blogs welcomed; all other rights reserved.
To send comments, to subscribe, or to unsubscribe, write jimt@quixotic.ca
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YOUR TURN
In last week’s column, I had argued that institutions develop an inertia that keeps them from changing, even as society changes around them.
Tom Watson reminded me that it also works in the other direction: “Somebody once said, ‘The seven last words of a dying organization are: We never did it that way before.’ And I agree that organizations change more slowly than individuals.
“However, I have also seen instances where nothing changed because of specific individuals. For example, put one person in charge of one area of responsibility in a church Presbytery for too long and that person's way of doing things becomes entrenched, sometimes to the point of being unhealthy. Change that one person and the windows are blown open to new possibilities.
“Condo corporation boards are an interesting example of the opposite. Board members are [often] elected for fixed terms, so there is considerable turnover on a regular basis. This creates the ground for all too frequent changes. Board members are volunteers and often run for office because they want to change something in particular. Elect new board members next round and everything changes again. In this case, stability for a while would be welcomed…”
Cliff Boldt quoted Bob Dylan: “Your sons and your daughters are beyond your command/ Your old road is rapidly agin’/ Please get out of the new one if you can’t lend your hand/ For the times they are a-changin’”
Cliff commented, “Changes in approaches to sexism, racism, ageism and other -isms have outstripped our culture. It will take another generation before they become mainstream.”
Janet Davis wrote sadly, “Thank you for your words today on the slow changes as society has gradually become more sensitive to the words they use and how they affect people. Words can harm! What you say reflects what I have observed in my 65 years in the central area of the U.S.A. I pray that progress continues.
“Unfortunately, over the last year it seems to me the U.S.A. has gone backwards. May this not also occur in Canada. Evidently many still do not understand that ‘political correctness’ is just speaking and acting in a way that honors the human-ness of each person. God created us all. God loves us all. May a more gracious spirit return soon.”
Isabel Gibson wrote on two subjects. One was institutional change: “I was once tasked with helping an executive craft a mission and values statement. I complained that the organization I knew in the trenches, as it were, wasn't the same one I was reading about. However, I don't always live up to my stated values either: that doesn't make it worthless to find a mechanism to try to keep them front and centre in my/our thinking.
I believe the ‘settled science’ on this is that where there's a discrepancy, we tend to bring our thinking into line with our behaviour, over time. So if our words can affect our behaviour, or form part of that behaviour, then explicit statements about the value of all people are worthwhile institutional tactics to effect change.”
Isabel also wrote about whether women influence sexual harassment and rape. I wasn’t going to extend this discussion, and then I changed my mind.
Isabel wrote, “The onus has been put on males to restrain their natural reactions to sexually provocative behaviour from women: revealing clothing, provocative language, and so on. I do not think that situation is reasonable or fair to males.
“A male friend of mine once said that if women could spend a day in the body of an 18-year-old male, they'd never go out again in anything but a gunny sack.
“Maybe we're so far into our right to express ourselves, that we've forgotten to be considerate of others. Not to take responsibility for someone else's inability to control themselves, but at least to understand what the other's experience might be like.”
Bob Rollwagen connected that discussion to the plight of former Ontario Premier David Peterson, “accused of sexual advances, and the efforts he had to take to achieve a full public apology six years later from the female accuser. The press puts these events out minutes after they occur with great detail and extensive coverage and then, randomly, follows up with brief summary reports on the impact or results as it will not make good news. It appears one is now guilty if the press suggests it. If the courts rule innocent, they are doubted by the public.”
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TECHNICAL STUFF
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PROMOTION STUFF…
To use the links in this section, you’ll have to insert the necessary symbols.
Ralph Milton ’s latest project is called “Sing Hallelujah” -- the world’s first video hymnal. It consists of 100 popular hymns, both new and old, on five DVDs that can be played using a standard DVD player and TV screen, for use in congregations who lack skilled musicians to play piano or organ. More details at wwwDOTsinghallelujahDOTca
Ralph’s HymnSight webpage is still up, http://wwwDOThymnsightDOTca, with a vast gallery of photos you can use to enhance the appearance of the visual images you project for liturgical use (prayers, responses, hymn verses, etc.)
Wayne Irwin's “Churchweb Canada,” an inexpensive service for any congregation wanting to develop a web presence, with free consultation. <http://wwwDOTchurchwebcanadaDOTca>
I recommend Isabel Gibson’s thoughtful and well-written blog, wwwDOTtraditionaliconoclastDOTcom
Alva Wood’s satiric stories about incompetent bureaucrats and prejudiced attitudes in a small town -- not particularly religious, but fun; alvawoodATgmailDOTcom to get onto her mailing list.
Tom Watson writes a weekly blog called “The View from Grandpa Tom’s Balcony” -- ruminations on various subjects, and feedback from Tom’s readers. Write him at tomwatsoATgmailDOTcom or twatsonATsentexDOTnet