Because NOBODY asked me for my thoughts on America's gun homicide problem...
...I offer them anyway. It's not an >answer< so much as a suggestion. I know it sounds crazy. Hear me out!
I have a hunch that future generations will look back on the shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory parade as a pivotal moment in the American story — a moment, perhaps, emblematic of the implosion not just of an empire, but of our collective national psyche along with it. That may sound hyperbolic. I am, after all, a writer. Which means I’m almost helplessly taken by the impulse to try and frame things in metaphors that I read into — and then retroactively impose on — events not long after they unfold.
Especially today, awash as we are in instantaneous communication, it’s all too tempting to reach for meaning while an event is still fresh, but to do so as if we were looking back on it. Moreover, gun homicide — and mass shootings in particular — have become so commonplace that it’s only natural to ask, “Well why should this one be different than all the others?” It’s certainly a fair question. And in what looks like a mass case of PTSD, Americans have grown dangerously numb — unresponsive verging on catatonia — to the horror that’s been mounting for three decades now.
Still, the symbolism is way too striking to ignore this time. The convergence of this kind of violence with the USA’s most popular sport by a wide margin has the unmistakeable look of history in the making, of an occurrence that will ring throughout time.
Shortly before the parade shooting, though, I listened to the December 23rd, 2023 episode of
(titled How to Get Pregnant) , where hosts Meghan Daum and Sarah Haider propose mandatory service as a way of repairing the American social fabric. With Daum and Haider’s discussion echoing in my thoughts as news reports surfaced from the parade, a lightbulb went off — an idea came to me that sounded crazy as I said it to myself out loud but felt more reasonable (if not necessarily feasible) the more I thought about it.I shared my idea as a guest on
‘s weekly Media Studies podcast/livestream, along with my thoughts on why I find the coverage of the shooting deeply dishonest (see clip above).You can watch my full conversation with Brown here.
Full audio of the Special Place episode:
<3 SRK
Interesting. Taking issue with the ‘solution’ to the extent a large portion of perpetrators are 1) impoverished 2) radicalized by political divisions &/or minimally educated. While training all the citizenry may produce a healthy respect those options are already available. Regulation is the only tool proven to work via Congress. Appreciate the discussion 🌿