Uvalde, Texas

The tragedy at Uvalde, Texas is an atrocity of indescribable evil leaving a myriad of questions with no answers whatsoever. I can’t begin to imagine how this young man could gun down little children screaming, running, and pleading for their lives. This was evil of the satanic kind.

As a nation we need to talk about unspeakably malevolent acts like this or we’ll lose perspective about who we are as a people and what we believe about right and wrong. The very real risk is that we’ll become anesthetized to the trauma and move on with life as though we’re helpless to change what we’re witnessing.

On one side of the debate about gun violence the focus is on the physical instrument – the gun. The argument is that if we restrict the kinds of guns available for purchase in America then the level of violence will decrease. Semi-automatic handguns and AR-style long guns with large-capacity magazines are most often mentioned as the kinds of weapons that either need to be more regulated or outlawed.

On the other side the focus is on the human instrument – the individual holding the gun. The argument here is that guns don’t kill people – people kill people. Last year there were nearly 700 mass shootings in America and they all involved people with guns. Not people with knives or pitchforks. People with guns kill people. Both sides of the debate have merit.

I don’t know if a common thread weaves together all those in America accused of being a mass shooter. I can only speculate about Salvador Ramos. His high school friends described him as having an aggressive streak. He may have taken on the attributes of an outcast having been socially rejected by his peers. There is evidence he was often bullied over a speech impediment that included a stutter and lisp.

Maybe these factors contributed to the buildup of a level of resentment within a cauldron of rage that could no longer be contained. Out of some kind of desperation to be recognized and accepted, he pours out his vengeance against the world on innocent children who have never offended him.

There are many things we need to learn about rampant gun violence in America. Perhaps one deals with a culture that winks at adolescent bullying as something representative of the growing up process. Something that is transitory and therefore can be excused. Something that is so widespread that it cannot be mitigated. Something so normal that it cannot be deviant.

That something embedded itself in Salvador Ramos and he showed us what it looks like with a gun in its hands.