Growing up, I was born in 1954, I was around firearms all my life. Gun safety was drilled into my head from as far back as I can remember.
The thing is, as I said, I grew up around firearms, most people my age did and we never saw a school shooting. Never saw church shootings, or, well, mass shooting anywhere.
My generation was the last generation to get their asses beat if we got out of line. We feared the police. We feared the Judges, and we feared going to jail even if was just juvenile detention.
Sometime around 1968 or so, things changed. The new motto was “If it feels good do it,” and “The Devil made me do it.” The police were not as fearsome and the thought of arrest and jail was no longer feared. Teenaged girls were no longer shipped off to other relatives to hide the fact they were pregnant. We had entered the world of “…love the one you’re with.”
The adults shrugged their shoulders and passed it off as kids being kids.
When AIDS showed up, it was the first deadly disease with legal protection even when people were spreading the virus and dying right in front of us.
Robert Heinlein said the invention of the automobile kicked off the sexual revolution as it meant a couple could get far enough away from the town, the risk of being seen and identified was slim. Before he died in 1988 he said the next major breakthrough in the sexual revolution had already been invented, but it was too early to tell what the invention was yet.
Robert was right, but, he should have said there were two. One is an old technology, cable and cable’s spinoffs. The other is the personal computer and later Smart Phones and tablets. On either one you can find an assortment of sexual perversions from the now mundane nudes, to whatever you are looking for. Kids are sexting without a care, and few legislators want to tackle the issue. Far too many adults argue sexting is free speech.
The mores of our society have changed, and not for the better. Anything goes.
Our children grow up believing they can do anything, but then find they were not given the tools in school to even balance a checkbook. They think getting to work on time is suggestion, but expect to be paid as though they were early, then get pissed off when they are fired for being late and drunk or high when they do show up.
We have elected people to office that are not qualified to be used as shark bait. “Elect me and I’ll give you free (fill in the desire of the day)” When asked how is the free stuff going to be paid for, the response is we just do it and worry about the money later.
No, the problem is we have been told and now have come to believe that we are not responsible for our actions.
In California, it is legal for a motorcyclist to drive between the first and second lanes on multi-lane highways. I used to ride my bike from Simi Valley to El Segundo, a distance of almost 50 miles, 45 of which was interstate. Most people don’t know the 405 and 118 in California is a one huge porno set. And don’t drive down Sepulveda Blvd with your kids.
The tragedy is no one seems to care.
Today when a kid is rejected by a girl, instead of accepting he is not Adonis, or talking it over with his friends, a counselor, or pastor, he takes his daddy’s gun and shoots her and anyone who gets in the way. When you make any point other than more laws, you are shouted down and told your thinking is limited.
Every school year there are a host of news reports of 13-year-olds fathering their teacher’s child, and coaches molesting females on their team. We as a society now take such news with little outrage. The comments on social media about such cases should scare us. Far, far too many comments are along the lines of “Where were these teachers when I was in school?” Worse yet, far too many of those comments are no joke.
We are three generations into “If it feels good, do it,” and “Love the one you’re with,” and we cannot see the disaster we are reaping. No, our response is twofold and diametrically opposed to each other. We call for more laws, while ignoring the laws we already have on the books, and we then say to those that feel free to act out in violence that it is not their fault, that they are special and deserving and it was wrong for society not to see just how mistreated they are for not seeing how special and deserving of his heart’s desire.
No wonder our kids are messed up, anti-social, and violent.
When we take an honest look at ourselves, can see the problem is not guns or any other tool, it is we, us, our, society.
Do we have courage to grab our kids by the neck and being down hell fire on them, or do we continue to coddle them and tell they can kill as it is not really their fault?