“Imagine all the people living life in peace. You may say that I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one. I hope someday you’ll join us and the world will be as one.” —John Lennon

I was in New York this past weekend on an annual girls’ trip when the horrible Google alerts started popping up about mass shootings in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio. It was almost unthinkable just a few days after an incident in the sleepy town of Gilroy, California (which I wasn’t even aware of until a conversation with friends this past week). So much tragedy and very few answers.

Whenever mass shooting happen in the U.S., social media explodes with calls for either an end to gun violence or a staunch defense of the Second Amendment. While I personally have no desire to keep a gun in my home, I understand the Second Amendment’s intent, which was to allow citizens to help protect against threat of foreign enemies or other political forces using their own weapons. Of course, there was still debate even among the founders whether citizens should be able to bear arms to defend against tyranny from the federal government or whether bearing arms should only come into play when forming militias.

Seems like we’re debating similar questions 200 years later.

Regardless of what side of that argument you fall on, I seriously doubt the authors of the Constitution could foresee the sophistication of the automatic guns and assault weapons being used by civilians to murder innocent people in modern day. And though mass shootings represent a small percentage of overall gun violence deaths (according to the CDC) compared to suicides and homicides, the nature of the killing seem extra senseless because of the hateful ideology behind many of them, the random targeting of strangers, and the general shock and horror of such things happening in public places that should otherwise be safe.

Where do we go from here, America? What questions should we be asking ourselves and how do we have an honest dialogue about it?

I think we start by focusing on the things we all can agree on. 

We all want to live in a country where we feel free, not fear of being targeted because of our race or nationality. 

We all want to enjoy public concerts, festivals, running errands at a local store, and even going to work without fear of having any type of gun open fire on us. 

We all want to stop grieving the loss of innocent lives, whether from suicide, homicide, or mass shootings.

We all want to feel like we belong, not isolated, lonely, or on the margins.

I’m still asking myself the questions above and don’t have any good answers, but I know we can’t stay here. We can be better. We have to. 

[Photo by Andre Benz on Unsplash]