By now, you’ve all probably heard about the shooting at the Holocaust museum in Washington, DC. I’m not going to recount all the details, save to praise the security guards for stopping the guy before he had a chance to shoot any innocent bystanders, and to offer my sincere condolences to the family of the guard that lost his life.
Now, what I am going to do is list a few things about the shooter that will probably be misrepresented in the media – it is important when you start talking to coworkers about this that you’re armed with facts, and not emotions and soundbites.
The shooter was a white supremacist, holocaust denier, and possible a 9/11 Truther. Any one of those three things is enough to classify him as “bat-shit loco”, but taken together it’s a testament to being a total ball of crazy.
He used a shotgun, which is illegal in Washington, DC.
He is a convicted felon, having been convicted of kidnapping and a few other charges; thus it was already illegal for him to be in possession of any firearms.
Once again, we find a sad case where no amount of gun control in the world could have stopped this man – just to get to Washington DC to attack the Museum, he committed at least 3 felonies that I can think of; all before firing his first shot. So when someone says “oh we need laws to prevent this sort of thing”, ask them “what laws?” and point out that it was already illegal for this guy to have any guns. Then ask them if they want us to “make it more illegal.”
You know what would work really well? How about a blanket law stating that it’s illegal to break the law? Now that would work like a charm, and save so much fuss.
Thank you, Caleb. Not asking you to do this, but to think out loud for a second; I would love to see your “just the facts, ma’am” take on this incident expanded to become an online listing of previous active shooters. One that documents what existing laws were broken in those situations, and highlights instances were properly qualified individuals helped end the thread with the use of legally wielded firearms (eg: LEOs, private security guards, or armed citizens). Anything to highlight that people are the problem (as opposed to the tools the use), and more importantly, that people can also be part of the solution.
Cheers.