Every time there’s a mass shooting at a school, some nimrod is going to go on about how people who oppose gun control just don’t care about murdered children. They say the same thing when it’s some kid caught in the crossfire between two warring gangs in inner-city Chicago or Baltimore. The fact that we won’t roll over for their solution means we don’t want any solutions.

Of course, it’s not just when there’s a shooting that this will pop up.

On July 4th, NBC ran a so-called “think piece” about just when patriotism became about selfishness. It’s unsurprising that a member of the media would think patriotism automatically means adhering to left-leaning ideology. However, I wasn’t really worried about the stupidity until I got to this little tidbit:

But I guess a country that values access to guns over children’s lives so often that the response to what was, pre-pandemic, near-daily mass shootings is “thoughts and prayers” instead of gun control doesn’t really have any pride left in itself.

At this point, the writer has given up any pretense of intellectual honesty.

After all, this comment supposes that the only possible solution to mass shootings–and the only way there are “near-daily mass shootings” is if you count gang shootings, which the average person doesn’t consider the same thing–is to enact gun control. Nevermind that most mass shootings are carried out with handguns, not so-called assault rifles, and thus won’t actually be curtailed by that particular bit of gun control. Nevermind that most mass shooters haven’t been convicted of anything that would prohibit them from buying a gun. Let’s also ignore those like the Sandy Hook shooter who murdered his own mother to get a gun he could use for his atrocities.

No, the only possible answer in the writer’s mind is gun control.

Worse, though, is that if you don’t bend over to support her position on the matter, you don’t actually care about the lives of children.

What I’d like to say to the author of this fertilizer pile masquerading as an opinion piece isn’t fit for publication on a site read by people of all ages. However, as someone who has actually lost someone he cared about in a mass shooting, I take personal offense at the implication. I’ve taken offense at it ever time it comes up.

The author acts as if those who oppose gun control just don’t care, but ignores the fact that many of us simply don’t think it will work.

Instead, we advocate for things we believe will actually make a real impact using the existing laws that are already on the books. For example, the Parkland shooter should never have been able to buy an AR-15, but not because of the weapon. Instead, he shouldn’t have because of his long history of domestic abuse toward his mother, abuse the Broward County Sheriff’s Department knew about yet failed to act on.

Let’s plug that loophole somehow.

After all, there’s evidence to suggest that most mass shooters have also committed domestic violence at some point in the past. Stepping up enforcement of those laws might well lay the groundwork for preventing many mass shooters from buying their firearms in the first place. Of course, that won’t stop mass shootings, especially the “near-daily mass shootings” that are actually gang warfare carried out with stolen guns.

But no, some people would much rather pretend that we just don’t give a damn and I’m sick of it.