I have watched with horror the tragedy of the murders at Virginia Tech. 32 shot dead in their classrooms and as many injured. Here in England, the coverage in all the media is no less than I suspect it is in the States. But few people can understand the American love affair with the gun.
I was stalked once by a student who came and sat on the stairs of my apartment building for hours. I wasn’t afraid that anybody was carrying a knife or gun. These days I think I might not be so sanguine.
I doubt this shooting will have any effect on gun legislation in the States, though. And I’m not convinced that outlawing the carrying of some guns is desirable even if it were possible. Yet I do wonder if it is really necessary to defend the rights of all US citizens to carry AKA rifles and other weapons designed specifically for war?
On the other hand, during the foot-and-mouth crisis over here when the military was called in by authorities in London to help slaughter millions of sheep, I knew that kind of thing could never happen in the States. Farmers would have met the military at the farm gates with their own weapons rather than let them in with the law-abiding anguish they did over here.
And I don’t like the idea of the military being the only people in a society that have legitimate access to guns. Governments simply can’t be trusted over the long-term to be given that kind of unassailed power.
