The
synagogue shootings in Pittsburgh highlights two deadly-serious national
challenges. The first is specific and the second is general. The first difficulty
is just staggering. If the Pittsburgh shootings and others like it in the
recent past can happen, every public place in America is a potential target.
Posting armed guards all over would turn the country into an armed camp. And it
still wouldn't provide absolute safety, for every place people go cannot
be guarded at all times. So, what should be done? The second more general
problem is even more troubling.
When
I grew up in the 1950s, I don't recall that there was ever even one mass
shooting. But not only didn't it occur, no one would have imagined that
anything like that could ever happen in the USA. Similarly, no one would have
dreamt that airplane passengers would have to first pass through metal
detectors, that big city public schools would need armed police guards at all
times to keep things safe, that edibles sold in bottles would require a seal
under the cap to prevent people from inserting poisons - and so on. How did our
society become so dangerous? Is Western Civilization beating a path toward savagery?
If we can fix the second problem, it will mostly
resolve the first one as well. But if the second one endures, there is probably
scant hope for solving the first one.
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