Farewell to 2022, and Hello to new Beginnings
2022: The year that was Trash
Looking back at this horrible year of mass shootings unfold in Highland Park, Philadelphia, and my hometown of St. Louis, one thing was clear to me as a licensed gun owner in Massachusetts: It’s time America made a New Year’s resolution to end toxic gun culture.
In 2022, ten years since Sandy Hook, there were 648 mass shootings in the United States according to the Gun Violence Archive. Factor in that Denmark suffered its first mass shooting this year and one wouldn’t be wrong to assume that mass shootings aren’t just America’s top domestic product, it’s also our main export.
It’s lead to a gun homicide rate that’s the highest since 1994, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Black men and boys aged 10 to 24 have borne the brunt of that, facing a gun homicide rate that was 21 times higher than white men and boys from the same age range.
This terrifying and deadly “guns everywhere” culture was fueled by the last 12 years of conservative Supreme Court rulings that culminated in the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen decision in June. That case forced Massachusetts to issue concealed carry permits to anyone who wanted one, stripping local police departments of an effective public safety tool to prevent gun violence.
As a gun owner, I don’t see the Commonwealth turning into the Wild West of the East, thanks to its strict permitting process, which the Supreme Court left mostly intact. Applicants still must get background checked, fingerprinted, and interview with their local police chief. The last two parts are still a big deterrent for some applicants, especially privacy minded ones, and the interview still gives police a chance to flag applicants who should never carry a gun. Massachusetts’ gun laws are effective. According to the Boston Police, the city has the least amount of shooting victims (67) compared to cities of similar size, such as Portland (156), Nashville (215), and Las Vegas (340). But despite Attorney General Maura Healey’s efforts to ban assault weapons, the same type of rifle that was used in the Pulse shooting in Orlando in 2016 and fires the same devastating round as the AR-15 is still available for sale in Massachusetts.
The public needs to shun the NRA’s threadbare and morally bankrupt excuses for sustaining this culture. The Buffalo massacre shredded their “good guy with a gun” mantra for dealing with mass shooters after an official “good guy with a gun”, retired police lieutenant Aaron Salter Jr., died trying to protect his grocery store’s customers. Afterwards, Colion Noir, a former NRA commentator tweeted that the public should be its own first responder. That sounds great in theory, but what he really meant was that we normalize wearing body armor, a first aid kit, and be armed whenever we’re out and about. That might be prudent when stepping outside the wire in Iraq or Afghanistan, but it makes no sense whatsoever if you’re going to Stop & Shop to get milk. But in the paranoid mindset of toxic gun culture, one must always prepare for the next gunfight that’s just around the corner.
States should regulate the use of body armor, which the Buffalo gunman wore to survive getting shot by the grocery store’s security guard and continue attacking his victims. Rifle-resistant hard body armor is a staple of toxic gun culture, as it’s worn by militia and other alt-right groups, such as The Oathkeepers, who wore it as they stormed the Capitol on January 6th. One might assume this tactical accessory featured in videogames such as Call of Duty would be more expensive and harder to get than a Playstation 5 in real life, but they’d be mistaken. It’s prevalent because it’s so cheap- one can buy a set for less than $300. Only one state, Connecticut, banned the sale of body armor after the Sandy Hook massacre, but other states could regulate it as well to prevent future massacres.
America must reject the NRA’s Big Lie: that the AR-15 was intended for civilian use. The AR-15 was built out of necessity and that necessity was the Vietnam War. Its rifle round was intended to take Viet Cong off the battlefield but 55 years after it entered Vietnam, it has done nothing but take our children and schoolteachers out of our classrooms. It’s owned by millions of law-abiding gun owners, but at what price?
If the Senate could ever muster the courage to ditch the filibuster, Congress could go a long way in reversing toxic gun culture by repealing immunity for the gun industry and holding them accountable for marketing AR-15s to children, placing all AR-15s into the National Firearms Act registry, and even offering to buy back semiautomatic military-style weapons. If Congress can spend $54 Billion to send weapons to Ukraine, why can’t they spend $54 Billion to buy back weapons of war on our streets?
Regardless of what the Supreme Court decides in future cases, it’s up to us to redefine what the Second Amendment should mean. In toxic gun culture, it’s shorthand for pressing ctl-alt-delete on rebooting American democracy into Authoritarianism, as shown by the failed kidnapping attempt on Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitman in 2020 and on January 6th, when Donald Trump wanted to lead his armed supporters as they raided the Capitol. The court’s distorted view of that amendment and federalism forced America into 18th Century governing in the 21st Century, which lead to disaster. Nevertheless, America always found a way to change its course towards progress and this moment can be the same.
Interesting things on the internets that you may have missed
The Boston Globe’s Ivy Scott took a look at what it would take to transform the Boston Police Department to look like the majority-minority city it protects:
Have you ever tried to get information from the Boston Police Department on well, anything? (Trust me, it’s a bit difficult.) Dig Boston’s Andrew Quemere persisted, and received a data dump of 8,000 complaints against BPD officers over the last 30 years. He’s loaded them into a searchable database, which is a small win for fans of police transparency and accountability:
https://andrewqmr.substack.com/p/explore-three-decades-of-complaints
Bigotry unfortunately was on the rise in 2022, from mass shootings in Buffalo, to Nazis openly marching nationwide, & an anonymously posted map online targeting Jews in Boston. The Emancipator’s Joanna Schroeder was right: This won't end until White parents sit down with their sons & warn them against online extremism.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWWbITp51xs&t=2s
And now a word from our feline sponsor
This is Supreme Cat Court Justice Purrgood Meowshall, a snowshoe kitten who adopted me in April, 2021. I found him in East Boston thanks to the Melrose Humane Society, and he’s been the best pandemic buddy one could ever ask for. Start off your new year right with a new kitty or pupper by checking out https://melrosehumanesociety.org/ or your local humane society. 😻
Finally man, I've been waiting for this Substack! Congrats :)