Monthly Archives: February 2013

Decay

Life.

Life happens and then we have to deal with it.  Often times it’s messy but sometimes it’s breathtaking.

However, when tragedy comes, and it will, we need to begin to re-evaluate our response.  For me, the tragedy is a time to reflect on the love we have for one another, how delicate our lives are in the balance.  Have we done good?

Can we do more?

But what we cannot do is legislate away the boogieman.

No matter how badly I want to, I can’t make it against the law for the brain tumor to take my dad.

And you can’t legislate fun:

LOVELAND, Colo. — A 2nd grader has been suspended from school in Loveland for a make believe game he was playing.

The 7-year-old says he was trying to save the world. But school administrators say he broke a key rule during his pretend play.

“I was trying to save people and I just can’t believe I got dispended,” says Alex Evans, who doesn’t understand his suspension any better than he can pronounce it.

“It’s called ‘rescue the world,’” he says.

He was playing a game during recess at Loveland’s Mary Blair Elementary School and threw an imaginary grenade into a box with pretend evil forces inside.

“I pretended the box, there’s something shaking in it, and I go ‘pshhh.’”

The boy didn’t throw anything real or make any threats against anyone. He explains he was pretending to be the hero. “So nothing can get out and destroy the world.”

But his imaginary play broke the school’s real rules. The school lists “absolutes” designed to keep a safe environment. The list includes absolutely no fighting, real or imaginary; no weapons, real or imaginary.

That is insane.  We’ve gone too far.

Don’t like people shooting people with guns?  Make shooting people with guns illegal.  Then, make the penalty as harsh as required to drive down the incidence of people shooting people with guns.

But let the boys play “Rescue the world.”

The Opposite of Banning Guns

The debate surrounding guns brings out a bunch of interesting stories.  But this one is pretty interesting:

No town in the U.S. has been as public about its support for guns as Kennesaw, population about 30,000, where city leaders for 30 years have required that every household have at least one gun. The Dec. 14 killings of 20 children and six adults, the second-deadliest school shooting in U.S. history, has done little to change that, residents say in interviews.

The state of Georgia allows citizens to carry guns openly as long as they hold permits, in a region where guns have long been prized and firearms are part of the culture, Crowe said.

“It’s ingrained in us,” he said. “It’s about responsibility as much as anything and I am passing that on to my kids.”

Kennesaw, about 30 miles northwest of Atlanta, had about 5,000 people when its City Council adopted an ordinance requiring heads of households to own a gun and enough ammunition to use it, said police Lieutenant Craig Graydon, 47, who’s fielded questions about the law for 26 years.

An interesting take indeed.