Since the birth of my children, I admit that I have been more an armchair citizen. While I’ve voted in mid-term and Presidential elections, paid my taxes, and donated to the local campaigns, I have not been a hugely active participant in political life. I made the laughable attempt to encourage my children to sit through the last vice-presidential and presidential debates (promises of Doritos and Sour Patch Kids were made) with mixed results (my daughter’s only question was, “Why does that lady keep winking?”). But now that Max is actively studying government, I thought it was time to demonstrate, by action, that being a citizen requires activism and not just passive observance.
After this weekend’s shooting, the senseless deaths of a Congresswoman’s aid, a judge, innocent civilians and a nine year-old child, I am left to wonder if I could or should continue to be active, or expose my children to this era of ugly politics. Pundits will say that this heated political climate is no different than the elections during the times of Andrew Jackson and James K. Polk. The big difference is that during those times, people had guns because they were killing food to eat or protecting their hen houses from coyotes. In my mind, and I hope in the rational minds of most Americans, there is no earthly reason for bringing guns to an event like Rep. Giffords’ Congress on Your Corner, a town hall or any political gathering. There is also no reason to advocate violence of any kind, on your website, your radio show, your blog, your tweets or at a rally.
Let’s hope for the sake of Christina Taylor Green and her parents, Judge Rolls, Gabrielle Giffords and others, this event is not squandered with a bunch of talking heads “debating” the need to change the political dialogue. These young men, and probably many other like him, have lost faith in public officials, the media and others who have tried to make politics a game of win or lose. I think we can all agree that in this tragedy, there were no winners.
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