Will+H’s+Final+AmEx+2014+Speech

=Forever to Be Remembered, Forever to Be Forgotten=

By now, I’m sure you are all aware of the pride I take in my Texan heritage, so what I’m about to say should not come as a surprise to any of you. I like guns. I was raised in an environment that taught responsible gun ownership and use, and to respect the power they possess. I was not raised to fear them or view them as evil. I do not perceive guns as the egregious threat to this country that many see them as. I do not hold them in a higher, lower, or more fearful regard than any other medium of menace, be it a knife, fire, rope, bombs, cyanide, or Liam Neeson. Consequently, I do not believe that restricting gun acquisition will eliminate the tragedies that plague our society.

However, the debate concerning gun control has, once again, been renewed following this past weekend’s tragic events in Isla Vista. A grieving father has ignited yet another media frenzy, sensationalizing the role of firearms in societal violence, appealing to the government to prevent further tragedies through the implementation of more restrictive gun laws. However, it is this exact “sensationalism” and over-hyping of these catastrophes that trigger new ones at a rate of, and I quote, “one every other school day so far this year”. In the world that I want grow old in, I want to see people stop blaming guns and start holding the media, and other causes, accountable for their role in perpetuating these horrific occurrences.

Various “fads”, let’s call them, throughout history have been sparked almost entirely by the massive dose of attention the media gives to them. Perhaps Mr. Geib will recall that period during the late 1990’s and early 2000’s where there was, essentially, a high-speed chase on television every day. The media coverage on each chase was extensive, providing full details about the perpetrators and allowing them easy access to their “15 minutes of fame”, as we say. Consequently, other people who were desperate for attention began exploiting the media’s fascination with these dangerous stunts, and soon you could hardly turn to a news channel that was not broadcasting live helicopter footage of the action. The media flurry surrounding these incidences is precisely what fed the desire to partake in them, and get recognized on widespread television. Though car chases are not nearly in the same vein as school shootings, suicides, and mass murders, the role of the media is almost identical in all instances. The community, at large, does not readily remember the names of the victims, but the names of the assailants will live on, possibly forever, in infamy. The media sees to it that the perpetrators of these heinous crimes receive immortality through incessant hype. It is this hype that has made it appear to those who feel wronged by their peers, superiors, or society in general, that this is the most profound and explosive (no pun intended) way to exact revenge for those transgressions. Those who feel neglected and forgotten by their community view these horrendous episodes as a way to finally be noticed and remembered forever for something appallingly extravagant. Eric Harris, one of the two perpetrators of the Columbine High School Massacre, frequently wrote in his journal about how his vision for the “Day of Reckoning” would put the “Holocaust to shame”. Seung-Hui Cho, the perpetrator of the 2007 Virginia Tech Massacre, and Elliot Rodger, the perpetrator of the Isla Vista shootings, both published their thoughtful, gruesome manifestos on the Internet so that all could see the extent they planned to go, and their justifications for their actions. Even after the event has subsided, the media will go, and has gone, to great lengths to analyze every possible aspect of the slayings, and tirelessly distribute and publicize the stories and profiles of these shooters, instead of letting them burn in hell, forgotten, depriving them of the exact thing they hoped to achieve. For all intents and purposes, when the Los Angeles Times publishes an article exclusively concerning the analyzation (yes, I made that word up) of Elliot Rodger’s manifesto (which is freaking creepy, by the way), then we have let him win. “He’ll be remembered as a horrible monster instead of a sad nobody” as Morgan Freeman bluntly put it. And we can’t not trust Morgan Freeman, right?

But why isn’t gun control the answer? Why wouldn’t it solve the amount of shootings that take place, now on a weekly basis, across the nation? One argument would be that it violates a constitutional right, and everyone hates when that happens. Okay, so what about not BANNING guns, but restricting them so heavily that only mentally stable adults over a certain age can purchase them? Great, that’s already been implemented, but the government cannot control (nor has any business trying to) where and how securely these weapons are stored. Nancy Lanza met all the requirements that were necessary for her to own weapons. They were completely legal, and completely within her control. She encouraged her son, Adam, to practice shooting the guns as a hobby, and would leave them in an unlocked safe for him to use whenever he pleased. Adam, who suffered from a sensory-integration disorder, Asperger syndrome, and possible schizophrenia, had intently studied past mass shootings, most notably Columbine and the Northern Illinois University shooting of 2008, and became fascinated with the concept of orchestrating one of his own. Thus, on Friday, December 14, 2012, Lanza retrieved his mother’s weapons, shot her dead in her bed, and proceeded to Sandy Hook Elementary School, where we all know what happened. There was not much in the way of “gun control” that could have been implemented in order to avoid the deaths of twenty first graders, or at least not much that would not have violated the Second Amendment. It is a very fine line, and one that cannot be crossed without severe backlash from one faction or another.

Much the same, too much attention is being focused on the use of guns in these tragedies. Elliot Rodger killed six people during his very brief spree in Isla Vista, but only three of those six were killed with a firearm. As illustrated in his manifesto, Rodger intended to lure dozens of innocent people into his apartment, and “slit their throats” or “flay them alive”. He appreciated death, not the mode with which it was distributed. Fortunately, he was interrupted by the police before he could lure anyone to their death, and instead opted to murder his three roommates by stabbing them, or severing their jugular. He never intended on using a firearm on these men, and never actually intended using a firearm on the sorority he was targeting until the police responded, when then he would begin his climactic showdown with the law enforcement and eventually take his own life by way of overdosing on Vicodin and Xanax. After his spree went awry, he attempted to use his vehicle to splatter pedestrians in his way. Three mediums, one goal. Furthering my point about guns only being PART of the issue is the instance of the Oklahoma City bombings. No guns, not gunshot fatalities, only a fertilizer bomb destroying the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City, killing 168 people. Many attribute gunshot slaying to mass murder and terrorism, but, in reality, a great deal have occurred throughout history when guns were either unavailable, or simply unnecessary. Those who desire to inflict harm on society will find a means to the end, regardless of restrictions put in place. There are many other factors that need to be considered other than simple “gun laws”.

Mental health and the treatment of the mentally ill is an extremely touchy subject in this country, am I right? It’s always been a major political topic about how they should be treated, regarded, and whether or not they should be allowed the same liberties normal people have, such as entering the Air Force or operating heavy machinery. Eric Harris was diagnosed at a young age with over-aggressiveness and the tendency to be anti-social. He later developed clinical depression, was put on medication, but later quit, believing the only way to solve his issues was to slaughter his classmates. Seung-Hui Cho was diagnosed in middle school with selective mutism, as well as major depression disorder. He was declared “mentally ill and in need of hospitalization” by a Virginia service board two years before he committed the shootings at Virginia Tech. I already explained Adam Lanza’s mental state. Elliot Rodger, like Adam Lanza, was diagnosed with high-functioning Asperger syndrome at an early age. It has been scientifically proven that these mental abnormalities are linked to “overly-aggressive and violent thoughts, and are responsible for abnormal social functioning that can lead to dissatisfaction with life and a feeling of futility that appears to be the main motivation of these killers.” I am not trying to stereotype all mentally abnormal people, but I am regarding this as a trend that might best not be ignored. It was known that Harris, Cho, Lanza, and Rodger were all very mentally disturbed, but no measures were taken to monitor them in order to prevent the atrocities they committed. This could be a worthy consideration for the future. **Don’t ask me how, and don’t hate me for saying so. I’m just giving a speech.**

You cannot help the unfortunate mental conditions of a person, or the feelings they experience as a result, but for the media to offer them such a drastic “way out” by portraying these mass murders and school shootings as extremely impressing and memorable things is far more the cause of these tragedies than the availability of firearms. The fad of the eighties was overdosing, the fad of the nineties of high-speed chases, and now the fad is killing as many people as you can in a blaze of glory. Why? Because the media eats it up like chicken nuggets. They exhaust the stories of the shootings and the exploits of the perpetrator(s) to the point where it becomes the norm. It’s seen as the acceptable way out. Not because guns are easy to acquire, but because it solidifies them in history, forever to be remembered, instead of their otherwise fate of forever to be forgotten. Thank you.

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