Cycles of violence: Uvalde school shooting

Another mass shooting at an elementary school. Children the ages of Evan and Bella, who look like Evan and Bella, were killed by a teenager from their community who was wearing body armor and carrying guns, and who, according to Texas Department of Public Safety, was “engaged” by police before he got to the school. 

Whatever “engaged” means in this context.

After that “engagement,” he went on to kill at least 18 people—children between 7 and 11, and at least one teacher. 

And then he was shot and killed. 

The grief of the families, the trauma of the children who survived, the ways all their lives have changed: who can hold that?

I have lost count of the mass murders committed in the USA this year. Is this 221? 222? Did another one occur between Buffalo and Uvalde? 

Journalist Eoin Higgins writes, “ICE is on scene which means many parents will have to risk detention in US concentration camps while checking to see if their kid is alive.” 

This country is full of people with a compulsion to “bear arms” and to shoot people; to police borders and to criminalize refugees who are not white; to believe that police make us safe and that if you have more guns and more police, you will be safe. This weekend, The Governor of Texas, Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, and Donald Trump will all be guests at a convention in Texas of the National Rifle Association, the gun lobby that holds our congress in thrall.

I don’t follow sports, and until today I didn’t know who Steve Kerr was. A coach, apparently, of basketball, I think. But he made a two-and-a-half-minute speech that expresses what many people feel tonight.

I’ll turn comments on because I know some people may want to say something about all this, but I am still promised for tomorrow and may not be able to respond until Thursday. Love and empathy with all the people whose lives were blasted to bloody pieces today, including the shooter’s family.