Recently a famous internet and punditry personality by the name of Charlie Kirk was shot and killed. As I was eating my lunch at my place of employment I overheard two of my coworkers, who I know are quite typical conservative Republican voters, discussing the event. They were going over the internet speculation and debating what it will all mean. They spoke often of "us" and "our side." This did not surprise me. What gave me pause however, was when one of my coworkers said "This kind of thing doesn't just happen." I haven't been able to stop thinking about this phrase since that moment. He was obviously speaking conspiratorially, as if it was a sign of some kind of plot or deception. But that phrase. It turned over in my mind over and over again. These kinds of events happen in America every single day. What on Earth did he mean "This kind of thing doesn't just happen."? America has one of the highest gun death rates in the world. Not the developed world. Just the world. Our shooting death statistics place us closer to active war zones and failed nation states than to other functional nations. Just earlier this same year multiple state Congress people were shot and killed. Just this year someone shot up a Catholic Mass. And those are the gun deaths that get reported in the news. People are shot and killed in this nation on an hourly, minute by minute basis. This problem has grown and grown and grown for decades now. But many people in this nation can live with this fact. They can accept it. They do not see anything wrong with it as a state of the nation. They think it is perfectly acceptable, nay preferable, state of affairs for the nation to be in. They believe the sacrifice of these lives is a price worth paying for their right to unfettered access to weapons of war and death. And do you know who believed that? Who stood up for that belief? Charlie Kirk.
