The Flaws Of A Great Country
One 19-year-old made 17 innocent hearts bleed to death and left their loved ones in mourning. With tears, heartfelt condolences and the dream to cease such mass shootings, we voice ourselves and we stand up for change alongside the students, faculty and staff of Stoneman Douglas High School.
In this great country, that 19 year old’s troubled, violent and threatening behavior gets him expelled from school, but some didn’t see his behavior as a warning sign for worse to come.
We are talking about Nikolas Cruz, a former student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. On Feb. 14, at about 2:20 p.m., Cruz walked into his former school, activated a fire alarm, opened fire and ended the lives of 15 students and two teachers.
In this great country, Cruz is not allowed to drink, but he is allowed to vote, drive, purchase an AR 15 firearm and become a media sensation.
Instead of creating walls to stop people from migrating into the land of the free, we should fund walls within every school for security. Every school should be constructed with metal detectors and reinforced doors with locks from the inside.
Institutions do not conduct red code or black code emergency procedures, even though they should be mandatory in orientations. Unfortunately, anyone is able to turn on a fire alarm switch and cause chaos. So, institutions should consider a help or stress button and to allow certain personnel to have access to the fire alarm switch box or panic button under a desk in class.
We should fund special facilities to treat, support and educate the mentally impaired and those with alarming behavioral problems, who are not fit to be in school. Some people require special attention and accommodations from professional therapists and doctors, who can also decide on subsequent actions. No one should be singled out as it builds up anger and cause violence.
People easily label someone as mentally impaired because he or she commits a violent or radical act, but there should be no correlation of mental diseases with mass shootings. How is one mentally impaired person capable of premeditating an act of violence with niceties? Who is mentally impaired? The one who holds a gun or the one who makes gun ownership easier?
In this great country, it’s too easy to obtain a gun permit. The credentials are to have a clean record, a driver’s license and money. Some states also require a firearm safety course and taking a test with about 20 questions. Regulations to own a gun should be beyond completing those requirements. Background checks must include mental evaluations and school and job records to help reduce deadly incidents.
Some follow the second amendment of the United States Constitution like the Bible. The amendment, written in 1791, is questionable and has caused debates nationwide. Will gun control halt mass shootings? If one looks at the statistics of homicide caused by firearms from countries like Australia, where gun control laws are stricter, one can easily conclude its effectiveness.
In this great country, politicians and senators constantly argue over gun control but never form any resolutions. Meanwhile, innocent people are dying. Gun control is no longer an issue of the right party or the left party— it is everyone’s issue. Our country must come together; some parties must disarm themselves from political views, modify and create new laws to protect our citizens.
People who bring awareness to these types of issues are called problematic or mentally off. Employers view an applicant’s social media accounts before hiring them. However, a gun shop owner is not required to do so, because HIPAA regulations does not allow medical records to be disclosed during a background check.
People are sometimes fired for posting and commenting on social media, but the FBI was not held accountable for not acting on the death comments Cruz made on Instagram. The FBI received the tip, but Cruz had tipped many people prior and none of them calculated the warning signs. Social media should not only be regulated, but also create a filtering software that will extract comments and posts that are violent towards people and animals.
During hard times people come together, but it is time for our government to come together decide for the people’s rights and make their future dreams possible.
NRA funds companies and politicians. We wonder if the child of an NRA member, or senator, or the president was involved in that fatal mass shooting on February 14, 2018, what kind of changes would have immediately taken place?
We become great based on our actions, duties, contributions and social responsibilities. Shooting with an AR 15 and killing 17 innocent lives at the age of 19 does not stand as a great act.
