Curt Day

It was the worst of times, it was the most apathetic of times. A crazed gunman with an itchy trigger finger eagerly fired on unarmed and innocent civilians. Many died as a result and even children were shot at. How should we respond? What do we want our government to do?

How would we feel if the authorities let Jared Loughner go free? How betrayed would we feel? Would we be so incensed that we would take matters into our own hands? Would we feel that we are now being forced to live by the rule of the jungle?

Fortunately our government is taking action to ensure that Loughner never shoots another person. And our leaders have been addressing issues in order to prevent similar massacres in the future. What our government is doing regarding Loughner is fortunate for us; but how it handles other like situations is not fortunate for all. Our government is not treating all mass murders as being equal. But lets first talk about what happened in Tucson.

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Nozomi Hayase

Cross hairs and gun-sights are all the rage in the media these days after the killings in Tucson, with Sarah Palin getting flack for her mindless cross hairs map, to the inflamed calls for illegal assassination of Julian Assange. Could this be a time for a more self-conscious look at the violent undercurrents of our 'civilized' American society? Perhaps each one of us has at some point put someone in our own gun sights after reducing them into the role of an enemy. What responsibility does each of us share for this violent rhetoric and behavior?

The shooting in Tucson was an event that has brought home how deeply violent American culture can be. The American people have drifted into what I term a gun-sight consciousness, one that is extremely narrow and turns others into caricatures, easily targeted with hate and manipulated with fear-based reactions. The 'big guns' US military budget that feeds at least three active wars is sacrosanct, all the while the country is going bankrupt and under no real threat from any nation. This is as senseless as the over-hyped rhetoric of right vs. left when both parties clearly serve the same billionaire masters. Maybe it a good time to wake up and become aware of how we are moving quickly into self-destruction phase through manipulation of irrational fear and outrage.

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