Introverted Bear

I would like to begin by saying that the designer of the jacket did a fantastic job. It's eye catching and also very profound and simple at the same time.

Gary Younge clearly did his research, and he did it well. Each chapter of the book focuses on a child that was murdered by someone with a gun within a 24-hour period. Within each chapter, he weaves in themes that concur with gun violence, such as domestic disputes, accidental shootings, and gangs. I thought it was very beautifully done. I don't know much about the statistics that he mentioned, but I was aware of most of the information already, except for the information about the gangs.

I have not researched gun violence myself, but from reading local newspapers, I am aware that tons of people die due to domestic violence and negligence. The Louisiana newspapers report on multiple occasions where children find guns and accidentally end up killing themselves or a relative. It happens more often than it should. When I lived in Baton Rouge, there used to be at least one domestic violence shooting per week in the Advocate, the Baton Rouge newspaper, and yes, most of them were black. Shootings in Baton Rouge were so common that only one article was written on each incident. On the other hand, shootings are so uncommon in my current community in Pennsylvania that that the reporters wrote 5-6 articles on one domestic violence shooting, even following the ordeal in the courts. There's a stark difference in response when your community is used to shootings happening almost daily.

Something really intrigued me in the last chapter of the book. The dad, Greg, wanted his kid to be in the house before 10pm. My mom was the same, and I grew up in a white middle class neighborhood. The safest place to my parents was their house with the doors double locked (Now that I think about it . . . none of the doors that I've seen in Pennsylvania double lock!). All parents want to keep their children safe, but sometimes that's impossible. I feel like it would be much easier to keep their children safe if there weren't so many guns in the US. I wish for once that we would choose people's right to bodily safety over someone's right to own a gun. I believe guns are inherently dangerous because it's too easy to make mistakes with them, even if you have taken a safety course and have used them all your life. It's just too easy to forget one little detail and cause an accident.

This may be a controversial opinion, but I think it's rather disturbing how Americans worship their guns. I've only heard of one person who's mom used a gun to defend herself, but I think most people who own guns in Louisiana own them for hunting. Or at least, my uncles and cousins owned them for hunting. But I honestly wish that there were fewer guns in the US, and I don't think we will be safe as a country until they are restricted.