April 17
It is no longer possible to say that I am shocked when hearing of a major shooting incident in an American school or university. Tragically, they are all too frequent for real shock, even when the scale of them is as horrifying as yesterday's rampage at Virginia Tech, which left 33 people dead.
They have also left the United States in the grip of yet another national debate about gun laws, and whether the ease of access to deadly weapons enjoyed by most American citizens contributes to the high incidence of these types of events, relative to European and other countries where the use and distribution of firearms is heavily regulated. (To me it seems all too evident that it is, but that is really neither here nor there.)
It is inevitable that there will now be days, or perhaps weeks, of hand-wringing in the US about this matter, but the shape of the debate is already set into a pattern that has been rehashed over and over again, to little effect. This forum in the Washington Post seems to say it all.
For the gun control lobby, this is another example of the perils of the gun culture. To the NRA and others, the tired response is the same as it ever was: "Guns don't kill people, people kill people." The laboured retort is: "But it's easier to kill people with an automatic weapon than a plastic spoon..." And then: "If everyone carried guns everywhere, this shooter would have stopped before he did so much damage." Etc, etc, etc...
These attitudes are entrenched and unchanging, and sadly I know that in another 6, 12, 18 months time we will be here again, in another school, a different university, a shopping mall or wherever, with another dozen dead and another circular, fruitless debate.
Because for better or worse, the US Constitution guarantees its citizens the right to bear arms, and there is next to no prospect of that being changed.
What is really most worrying and depressing about this debate is that nobody seems to have either the desire or the ability to find, or even really look for, a middle path that somehow will allow Americans to keep their cherished Constitutional rights at the same time as protecting citizens from the worst excesses and horrors of gun use.
The United States is an extraordinary, powerful, innovative, wonderful country full of generous, smart and creative people. Surely it cannot be beyond the wit of one or some of them to find a way through this unholy mess and do something to resolve the ideological and practical deadlock.
In the meantime the rest of us can mourn and pray for the unfortunate victims at Virginia Tech and their families, and keep our fingers crossed that it doesn't happen again.