I have been thinking a lot about two things since I heard about today's tragic shooting in Connecticut. One of these things is a number and one of them is a book. The number is 62 and the book is The Brothers Karamazov. Allow me to explain.
Sixty two is the number of mass shootings (shootings in
which at least four people were killed) that have occurred in the United States
since 1982, the year I started high school. Twelve of these have been in
schools. Each of these shootings outraged and terrified the nation. Each
produced a brief national conversation about such things as guns, mental
health, or media violence, and none of them led to any substantial changes in
anything. After the United States, the country with the next largest number of
mass shootings during the last 30 years is Finland, which has had two.
The most horrible thing about these unthinkable tragedies is that they are not unthinkable tragedies. Horrific and senseless, yes, but not unthinkable. Nothing that happens 62 times can be considered unthinkable, if only because we have been forced, 62 times, to think it. And there is a tremendous difference between an anomaly and an extreme. Anomalies, when they happen, do not seem possible; extremes are not only possible, but, given enough instances, guaranteed to occur. To the great discredit of our society, none of us heard the news today and thought "this cannot possibly be happening." What we thought was, "oh no, not again."
We need to stop pretending that whatever it is that causes things like this to happen is not an integral part of or society. It is. And as long as we allow it to remain part of our society, these things are going to keep happening. I don’t know exactly what the right answer is, but I would say that the three top contenders are
The most horrible thing about these unthinkable tragedies is that they are not unthinkable tragedies. Horrific and senseless, yes, but not unthinkable. Nothing that happens 62 times can be considered unthinkable, if only because we have been forced, 62 times, to think it. And there is a tremendous difference between an anomaly and an extreme. Anomalies, when they happen, do not seem possible; extremes are not only possible, but, given enough instances, guaranteed to occur. To the great discredit of our society, none of us heard the news today and thought "this cannot possibly be happening." What we thought was, "oh no, not again."
We need to stop pretending that whatever it is that causes things like this to happen is not an integral part of or society. It is. And as long as we allow it to remain part of our society, these things are going to keep happening. I don’t know exactly what the right answer is, but I would say that the three top contenders are
- A media culture that glorifies and perpetuates a pornographic violence that is often presented as an acceptable way to obtain power and solve problems.
- Unprecedented access to guns and a political culture that has become increasingly unwilling to limit who can obtain guns or what kinds of guns can be obtained.
- An extreme aversion to programs that make health care—including mental health care—available to those who cannot afford insurance.
What unites all of these cultural
factors, of course, is something that Americans are very proud of: our
cherished freedom to whatever we damn well please. We have the First
Amendment, which guarantees the freedom of expression, no matter how violent or
reprehensible. We have the Second Amendment, which means that anybody who wants
a gun can, with very few exceptions, get a gun. And we have all watched for four years as an extremely modest attempt at health insurance policy has split the country in two.
And this, really, is the problem. A culture of unlimited freedom cannot protect its most vulnerable members. To a very great extent, giving up some freedom to protect our children is what it means to live in a civilized society.
This leads me to Dostoyevsky’s masterpiece, The Brothers Karamazov, and to a passage that I never really understood until today. It occurs in the fourth chapter of the fifth book, right before Ivan tells his brother, Alyosha, the famous “Grand Inquisitor” story. In this stunning prequel, Ivan talks about the gruesome murders of children that he has experienced or been made familiar with. The stories are heart rending. One tells of children being shot in the face by Turkish soldiers in front of their mothers. Another recounts the tale of an eight year old child who was torn to pieces by hunting dogs as punishment for throwing a small pebble at a nobleman’s favorite hound.
At the end of these stories, Ivan proposes a thought experiment: imagine a situation where you could bring about universal harmony and all you had to do was consent to the brutal torture and murder of one innocent child. Alyosha recoils at the thought and rejects the proposition. And so do I. And yet, at about 1:00 this afternoon, I realized that this is exactly what we, as a society, have agreed to do. In the sacred name of freedom, we have consented to a culture that we know will produce, at regular intervals, the senseless deaths of innocent babies.
I realize, of course, that most of us would agree to take guns away from people whom we know are going to use them to shoot up a kindergarten. I know, too, that we would all be willing to provide him with free health care and control his video gaming experiences. Once we know that somebody is a psychopath, we are more than willing to take away his (and it always does seem to be a “his”) liberties.
But laws and policies governing three hundred million people cannot be that discriminating. If we wait until somebody has proven to be a criminal or a psychopath before we do anything to regulate his choices, we will always be too late. The alternative is that we all give up some liberty—not completely, of course, I don’t think anybody is suggesting that we get rid of all media violence or all guns—but at least partially. There are plenty of non-totalizing measures that we could take, but political pressure and slippery slope arguments—combined with inexhaustible funds with which to lobby politicians—have generally prevented even modest attempts to regulate guns, or media violence, or health care costs.
So horrific events will keep happening. That is what the number 62 tells us. As long as we accept the status quo, we are implicitly accepting the extremes that are statistically guaranteed to occur in any set of behaviors. But let us at least be honest about the tradeoffs that we are agreeing to. Or, perhaps, we can abandon our well rehearsed scripts and engage in deep and meaningful conversations about the culture we have created and the consequences that our choices have for the most vulnerable among us.
As for me, I agree with Ivan Karamazov: “if the sufferings of children go to swell the sum of sufferings which was necessary to pay for truth, then I protest that the truth is not worth such a price." Neither is the absolute freedom to do whatever I want to do whenever I want to do it.
And this, really, is the problem. A culture of unlimited freedom cannot protect its most vulnerable members. To a very great extent, giving up some freedom to protect our children is what it means to live in a civilized society.
This leads me to Dostoyevsky’s masterpiece, The Brothers Karamazov, and to a passage that I never really understood until today. It occurs in the fourth chapter of the fifth book, right before Ivan tells his brother, Alyosha, the famous “Grand Inquisitor” story. In this stunning prequel, Ivan talks about the gruesome murders of children that he has experienced or been made familiar with. The stories are heart rending. One tells of children being shot in the face by Turkish soldiers in front of their mothers. Another recounts the tale of an eight year old child who was torn to pieces by hunting dogs as punishment for throwing a small pebble at a nobleman’s favorite hound.
At the end of these stories, Ivan proposes a thought experiment: imagine a situation where you could bring about universal harmony and all you had to do was consent to the brutal torture and murder of one innocent child. Alyosha recoils at the thought and rejects the proposition. And so do I. And yet, at about 1:00 this afternoon, I realized that this is exactly what we, as a society, have agreed to do. In the sacred name of freedom, we have consented to a culture that we know will produce, at regular intervals, the senseless deaths of innocent babies.
I realize, of course, that most of us would agree to take guns away from people whom we know are going to use them to shoot up a kindergarten. I know, too, that we would all be willing to provide him with free health care and control his video gaming experiences. Once we know that somebody is a psychopath, we are more than willing to take away his (and it always does seem to be a “his”) liberties.
But laws and policies governing three hundred million people cannot be that discriminating. If we wait until somebody has proven to be a criminal or a psychopath before we do anything to regulate his choices, we will always be too late. The alternative is that we all give up some liberty—not completely, of course, I don’t think anybody is suggesting that we get rid of all media violence or all guns—but at least partially. There are plenty of non-totalizing measures that we could take, but political pressure and slippery slope arguments—combined with inexhaustible funds with which to lobby politicians—have generally prevented even modest attempts to regulate guns, or media violence, or health care costs.
So horrific events will keep happening. That is what the number 62 tells us. As long as we accept the status quo, we are implicitly accepting the extremes that are statistically guaranteed to occur in any set of behaviors. But let us at least be honest about the tradeoffs that we are agreeing to. Or, perhaps, we can abandon our well rehearsed scripts and engage in deep and meaningful conversations about the culture we have created and the consequences that our choices have for the most vulnerable among us.
As for me, I agree with Ivan Karamazov: “if the sufferings of children go to swell the sum of sufferings which was necessary to pay for truth, then I protest that the truth is not worth such a price." Neither is the absolute freedom to do whatever I want to do whenever I want to do it.
