Prayer Vigil 2010
Today my friend Marna called to say she had updated the 2010 Homicide list for the web page Mothers Against Gun Violence. I take pictures at some of the prayer vigils and then post them on the site. I did not get the pictures posted tonight but on the news heard a report of a triple homicide, a mother and two very young children and the death, suicide or homicide, of a fourth person of interest in the triple homicide. A fifth person involved in these events, a 6 week old baby, was found in the cold outside of a Church. Now in one day we go from 13 to 16 or 17 homicides. When will the violence stop?
In a few weeks I plan to redesign the Nonviolent Action side of the web page, www.nonviolentcow.org. I was thinking of breaking up the material on this side of the web site into two parts: No More War Spending and Teach War No More. Now, after the homicides today, I am thinking of a third breakdown under nonviolence dealing with the daily violence we face in our society. This year many of the homicides have been domestic, killed by friend or family member. Efforts of groups like Mothers Against Gun Violence or WAVE have been no match for the gun lobby.
Last night I saw in the news that a 19 year old teenager was sentenced to 80
years in prison for shooting two police officers. Fortunately the police man lived to testify at the sentencing. The young man had pleaded guilty. The news said that he suffered from a low IQ and severe mental illness. The young man himself, in apologizing to the police officers and their families, said that he purchased the gun because he believed someone was out to kill him. When the two policemen stopped him for a traffic violation while he was driving his bicycle, he thought that he was going to be killed and in a scuffle shot the two police officers.
What a tragedy for the victims, police officers, and young man who will spend the rest of his life in prison, clearly no on medication and realizing what he had done.
Violence takes all forms in our society, war, war spending, teaching war, domestic and street violence. Maybe the title of this side of the web page instead of nonviolence should be NO VIOLENCE.
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