boys and guns

the media has rolled out the carpet and begun the fetishization of today's horrific murder today at the elementary school in connecticut.  they are giving the american psyche some feeling of control as they give minute by minute updates as to the names of the victims.  they are interviewing bus drivers who knew the students.  children are being shoved in front of cameras to talk about how frightened they were.  you can hear it in the scripts of the stations- in the voices of the anchors and correspondents- they are desperate to make something new out of this.  something that will make this a worst or a most or an extreme.  sensational.  sick.

and everyone online is horrified and giving their children extra hugs tonight.  and i do not blame them.
and everyone online is asking for god's healing for the families and victims.  and i judge them.
and everyone keeps stuttering, in chorus like stupor, "i just don't understand why."

my usual response would be:  there is no why.  there is no comfort.  we live in an absurd world.

but a few days ago, i turned in a paper about the social constructions of masculine identity, and the devastating effects these constructions have not only on women, but on the men themselves.  i was writing on gods go begging, concerned with soldiers in the Vietnam War.  i dove into some writings by wollstonecraft and woolf who undermine the stability of a patriarchal hierarchy, particularly in regards to gender, war, and heroism defined by violence.  all that to say...  it's got me feeling differently about what happened today.

i would like to point out that all of the recent mass shootings- schools or theaters- have been committed by young men.

and i would like to suggest that there is something terribly wrong with the way that we are raising boys.  we breed soldiers.  we put toy guns in the hands of kids who aren't even able to talk through problems.  we glorify and justify acts of violence in the name of patriotism, and expect that only actual soldiers will be influenced by that image of courage and power and bravery.  men are aggressive. men protect.  men shoot guns.  there is something wrong.

current definitions of masculinity do a terrible disservice to boys and men.

there is a difference between physical exertion and violence.
there is a difference between competition and domination.
as a culture, we can barely articulate a difference.