A gunman killing 12 in a murder rampage this week in the Washington, D.C. Navy Shipyard brings to the surface thoughts I’ve had before when things like this happen. This time the feelings did not accompany those thoughts. I didn’t have my familiar feelings of terror, panic, worry, anger and sadness. I’m insufficiently distraught, which is what is frustrating. I’m worried things like this don’t shock my conscience anymore.
Don’t get me wrong. What happened was horrible and tragic. Killing 12 people for whatever misguided reason this man may have had is never excusable, but this narrative sounds all too familiar. Maybe that familiarity is the reason I no longer feel like I did after 9/11, or Virginia Tech, or Ft. Hood, or Tucson, or Aurora, or Sandy Hook or even Boston. This is the first time, I’ve felt almost nothing.
Can I comprehend what happened is tragic? Of course. My heart, beyond probably anything I am actually capable of articulating, goes out to the families of those whose loved ones were victims.
But when things like this happen I almost feel manipulated by the media about how to feel as they turn this tragedy into for-profit ratings of a mass media spectacle known all too well in the 24-hour news cycle, which is scary and I’m tired of it.
What I’ve learned from tragedy in just the last year or so is that mass media hysteria, even when it is all over, still does not humanize us. Instead, we are left wondering how soon is too soon to politicize a tragedy, which only further divides this country. If our policy makers and our country cannot come together after one of our elected officials is shot in the head, people are innocently slaughtered enjoying the latest summer blockbuster, or children — before many of them even learned how to write their name in cursive — become victims at a place where they should be the safest, are killed, then when will we come together?
More and more this country is united not by beliefs and principles, but instead united by tragedy and senseless acts. We mourn together and pray together and say never again, but do we ever mean it?
The atrocities continue to mount and I’m afraid we will get to the point where these so called atrocities will become common place in the news cycle. We will mourn less and less each time as the collective conscience as a country hardens as the once spectacle becomes the new normal. How many times does it have to happen for us to be shaken at our core as individuals and collectively as Americans before we say enough is enough?
I’m afraid I’m already numb.