Blood on His Cheeks and Hands

Barrow County Sheriff Jud Smith called the latest school massacre in Winder, GA “pure evil.” 

Smith was among the predictable chorus of voices who ascribe demonic forces at work every time children (and adults) are slaughtered in America. 

Colt Gray, the 14 year-old charged in the murders, is called “evil” and has been charged as an adult. Initially, the death penalty was mentioned, until the judge realized that a minor can only be sentenced to life in prison. Trying him as an adult is a travesty. He is a boy - a sad, desperate product of terrible, heartless dysfunction. He did something unthinkable, but a compassionate society does not compound the cruelty.

Colt’s father Colin has also been charged with, among other counts, second degree murder. Colin apparently allowed Colt to have unfettered access to the AR-15 with which he executed his classmates and teachers. 

The elder Gray claims to have properly raised the boy, including, according to the New York Times, sparking interest “in the outdoors, and away from video games. . . .” “The son, then 13, had recently shot his first deer, and his father kept a photo on his phone of the animal’s blood smeared on the boy’s cheeks — a common tradition among hunters.” 

Spare me the affection for hunting “traditions” and contemplate the image of a vulnerable 13 year-old boy with blood smeared on his cheeks. Now imagine featuring an image like that of your child on your phone or desktop.

I am sick to tears at the national paralysis over gun violence. Columbine didn’t matter. Uvalde, Sandy Hook, Parkland . . . bloody little corpses prayed over and then largely forgotten until the next one, and the next one and . . .

Along with the prayers, a few politicians mewl over the tragedy and whimper soft rhetoric about “common sense” gun measures. It hasn’t made a damned difference before, and it won’t now. Universal background checks, red flag laws, assault weapons bans and other largely symbolic measures might - might - slightly diminish the annual body counts, but no one seems able to muster the simple moral courage to tell the truth. Guns are killing machines, not “tools,” and any boy or man desperate enough to spray a classroom with bullets can and will get their finger on a rapid fire trigger when our guns outnumber our population.

Conservatives and others use “they want to take your guns away” to solidify opposition to any gun control efforts. To neutralize this rhetoric, it seems mandatory to establish gun bona fides. Even Joe Biden, pitifully, used this by mentioning that HE keeps his guns locked up. I cannot count the number of times politicians talk about “their” guns as though that bolsters their moral authority. 

Where is the politician or other leader with the courage or clarity to say, “Guns disgust me and I will not have one in my home.”?

J.D. Vance, like most others, prays and then proposes more school security. Trump thinks we should just “move on” from such tragedies. It is like suggesting gas masks for a nation exposed to toxic fumes, rather than addressing the source.

Georgia, like other states, has loosened gun restrictions. Governor Brian Kemp produced a campaign ad in which he held a shotgun on his lap while chatting with a boy. Members of Congress wear AR-15 lapel pins. Lauren Boebert struts around packing heat. I could give scores more examples. Then many of them shake their heads somberly intoning, “This is not who we are” as they demonstrate that this is exactly “who we are.”

As to GOP rhetoric, yes, I do indeed want to take your guns away. Of course I have no influence, but perhaps a few others share my belief that a gun-free society would be a better society. It is ironic that the “freedom” to bear arms has diminished the freedom to be safe in school, at a movie theater, at a nightclub, in rush hour traffic or at a parade celebrating freedom. 

The horrifying event at Apalachee High School left many victims in its wake, including Colt Gray. While I do not equate him with those he murdered, he too is a victim of a culture of violence and indifference. He was unnoticed, despite ringing the alarm bells himself, both with online postings and, according to his aunt, asking for mental health support. Instead, his 13 year-old face was smeared in deer blood. 

I don’t believe in the “good vs. evil” paradigm, particularly in its association with a divine power. But aside from its religious implications, calling Colt Gray “evil” absolves us of any responsibility for the desperation felt by too many boys and young men who are marginalized, humiliated and ignored.

Do that to boys, immerse them to a culture of “getting even,” make death machines tantalizingly available, and frequent eruptions are inevitable. 

And it’s only September.