If we rationalize our reaction to what happened in Orlando and feel it does not affect us personally we do so at our own peril.
I spent a good deal of time last week watching and listening to
the often-hyperbolic media coverage of the events at the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando.
Like many I have talked to, there were moments that I just had to
turn off the TV, log off the Internet and take a break.
I think the media coverage was excessive, exploitive, and
sometimes vulgar and like a lot of media coverage of major events way to much
got ya journalism.
None of that too in any way reduce the horror and misery that were
inflicted early Sunday morning.
The real public awareness issue with the Orlando massacre is that
responses to it are too easy to compartmentalize. There is the we need more gun
control crowd, the 2nd amendment defender crowd, the immigration
crowd the homophobic crowd and a few others.
The problem is the average person can easily put this event in
the it doesn't affect me pigeon hole because they are not part of the lifestyle
group affected, the demographic group affected and are unlikely to be a similar establishment.
If we as individuals we rationalize, our reaction to what happened
in Orlando and feel it does not affect us personally we do so at our own peril.
I saw many people, victims, public figures and average citizens
saying we will not change our behavior because that is what these people want
us to do. To react in fear.
Actually, we do need to change our behavior. As individuals, we
need to think more carefully, about where we assemble, where we let our
children go, where we go and evaluate the risks and rewards associated with
those decisions.
Juliette Kayyem, a former assistant secretary at the Department
of Homeland Security, is author of the forthcoming book: Security Mom: An Unclassified Guide to Protecting Our Homeland and Your
Home. She said, "The flow of
people and things, the movement to and within cities, the congregation of the
masses that makes our lives meaningful, whether at church or at Fenway Park,
are inherently risky. Our system (a federal government with limited powers,
mayors overseeing police departments, governors directing National Guards) wasn’t
designed to produce a seamless shield against every conceivable threat."
If you find yourself feeling bad about what happened in Orlando
but thinking, it really does not apply to you - you are wrong.
Like it or not, we are being changed by the events occurring
around us. We always have been and always will be.
Those wonderful days of walking out of your home and feeling
totally safe are just not part of our society anymore. Every public action and interaction
in our society carries some degree of risk, and our best defense is not the government.
It is common sense.
E-mail Doc at mail to: dr.gwebb@yahoo.com
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See Doc's Photo
Gallery at Bay Post Photos.
Disclosures:
Contributor: Bob Gualtieri for Pinellas County Sheriff
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