Victoria Soto: Killed protecting her students from a deranged
gunman, American political leaders need look no further than
her to understand what needs to be done.
Obama Must Follow Victoria
Soto: Only Action, Not Tears, Saves Lives (Estadao,
Brazil)
"Today, the
post-massacre ritual is repeating itself: politicians speak of God and family, and
lower flags to half-staff. Platitudes are regurgitated during countless interviews.
Psychologists and sociologists are invited to examine the assassin's profile -
almost always a lone White man. ... But no one has the courage of Victoria Soto,
the teacher who died protecting her students. The same politicians who want to
protect children from gay marriage are opposed to prohibiting private ownership
of automatic weapons."
NEW YORK: The
U.S. government wouldn't allow any of the 20 children who were executed by Adam
Lanza in Connecticut on Friday to ride in a car
without a special child seat.
If any of those children martyred in the classroom lived
in my apartment, I'd have to inform the government so that protective bars would
be installed over the windows.
Two weeks before having their bodies pierced by bullets
from an automatic weapon American soldiers use in Afghanistan, the same victims
had been shielded by the new Child Protection
Act - a law that gives 20 year prison sentences to anyone found with pornographic
material involving a minor under 12.
One of the senators who sponsored passage of the law is
Texan John Cornyn. He is the same Republican who
voted in favor of allowing passengers to carry firearms in their luggage onto
trains, and received the maximum rating from the National Rifle Association -
an "A."
In Washington, 244 of the 435 members of Congress accepted
donations from the NRA this year. Of those who didn't directly receive money from
the powerful firearms lobby, how many would do what Victoria Soto did - the
27-year-old teacher who hid her students in a closet? Victoria's last words
were directed at Adam Lanza: She lied about the children's
location before being executed.
This month, four U.S. states will count on help from the NRA
in an effort to join 17 other states that have passed laws permitting employees
to carry firearms to their workplaces - as long as they're kept in the car.
Following the second worst firearms massacre in U.S.
history, American media have scoured Lanza family history
for signs that could explain the tragedy. The divorce of Adam's parents was
traumatic, they say. The 20-year-old shooter was extremely intelligent - but
antisocial. Speaking to reporters, even the sister of Adam's father confessed with
some relief: “My children know how to tell right from wrong,” and she
pontificated about the need to raise children properly. Her sister-in-law Nancy
was Adam's first victim, killed from a shot to the face. When she would sit at
the Newtown bar an listen to jazz, Nancy Lanza was
proud to speak of the collection of weapons she kept at home. Her friends say
she would take her sons shooting at gun ranges in upstate New York.
Connecticut's governor said there was no reason to seek a
motive for the tragedy, as there could be no satisfactory explanation. How mistaken
he is. In 1997, after the mass assassination of 35 victims in Tasmania, Australia's
conservative government passed a law controlling the possession of firearms.
There hasn't been a massacres since. In the same year, after the killing of 16
children at a primary school in Dunblane, Scotland,
the British Parliament made private ownership of firearms illegal.
The year 2012 was one of the most lethal in the history
of American massacres. Just like what happened in an Aurora movie theater
tragedy in July, when James Holmes shot 12 people with legally-acquired guns
and ammunition he purchased online, today the post-massacre ritual is repeating
itself: politicians speak of God and family, and lower flags to half-staff.
Candlelight vigils multiply and the entertainment industry cancels events.
Platitudes are regurgitated during countless interviews. Psychologists and
sociologists are invited to examine the assassin's profile - almost always a
lone White man.
Posted by Worldmeets.US
But no one has the courage of Victoria Soto, the teacher
who died protecting her students. The same politicians who want to protect
children from gay marriage are opposed to prohibiting private ownership of
automatic weapons. In the majority of American states, proposing control of the
possession of firearms is akin to committing electoral suicide.
In a world where the greatest influencers of opinion are
those with the most millions of Twitter followers, there is no responsible
debate about the severity of America's public health problem - yes, public
health, an epidemic of firearms. The United States has as many inhabitants as
it has guns in circulation - over 300 million. American children ages 5 to 14
have a 13 times greater chance of being killed by firearms than children from other
industrialized countries.
We've never seen Barack Obama cry. Yet the president
nicknamed “no drama Obama” fought back tears while reading a short statement
after the massacre on Friday, in which he lamented the lost innocence of the
children who survived the killing. Victoria Soto didn't cry, but she did save
her children. How many children is the president ready to save?
