The head of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives says he fears that a drumbeat of mass shootings and other gun violence across the United States could make Americans numb to the bloodshed, fostering apathy to finding solutions rather than galvanizing communities to act.
Director Steve Dettelbach’s comments to The Associated Press came after he met this past week with family members of some of the 18 people killed in October at a bowling alley and a bar in Lewiston, Maine by a U.S. Army reservist who later took his own life.
He said people must not accept that gun violence is a prevalent part of American life.
For me, Sandy Hook was the moment I realized we aren’t going to collectively do anything about gun violence.
Seeing children cry whatever. But the amount of grownups I saw cry that day—people who I expected didn’t cry at all even—and I was like “don’t get your hopes up, self; these Americans are sadists to people unlike themselves and they are people who like horrible things”. I was delighted when I was wrong for the first six months. And then despondently correct all along since then. What kind of horrible people made out of literal garbage allow the slaughters and massacres, especially those of children, to continue? Disgusting.