Preach

The holy men and women who have impressed me in my 24 years have been few and far between, but there are a handful. During today's Madison Police press conference, I added another to that list -- Pastor David Smith, who spoke both as a community leader and a black man about the senseless killing of Karamee Collins Tuesday night.

Pat Simms rolled tape, so I don't have to futz around myself to upload his speech. There's more, but these were the best parts

I hope Smith's cause resonates with the southwest side and gathers some steam. He closed his speech by calling on other members of the clergy to join him. I hope something comes of it.

The Corral Ain't Okay

Apparently, the big fad among young people around town is to indiscriminately blast everyone and everything in sight at the slightest provocation. I'm a little alarmed, mostly on account of the fact that I myself am something of a young person (though feeling less and less so after reading this week's headlines), but I didn't get the memo.

Well there's that, and then there are the bullets whizzing all over the side of town I work on.

You'd be hard-pressed finding anyone to argue that the drive-by shooting of 17-year-old Karamee Collins last night wasn't senseless. Sadly, you could find about 20-30 people, by police estimates, who would argue the recent string of nine shoot-em-up-don't-hit-shit gun crimes aren't outrageous, reckless, and foolish beyond belief.

But they're just idiots... 20-30 heavily-armed idiots with terrible aim who spray dozens of rounds willy-nilly around Loreen Drive as kids are coming home from school.

Police haven't be able to figure out for sure what's at the root of all this senseless violence, but there are some pretty good theories. When a 17-year-old is shot, it's likely he was shot by other 17-year-olds over whatever petty dramas 17-year-olds get fightin' mad about. The theory about the nine shootings is that there are four groups of people duking it out in a ridiculous Romeo and Juliet scenario spun rapidly out of control, to the point where they think it's become acceptable to walk down the middle of Allied Drive shooting the windows out of random apartments as a means of exacting revenge.

So brace yourselves. Now that we're in the midst of a spike in gun crimes, the old hot air machines will be firing up shortly to deafen us with insipidity. The anti-gun nutjobs will begin crying these tragedies could have been prevented by stricter gun control. The pro-gun nutjobs will start screaming a concealed-carry law would keep these thugs cowering in their basements instead of shooting up our streets. Both sides will lose all connection with reason.

And if the people of Madison are scared enough, they'll listen to whoever's solution is most outrageous.

I'm going to hazard a wild idea and say the guns are not the issue here. Guns are simply tools, a means to an end. People were killing each other for millennia before the first human had the idea to propel fragments of metal at other humans using a mix of saltpeter, charcoal and sulfur. Having more guns on the street will not lessen violence. Having fewer guns on the street will not lessen violence.

The shootings in Madison are a product of a problem with our society. This isn't a problem that's caused by television, or video games, or rap music. Those are all just symptoms of the problem.

The problem is there are some segments of our population that are so far out of touch with their humanity that they can momentarily justify using a gun, or a knife, or a bat to solve their own, smaller, insignificant problems. They've lost sight of the big picture of humanity as a whole and allowed themselves to become just a caricature of what they see on television and video games and rap music, because it's all they've let themselves know.

The young people who shot Karamee Collins didn't do it to protect their own lives. The 20-30 heavily-armed idiots running around the south side could lay down their arms and safely live out the rest of their days.

These criminals are acting out of line because of some perceived, irreconcilable wound to their pride, a pride which they've let become bigger to them than the sanctity of human life. And they'll suffer for it, but not before they exact even more suffering on the people around them.

But this problem of people losing touch with their humanity, it's not just limited to poor black neighborhoods on the south side. It runs through every strata of society. It lead a handful of Enron execs to try and steal billions of dollars from their employees. It lead two students to slaughter thirteen of their teachers and classmates before ending their own lives. It even lead an entire democratic nation into an immoral war. And the ends never justify the suffering that accrues along the way.

Collins was Madison's first murder of the year after a particularly bloody 2008, an inevitability given the way bullets have been flying. As my mom used to say, I guess it was only a matter of time until someone got hurt. But when I open the newspaper tomorrow or Friday and see police have released a "motive" in Collins's murder, I'll be hard-pressed to overcome the feeling of dread that will well up in me.

I know no matter what these foolish kids thought gave them reason enough to kill Collins, it will make me want to cry for them.