BY the end of July, 46 homicides were reported in Milwaukee, where I grew up. On August 5 seven more dead bodies were added to the total. What’s happened to the city I loved, that nurtured me for my first two decades?
Mothers continue to bury children mercilessly cut-down before-their-time; siblings and friends bear painful scars for life.
Bereft families lead marches begging to end violence ... “No more!” they plead; “Not in my name; enough of our children have been murdered!” they implore. Strangers of all backgrounds light candles in vigil for the Sikhs ruthlessly murdered.
My friends here in Australia are gobsmacked at America’s love-affair with their guns. They challenge me, “Assault weapons? Semi- and fully-automatic weapons? Who needs those?” They continue, challenging my weakening defence of “Second Amendment rights”, “Automatic weapons aren’t intended for self-defence!”
Increasingly, “the land of the free and home of the brave” becomes a mockery, with its gun-based violence and its export of weapons and war.
Recent massacres in Denver and Milwaukee prove the case.
“When did life get so cheap?” sobbed one parent after a man murdered his pregnant girlfriend in Milwaukee. When indeed?
It’s time to re-think our position on personally-owned guns, before more of our children, siblings, parents and friends are ruthlessly taken from us.
Judy Bamberger
Canberra