Editor,

Yes, it happened again — as any intelligent, open-minded person knew it would — and will again. This time it was in Winder, Georgia. And, two recent articles in The Mountain Messenger pretty much highlight and explain the crisis.

Everytown for Gun Safety reports that the shooting at Apalachee High School was the 139th incident of gun violence on school grounds in 2024. For context (and based on our local school calendars), there have been 105 school days so far this year. Everytown also reports this as the 385th mass shooting (defined by Everytown as an incident where four or more people are killed) in 2024 — and it happened on the 217th day of the year.

In the August 8 issue of The Mountain Messenger, the lead article was “Gold, Gunfights, & Good Music”, with accompanying photo of the “gunfight”. The article said about the events of Gold Rush Days that “[t]he highlight, as usual, was the gunfight show on Main Street…”. In the following week’s paper, a front page article was “Sierra County Holds Active Shooter Training with CHP”, detailing how school staff and students were utilized for role-playing in the exercise which took place at Loyalton High School. The article was accompanied by photos of heavily-armed law enforcement officers.

The two articles encapsulate how we got to where we are now. It’s in our history as a nation and, apparently, in our psyche that guns and what they allow us to do are to be celebrated — even worshipped. For so many in our country, the only part of the U.S. Constitution that is really relevant is the Second Amendment — and that is sacred. And, really, the only part of that amendment that is really important, to the thinking of many, is the phrase (most usually taken out of context), “…the right of the people to keep and bear arms…”. As a result, children are having to undergo active shooter drills in school, and law enforcement are training for the actual incidents. And, if you don’t think that it can actually happen here, then ask yourself why such a training even took place in one of our county’s school.

In a directly related matter, did you know that there is an ongoing debate about whether students should be allowed to have access to cellphones in school classroom? On the one hand, there are studies that show an increase in learning, when students don’t have that distraction. On the other hand, students want to be able to call their parents with a final word of love and farewell, when the shooting happens in their school.

There are, of course, partial solutions to this crisis — solutions that a growing majority of our nation’s people support: universal background checks; red flag laws; outlawing of military-style weapons in the hands of civilians. Finding legislators with the will and courage to put those solutions into place, however, is a huge part of the problem. But, as long as guns are available — as long as guns are considered more sacred than our children’s and neighbors (and even our own families’) lives — the crisis will exist.

Paul Guffin

Downieville