Some Thoughts on Yesterday’s Tragedy in Uvalde from a Native Texan
More than the flag below is in tatters today
I don’t know the right way to start this piece, because it’s one that should not have to be written. Yet somehow it’s one I could write with alarming regularity and it would still fall under the heading of “breaking news.” Eight months after I was born in Texas in January 1966, Charles Whitman killed 16 people, most while firing a rifle from the observation deck of the University of Texas tower; this is widely considered the first mass shooting in U.S. history. Yesterday, 56 years later, another gunman murdered 21 innocent people at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas; 19 of those killed were children. Children.
In between those two horrific crimes are a litany of similar events in the Lone Star State: a Luby’s restaurant in Killeen (1991) — 24 dead; Fort Hood (2009) — 14 dead; First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs (2017) — 27 dead; Santa Fe High School (2018) — 10 dead; a Walmart in El Paso (2019) — 23 dead. Those are just the instances where 10 or more people were killed; there are 12 more where at least three people were killed. All happened after 1980, and the frequency of such attacks has only increased over time. In just the past five years, 102 people have lost their lives as a result of mass shootings in Texas alone.
