Gun Violence Beyond the Numbers: To Rid Ourselves of Hate, We Must Listen
Dr. Ben Danielson, from the Odessa-Brown Clinic, began last week’s panel discussion about gun violence and hate in a surprising way. He cleverly made the audience imagine these concerns as an opportunity to see into our nation’s soul: “Gun violence teaches us how deeply racism and hatred permeates our society” the doctor said. “We live in a country that has too many flavors of hate.”
The diverse panel brought together in the back room of Gay City did a fabulous job of unveiling these different flavors, by offering voices to civic activists who had experienced a disturbing, but all too predictable, range of hatred and intolerance. The subsequent panel discussion, led capably by Pamela Banks, did not fall into an exchange of grievances, but instead challenged the audience to empathize.
Danni Askini, a transgender civic activist, spoke of standing up to a “culture of fear” that weighs down transgender Americans every single day. A community activist named Sonja Basha implored the audience to challenge what “justified violence looks like” and to understand that gun violence threatens the daily existence of those outside the protection of our society. In a similar vein, Reverend Carey Anderson told a personal anecdote, describing his wife’s fear when he was pulled over by a cop in the middle of the night for no other reason than being black.
While the panelists focused on different sources of hatred, all of them shared a common call-to-action, which Monisha Harrell from Equal Rights Washington summed up well: they wanted a society which recognized the right to simply be.
As a straight white man, this is a status that I am accustomed to. I have never had to fight for it. And Harrell’s claim served as a poignant reminder to me and to the (mostly white) audience that violence in this country does not affect everyone equally; that simply being in America is not a given.
The Alliance for Gun Responsibility and Greater Seattle Business Association deserve huge credit for assembling a panel that truly highlighted the many flavors of hate present in America. The vibrant discussion illustrated just how far the gun responsibility movement has come in the last five years.
By giving a platform to a broad range of civic activists (who are normally shut out of the conversation), the movement can begin to reflect the true reality of gun violence, and by doing so, can help lead us to the best solutions. For while gun violence is often described as “random”, “indiscriminate” and “senseless” by our society, the hate which fuels it is distinctively not. That aspect of gun violence, we can absolutely tackle. But only if we listen.
By identifying where the hatred comes from and allowing those affected to boldly announce their fear, we can more purposefully rid ourselves of this deadly sickness we call gun violence. Last week’s panel helped begin this healing process.
