School Shooting, Cultural Emotion

Ok, usually I have an idea for my posts weeks ahead of time and I’ll map it out in my head for sometime before sitting down to compose my post. 

This time…nope, nothing, no blaring stories were percolating inside my noodle of a brain.

So what to write about?  More Alaska tails from my childhood?  Perhaps the true story of what happens to a thumb when it gets struck by an ax?  A bloody good story for sure, but I want to develop that story in my head before I write about it.  For another time.

This morning my wife inquired about my post for this week, and I told her I had nothing.  She said sure you do.  You should write about the recent Noblesville Middle School shooting. 

My first reaction was yeah, but I don’t want to make this blog a political platform.  She understood, but it got me thinking about the resent school shooting again.  So, why not go down this conversational path a little?

My intentions are not to get political.  I do not have a manipulative political agenda.  This is more opinion of our culture and society.  Again, just my thoughts and observations.

As a culture we are an emotionally driven.  We thrive on emotions, it’s everywhere in our culture.  Disney Pixar made a movie about emotions and had specific characters for each emotion.  We communicate via text messages using emoji to express emotions in text form.  

For many, we let our emotion dictate our reality and prospective of the world.  The emotional fact is more real then the factual truth for some. 

Unfortunately, our advertisers, politicians, and entertainers use our emotions.  They are the cultural marionettes of emotion, tugging at emotional strings from above. 

For what reason? 

Pick one.  It doesn’t matter. 

Someone with an agenda will use an emotional strategy to meet a goal…whatever the goal.   

As a culture we let this happen, consciously or subconsciously.  We allow emotion to drive our logical thought. 

As an emotionally driven culture we have great tools and platforms to express our emotions. 

Pick a social media platform, Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, this blog…and alike.  They are all platforms to express our all-important emotional stances on whatever is going on--from gun control to school shootings, to how to make the best PB and J sandwich to serve at school lunches.  (Wait, we can’t serve peanut butter at school anymore.  Everyone is allergic to peanut butter.  Serving peanut butter will cause an emotional uproar).

Everyone is an expert and everyone is going to make sure you know they’re an expert through the great social media platforms.  Should you decide to question one’s opinion, hold on for the emotional backlash.

The day of the shooting took place at Noblesville West Middle School, I received an automated phone call from the Noblesville School District with an automated recorded massage informing me of the shooting at Noblesville West Middle School.  Sure, I got a little panicked (wait, they said West Middle School Right?).   My daughter attends Noblesville East Middle School, so naturally, I thought of her and replayed the recorded message in my head.  I reassured myself that the incident was taking place at the other middle school.   

My daughter is fine.  The shooting made her think for sure.  She has shared some of her thoughts and feelings about that day and it’s a good way for her to process and learn.  Unfortunately, some of her friends have encouraged her to be more vocal about the shooting, encouraging her to post more of her thoughts and feelings on more social media platforms.

I am fine with her wanting to do this as long as is it’s something she wants to do… not something someone else wants her to do, especially people with an agenda… an agenda that uses emotions to gain whatever.

Yes, any shooting, especially a school shooting is a tragedy and needs to be prevented.

Unfortunately, the common cultural trend seems to point the finger at the gun(s) instead of finding out why the 13 year old decided to go to school and open fire on his class with two handguns. 

Where did he get these guns? Why did he resort to shooting people?  Was it because of his emotions?  What kind of help does this kid need?  What kind of help or support does his family need?  Who should be accountable?

It seems like in today’s cultural everyone has an emotional view on whatever, but no one wants to take personal responsibility for anything. 

Responsibility is irrelevant.  People do not want to take the blame, but they understand each other through emotions. 

Emotions are a good thing, but culturally people are misusing emotions.  It seems emotions are the main focus in today’s issues.  The culture will connect to an emotion.  If the emotion fails, then blame the emotion and pick another emotion to use as an excuse.  It’s so much easier then taking responsibly. 

We can’t take responsibility because our emotions can’t handle that.