Remembering Columbine

The Columbine High School tragedy of ten years ago is being remembered.  Two students killed 12 classmates and a teacher.  Others were injured.  Ten years on have lessons been learned in the USA about lax gun laws? No, and so every so often the same kind of tragedy recurs.  Not always in the USA but that country does seem to lead the world for mass shootings.  More than 290 school shootings in the USA since 1992 says Michael Moore.

Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine is a film well worth seeing.  Moore explores the obsession with guns and also links it to the violence of the foreign policies of the USA.  In one memorable scene Michael Moore went with a man in a wheelchair to return an item to Walmart.  The man was understandably not happy about the bullet sold by the company that had lodged near his spinal cord.  He could not actually present the offending bullet because surgeons were unable to remove it.   Another scene was of Michael Moore going into a bank to open an account.  When asked what kind of account he answered that he wanted the one with a free gun.  (Yes, the film is a documentary and not fictional.)

I have written before about the conflict between the right to life and the right to have a gun.

Update, 21 April 2009: A bill is about to be introduced in the United States Senate to require checks before guns can be bought at gun shows.  Just over ten years after the Columbine massacre is not a moment too soon to close the loophole.  The guns used in that shooting were acquired at a gun show.  See news release from the Brady Campaign.