The tragedy in Uvalde, Texas has increased debates about how to address the issue of mass shootings and how to best protect schoolchildren.
The desire to do something is understandable, but just doing “something” isn’t wise – we need to be effective in our efforts to protect children.
Gun restrictions, mental health measures, having one point of entry at schools, improving police protocols, and having an armed security officer at every school are some ways to attack this problem that I’ve heard.
All these debates are good to have, as long as they are based on facts and logic – and not just emotional arguments.
The point of this column, however, is not to delve into the merits or faults of any of these solutions. While something clearly needs to be done to address the issue of mass shootings – as well as gun violence in our cities – we need to address the source of these issues and not just come up with short-term solutions.
In other words, we need to address and implement what we can to protect children now; but we need to recognize that we are just putting Band-Aids on the problem.
We must get to the root causes of these issues. Obviously something has changed in our society because we’ve always had guns in America, but the incidents of mass shooting and gun violence in our cities have increased.
As I’ve reflected on these things, I see at least three things that significantly contribute to the root of the problem. In other words, if we could change these three things we would reduce the number of mass shooters and violent criminals in our cities – not just protect children from their attacks.
I only have space to present one principle issue: fatherlessness. Almost all mass shootings are committed by young men. And a disproportionate number of them come from broken homes (I’ve seen statistics ranging from 75 percent or higher). Furthermore, the fact that virtually all the gun violence in our cities is being committed by young men from broken families is apparent, because over 80 percent of boys in cities grow up without a father in the home. The impact of unstable homes with no fathers – or with uninvolved fathers – in them has enormous consequences.
It’s extremely difficult for boys without a stable home life and an involved father-figure to grow up healthy, mentally and spiritually. Many – by God’s grace – do overcome, but single mothers of boys have a difficult task on their plate (often not their fault). And the schools, the government or social media are not going to solve this problem.
Often our culture’s solution to this issue is to turn boys into girls; but feminizing boys is not the answer. We need good men to be role models that actively engage in boys’ lives. Boys benefit immensely from fathers investing in them and helping them navigate life in this crazy world.
Men leading – instead of abandoning – families is a powerful force for good in society.
Scott Kamps writes a bi-weekly column for The Graham Star. He can be reached via email, thestableguy@frontier.com.