Payton S. Gendron, an 18-year-old white man, allegedly drove 200 miles to kill 10 Black people and wound three others in the Tops supermarket in Buffalo, N.Y., before being arrested. In Uvalde, Texas, Salvador Ramos, an 18-year-old Hispanic man, killed 19 children and two teachers after shooting his grandmother. He was shot dead in the classroom he invaded.
Neither of these killings is acceptable. What is perturbing is how a white person can walk out from a horrendous crime and only be taken prisoner. If he had been of another color, history has shown there would have been shots fired at him. True, Gendron is not free and is being held for trial. However, he is alive, whereas many of other races pay the full price at the scene of the crime.
The Gendron case is a young man allegedly wanting to rid our country of those who are not white. Ramos, according to a neighbor, had a speech impediment and was bullied, and was not able to get his diploma. In either case, our country needs to be able to cease weapons of war being in the hands of erratic people. We must come together and not hide behind statements of “we need weapons of destruction to be ready when the government comes after us,” as a Libertarian man told me. Social media sites are being used to infiltrate minds and convince vulnerable people to believe and do as holders of the information spew their control and power.
How many more mass shooters will we tolerate before we tell our government enough has been too much? For social media sites, how do we control evil agendas when free speech of such negative impact seems to reign?
Kath Allen
Peterborough