School shootings and what to do about them

"Something has to be done!"

I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this, but sometimes bad things happen, and there is nothing you or anyone can do to stop it.

You can try to institute gun control, but this only removes guns from the hands of the law-abiding citizens.

You can try to diagnose mental problems in people early, but then you become Big Brother with a cadre of thought police running around forcing drugs on people.

You can try to 'educate' people but there is a certain percentage of people out there who either can not or will not absorb the letter and spirit of the lesson you intend to teach.

Face it. Stuff happens. Accidents happen. Disease happens. Evil happens. People get sick. People die.

And while some things can be done to reduce the bad things that happen, there is no way to prevent anything 100%. Its natural for us all to get that knee-jerk reaction that something more could have been done. In those times when a seemingly senseless act of violence has harmed or killed someone, we can commiserate with the ones affected by it. We express our outrage, and in our anger at the unfairness of it all we fumble about pointing fingers at anyone and anything that might have been at fault.

Let the lawsuits begin. We have to punish those who were negligent, we have to compensate those who have had a loss. (Does anyone else think it seems wrong that a death of a loved one should turn into a lottery ticket?) While we struggle to find an answer that will provide catharsis, we feel we need to "do" something. Its almost a let-down when the one who has committed the offense (as in this most recent case) kills themselves. Now there is no one from which to exact revenge.

In most cases, time is this only thing to come close to healing our wounds. Money wont do it. Revenge wont do it. Time does not even completely heal us. Perhaps a lesson can be learned from how the Amish handled the senseless murders of their children in October 2006.