Parkland is Just Water Under the Bridge in Utah, in Some Ways

  Parkland was water under the bridge, then, in some ways. All the protests and rallies and efforts of the students after the shooting were in hopes of bringing change. In Utah, legislators deferred last year, preferring to not act under the duress of the moment, but rather to wait for later.

And, this year? Nothing.

Rep. Stephen Handy raised a red flags bill, but it is languishing without moving forward. It takes guns out of the hands of those who shouldn't have them. Ask yourself this: If someone jumped a gunman, and wrestled the gun from him, wouldn't that make him a hero? So, if society wrestles guns away from those who shouldn't have them, isn't that much the same thing? If society wants to be a hero, it will have to have the same courage to act as the person who jumps the gunman in a shooting. We have to have the courage to do the things that save people's lives.

Red flag laws are an attempt to do that. They take those who shouldn't have guns, and take the guns away from them.

So, was the Parkland shooting just water under the bridge? On the one year anniversary of the shooting, Rep. Handy's bill sat in the House Rules Committee, unable to get introduced on the floor. Like victims of a shooting, it lies on a floor, dying.

Now, this is not to say some gun legislation did not mark the anniversary of the Parkland Shooting. But, what was it? The House approved a measure suggesting "that the best manner to protect the vulnerable without infringing on the right of the people to bear arms is to enforce the laws already found in Utah code."

Bless those who feel this way. I see it differently, though. To me, all the shootings cry out, saying something more is needed than the status quo. The status quo is not enough. And, there are things that can be done. If there is one thing that should be clear, it is that many of the shooters in these shootings should not have been allowed guns. They should have been taken away from them.

We can do this, or we can ignore the wisdom of youth. The teenagers from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High and others around the nation beg that we act, that we do something to stop massacres such as we had at Parkland.

Taking guns from those who might abuse them is the right thing to do.