Solutions start with us

Regarding “How much do we care about ending the carnage?” (June 21):

Not enough to make a difference. Some gun control could substantially ameliorate the extent of such massacres, I’m sure, but, as Norway illustrates, easy access to guns is not the fundamental catalyst to evil, and gun advocates rightly note that it’s people who kill people.

Perhaps the most fundamental influence is exemplified by mass marketing, our best-funded and most-persistent educator. Contrary to family, community and spiritual values, it indoctrinates us with instant gratification and unrealistic expectations. Multinational corporations care more for avarice than they do altruism, and they peddle influence to drive policy both at home and abroad.

So we “nation build” where it costs our troops casualties and, since broken troops are not profitable, the Veterans Administration is underfunded.

Perhaps Abraham Lincoln put it best: “In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not mine, is the momentous issue of civil war.” We have the vote, and the right to demand remedies from our representatives. Surely we can do better, if we care.

Philip Mulligan

Spokane