Stephen King and America's Gun Problem
This article was featured on Nov. 1, 2023 in The New York Time’s Opinion in response to “18 More Deaths From Our Gun Addiction,” by Stephen King (Opinion guest essay, Oct. 31):
Mr. King’s frustration with gun violence and his feeling of helplessness for our country are not unique, but they are born more from exhaustion than reality.
I reject his view that “there is no solution to the gun problem.” We may be “addicted to firearms,” but America has overcome addiction before with the same grit and persistence that helped end slavery and bend our collective views away from racism.
Cultural change takes generations. The gun culture we mistakenly fell in love with was bolstered by decades of green plastic Army men and Nerf and cap guns handed to preschoolers for play, classroom history lessons centered around military battles, and movie and television hailing the best gun handler as the hero. That was my reality, and I passed that culture to my children.
“The gun problem” is just that: a problem to be solved. Just as we created that problem, we can change it. Every shooting reminds us collectively that firearms violence has become the No. 1 killer of children and teens under the age of 19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Shooting drills are a ubiquitous part of the lives of most schoolchildren.
A good coach knows when to substitute for exhausted players, and it’s OK that Mr. King and others need some bench time. Substituting in are parents afraid to send their kids to school, energized politicians, influencers, researchers and business owners looking over their shoulders for a catastrophic event. I am surrounded by them and their contagious attitudes.
Mr. King may find “little more to write” right now, and that’s OK. The fresh legs off the bench are many, and they are moving with optimism, impatience and persistence to find the right courses of action that will make America’s gun violence problem no longer exist. [Read Stephen King’s opinion guest essay “18 More Deaths From Our Gun Addiction”]
I’m sure of that.
Katherine Schweit
Centreville, Va.
The writer, a retired F.B.I. agent, created and ran the F.B.I.’s active shooter program, set up after the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre. She is the author of “Stop the Killing: How to End the Mass Shooting Crisis” and “How to Talk About Guns With Anyone.”
Mourners comforting one another at a vigil in Lisbon, Maine, on Saturday. Credit: Hilary Swift for The New York Times