On Wednesday March 9, 2016, a man was killed in Florida for simply being another man's boss. A classic "you can't tell me what to do" conversation turned deadly. Did the shooter care for the value of the victim's life? No. What is worse though, is that the shooter didn't just end one life. He ended the life of a man, he changed the life of the victim's niece and nephew whom he was closest with, he altered the lives of the victim's brothers and sisters... and the shooter inadvertently ended his own life. The shooter is in custody of police and at 21 years old, his life as he knew it is completely over.
How is it that things like this are still happening in a society that claims to be "evolved"? How is it that in the past 365 days I have written two articles of senseless shootings and nothing has changed? Blogging, as I know, does not change the world... but it amazes me that Brittney Little, a person of no consequence who knows and loves a relatively small amount of people, has known two people to be senselessly shot in the last year. I am average! On the grand scale of life, I am a 25 year old white chick from the suburbs... THAT'S HOW AVERAGE I AM. This means that there are people out there who have lost far more than I have all to stupid acts of senseless violence. This means that people MORE consequential than a mere blogger KNOW what is happening and nothing has been done.
A rational brain may say on a bad day, "I could just kill my boss today... they're the worst!" but that same brain also knows that ACTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES. Violence like this has a ripple effect... it hits the people closest to it the hardest... but you cannot possibly know how far that ripple goes. A rational brain doesn't go out and KILL THEIR BOSS. A slightly irrational brain quits the job at worst. Senseless killing doesn't save an undesirable situation... it creates a permanent one.
To the shooter, I hope you know how many lives you ruined and changed. You killed a good man, a happy uncle, a neighbor, and a friend. You hurt my family... and as a complete paradox from my stand on the sanctity of human life I want you to know: I hope you rot in hell.