From a national news story on-line this Nov 12, 2018, about the youngest Thousand Oaks shooting victim, age 18, come her devastated family's comments:

We believe that there is a message that's out there."

"What's the message?" Cowan asked.

"To us, it's to be kind to one another. It's to put down your technology, put down your phones and look at somebody and have a conversation. It's not about gun control; this message is about doing something bigger, to be with your community, to love one another."

"All things that you don't have to legislate?"

"Right. Exactly," said Arik.

Adam added, "To get to the point where we can have a conversation about anything political, it has to start here [points to heart]. It has to start with the soul, because we've lost that."

Arik said, "What if somebody walked up to the guy and just asked him how he was doing that day and said 'hello' to him or did something that may have just changed his mind, instead of ignoring, or whatever we're doing?"

Cowan said, "You know what people are going to say, though – skeptics are going to say it's too simple, that that sounds great about being decent and kind and reaching a hand out, but I think most people are going to say it's too complicated."

"But I think it starts there," said Tamera. "You start with imagining, 'Wait a minute, what if that was my child, or my niece, or my cousin?' It will get you in a place of just having some sort of human decency."

If there's any doubt there's a deficit of decency, look no further than the family's social media.

Adam said, "You should see some of the tweets we got after Alaina died. Oh, I got one, 'You deserve it. You worked at Fox News.' And it got liked by about 78 people."

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I think it's not about the weapon used. But we've made it too easy in America to use a gun for all the wrong purposes. Screening guidelines, rules, and regs. have proven worthless time and again. Known mentally un-balanced people still gain access to weapons one method, or another. We are, nationally, a gun culture, perhaps like no other country in the world. I am not interested in international comparative statistics today. Means nothing.

This family received hate e-mail with almost 80 people LIKING the hate messages. Think about that. Who does that?

When I was substituting in a Summerville SC high school classroom last Spring, I asked the students in each class that I had that day, to stand up and name all their classmates. This was March. No student in any class could do it. They meander the halls in a daze, on their phones, cap-wearing, pants-dragging, elbow and shoulder-bumping, not holding doors for each other, and they don't even know their classmates. I would venture a guess that this scenario could easily be repeated in schools and communities across our nation. Meanwhile, administrators focus on test results and graduation rates, as if that was all that mattered.

I sit in traffic at green lights, because the moron in front of me yapping on the phone hasn't noticed anything. I honked at a female motorist last month, twice, to keep moving at various stop points, and she flashed her middle finger at me, all the while not once putting down her phone to safely drive. She was old enough to have h.s. age children. It's where kids get their behaviors from.

There isn't an older teacher alive that won't tell you our family structure in America is seriously broken. The rudeness, the open defiance, the impulsive anger, the standard dis-respect to any authority figure, is standard. Now, how did THAT happen?

Mass shooters could have used any object to wreck havoc and death. But from a hotel room high up on a strip, it's awfully difficult to throw knives and swing axes, etc. Just spend a week bringing an arsenal of weapons up to your room, and have at it. The Newtown Sandy Hook slaughter anniversary is almost upon us, and this family above, is absolutely right. Nothing has changed. No movement from Congress or the NRA or their fans or opponents.

A massive social more change is necessary, I believe. This love affair with all things gun-related simply has to stop.

Additionally, we need to take violence out of our culture via the various media forums out there. Video games, tv programs, movies, music, it's disgusting what is available, and what sells.

Additionally, our returning soldiers need a mandatory decompression week, minimum. No work, just spend time with fellow soldiers, counselors, totally relax, and importantly, talk about their experiences with other veterans, before being released to their families and to pick up their lives.

More gun laws aren't the answer. It's not the weapon. It's all of us, locked into our technology and not simply acknowledging the presence of each other, talking to and with each other, greeting each other, knowing who our classmates are, etc.

An increasingly impersonal world, guarantees more slaughter.

Just felt like calmly ranting. Thanks.