Well, our nation has suffered another mass killing. Another misunderstood loner has decided to call attention to themselves by inflicting pain and suffering upon random victims. The country is becoming numb to these events. It seems the frequency appears to be around once a month. The cities and states are interchangeable. The location of the shooting can be anywhere…schools, malls, theaters…what difference does it make to the killer? The people they mow down, for the most part, have never crossed paths with the killer prior to that moment. The victims have not offended the killer. No, their only crime is having the misfortune to be at the wrong place at the wrong time!
The media will go into over-drive. Don Henley’s song “Dirty Laundry” has the following lyric,and over the next couple of weeks it will seem the song is firmly rooted in the truth…
We got the bubble-headed-bleach-blond who
Comes on at five
She can tell you 'bout the plane crash with a gleam
In her eye
It's interesting when people die
Give us dirty laundry
The media will point in the direction of needing more gun control…who knows, maybe we do. The media will point to whatever crap the killer says to justify his insane actions. He just had to kill a bunch of people because of this...or that…and the media will scamper down that rabbit hole as if we just eliminate whatever the killer says caused him to murder…well, then life could go back to normal.
The time before, it was a Confederate flag flying on a flagpole that the media identified as one of the contributing causes of people being massacred. While I certainly think it was time for that flag be moved to a museum, that flag was no more the reason why that young man killed those people than someone not returning a smile to him that morning.
You don't really need to find out what's going on
You don't really want to know just how far it's gone
Just leave well enough alone
Eat your dirty laundry
These monsters come out from under our beds because they get their picture and name plastered in every media outlet. They do it for their 15 minutes of fame. They do it so they can see cameramen shoving each other around to get the money-shot as they enter the courtroom. They do it to have us read their sob story in print about how they were mistreated by family, friends, and their community. They do it so some talking-head with do the jail interview to ask the pimply-faced teenager why he did it. Why did he do it? Because he got you to come interview him as if he accomplished something of importance…that’s why!
What is the first thing you learn as a parent? Never reward bad behavior! Yet, we continue to chase our tails by spinning tales about it being guns, or flags, or whatever flavor-of-the-month justification that some moron pulls out of their butt.
Want to stop the behavior? Stop the reward!
The next time one of these knuckleheads decides to murder a bunch of innocent people…let’s switch things up on them. No media coverage…no one sees their picture…no one reads their name in print…no one gets to hear their pathetic story. Once the word gets out that the word is not going to get out; society stands a better chance of staying alive.
I make my living off the evening news
Just give me something-something I can use
People love it when you lose,
They love dirty laundry
