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Colorado: ‘Big Brother’ America Had Best Tend to its Own House (Khaleej Times, United Arab Emirates)

“How, with this scale of mindless carnage, can Washington even deign to issue directives to others? … One cannot blame the rest of the world for saying that Big Brother would be better off watching over its own brood and figuring out how its own brand of domestic policies - political, economic, and social - is affecting its collective, disturbed mindset.”

EDITORIAL

July 21, 2012

Khaleej Times, United Arab Emirates – Original Article (English)

When unsuspecting moviegoers at the Century Cinemas 16 Theater in Aurora, a suburb of Denver, Colorado, faced a masked gunman, they probably assumed it was just a part of the stuntsmanship Hollywood is so well known for.

After all, it was opening night of The Dark Knight Rises, the newest film in the Batman franchise. It soon became clear that it was instead a horrific tragedy, as the masked gunman opened fire, going on a shooting spree that killed 12 and injured 50. Mass murder by Americans is nothing new. There have been others, like the shootings in Oakland five months ago, the Virginia Tech massacre that saw 32 killed and 21 injured, and like the1999 massacre in suburban Columbine High, in the suburban town of Littleton, Colorado, just 15 miles from Aurora.

It was yet another dark night for Americans. And what has kicked in now, predictably, is a frenzied global debate on the feasibility of the already-controversial Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution - which gives citizens of the world’s largest democracy the right to protect themselves through the possession of firearms. It is a clause that over the years has proven to be entirely counter-intuitive - and with devastating consequences. Shooting incidents like these have been commonplace in a land sold as the best equipped to realize the greatest of dreams. The powerful gun lobby runs America, and all attempt to restrict gun sales always met with its stiffest opposition. The United States experiences more gun-related deaths than any other industrialized nation, with over 32,000 Americans killed each year by gun-related injuries.

But the greatest tragedy now unfolding in this small corner of one of America’s most breathtakingly-beautiful states is that rather than being addressed respectfully as a heart-rending human tragedy, the issue is snowballing into a political one. With U.S. elections right round the corner, the blame game has begun in earnest, and the spin doctors have swung into action.

Social media is filled with criticism how the United States - always intent on politicizing matters on other parts of the world in typical and often unjustified American fashion - has failed to do more to tend to its own house. Reports are that a sense of disgruntlement now prevails in the country, along with attempts by some to trigger a “class war.” How, with this scale of mindless carnage and people taking the law into their own hands, can Washington even deign to issue directives to others?

Posted by Worldmeets.US

One cannot blame the rest of the world for saying that Big Brother would be better off watching over its own brood and figuring out how its own brand of domestic policies - political, economic, and social - is affecting its collective, disturbed mindset.

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SEE ALSO ON THIS:
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La Jornada, Mexico: 'Violence and Barbarism' in Retrograde United States
Berliner Morgenpost, Germany: Anders Breivik: Europe's Own Osama bin Laden
Le Quotidien d’Oran, Algeria: The Troubling Profile of a 'Bushian Terrorist'
DNA, France: Terrorism in Toulouse and the ‘Currency of Hate’
Sydsvenskan, Sweden: After September 11, We 'Lost What We Wanted to Defend'
Polityka, Poland: America in Anger's Clutches
Beijing Youth Daily, China: Making Sense of America's Right to Bear Arms
Frankfurter Rundschau, Germany: Virginia Tech One Year On: The 'Silent Scandal'
New Straits Times, Malaysia: Don't Just Blame Virginia Tech …
Kitabat, Iraq: 'Thank Allah the Virginia Killer Wasn't Muslim'
La Jornada, Mexico: Virginaa Tech: An American Tragedy
NRC Handlesblad, Netherlands: Americans Distrust State Monopoly on Violence
JoongAng Daily, South Korea: The Legacy of Cho Seung-hui: A Lesson to Koreans
The Korea Herald, South Korea: Koreans Feel Collective Guilt Over the Massacre
La Jornada, Mexico: Rejecting U.S. Drug War is Essential for Mexico's Survival
Xinjingbao, China: Information Society Triggered Massacre
China Daily, China: A Nation Cannot Be Tarred by a Single Killer
La Jornada, Mexico: The 'Paths of Death' Lead to Washington
La Jornada, Mexico: A Culture of Violence …
O Povo, Brazil: Virginia Tech: Sign of Our Wounded Civilization
Khaleej Times, UAE: Shooting Shows Something Ails America 'At its Core'

Al Watan Voice, Palestinian Territories: Fort Hood: 'Muslims Can't Be Trusted'

Dar Al Khaleej, UAE: America's 'Black Knights' and the Fort Hood Tragedy

Le Temps, Switzerland: 'Double Lesson' at Fort Hood

Khaleej Times, U.A.E. Fort Hood Shooting: 'Don't Pin It on Faith'

Hurriet, Turkey: Shooting at Fort Hood and the Role of Muslim Clerics

The Telegraph, U.K.: British Muslims Debate the Fort Hood Killer