When your brand of tragedy becomes commonplace

Notoriety.

It’s a horrifying moniker to bear when it comes to mass shootings that forever stain a venue with the mark of murder. And America can’t seem to get away from it. Eleven more innocent people died in two appalling mass shootings this weekend that once again illuminate the horror of unchecked gun violence.

I recently felt the sting of my own home’s tragic brand during an out-of-town event, where I bonded instantly with a woman seated next to me after we discovered that I was from Parkland and she from Newtown, Conn., where the Sandy Hook school shooting occurred.

Two strangers, both parents, gathered for a happy occasion suddenly realized we both came from towns forever synonymous with horrific mass school shootings.

Both of our cities were once considered safe havens. Then mass murder put them on the map. Buffalo, N.Y., and Laguna Woods, Calif., joined this grim list over the weekend.

Now, people shake their heads and offer vague condolences when they find out where I live. The shooting rampage left wounds have been reopened by the trial of the shooter, currently underway.

Many hoped the Parkland murders would somehow prove to be a turning point that would lead to concerted actions to prevent gun violence. But that has not been the case.

An investigation by the Washington Post showed that more than 300,000 students have experienced gun violence since the Columbine High School shootings in April 1999. Since Parkland, there has not been a single major piece of gun control legislation at the federal level.

Rather than enacting sensible and measured steps such as banning people on terrorism watch lists from securing weapons or restricting high-powered and high-capacity firearms, astoundingly, members of Congress have instead increasingly glorified guns and cynically used violent imagery to raise money for their campaigns. Advertisements for House members and Senators across the country during this election cycle have included videos of candidates brandishing, aiming and firing assault rifles. Pandering to a base of supporters who have been programmed to reflexively and inaccurately believe that the government is somehow going to fully strip them of their Second Amendment rights, some incumbent lawmakers sent Christmas cards to supporters showing their own young children holding firearms.

Meanwhile, several candidates are reeling in campaign contributions by entering donors’ names into raffles for giveaways of AR-15s.

If the bloodbaths at Columbine, Sandy Hook and Parkland aren’t enough to convince lawmakers and Americans of all political persuasions that we need to take more-concerted action to prevent mass shootings in schools, then what will it take? Moreover, deadly rampages at supermarkets, churches, movie theaters and nightclubs don’t seem to move the needle either.

We need a combination of legislative efforts to include enhanced and hardened building designs, violence prevention programs, upgraded communications systems within schools and other venues, better training for security personnel and more aggressive intervention programs to identify and intervene with troubled youth displaying warning signs ahead of attacks.

There should also be steps taken to make it harder for young people to get their hands on guns and reasonable restrictions on weapons of war that provide shocking amounts of firepower.

Every time I drive past Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, where my son attends, I cringe when I see the freshman building where pure evil and terror devastated families and an entire community. Still considered an active crime scene, it has not yet been bulldozed to the ground.

That fenced-off building is a reminder of what was lost, and what we stand to lose in the future unless we elect leaders who are willing to find bipartisan paths to address mass shootings.

By Evan Nierman