This post originally appeared December 19, 2012. My opinion has only grown stronger in the intervening five years.
I met Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson at a conference once.
It was 1972. The country was deep in the throes of a Presidential election.
Four months earlier, segregationist and gun-loving Alabama Governor George Wallace had lost his bid for the Presidency thanks to a would-be assassin.
I asked Dr. Thompson whether he thought Wallace might change his stance on gun control after being shot five times in the chest and stomach.
"I don't know," Thompson snarled. "But I do know this. Everyone should carry a gun. We all should carry guns. The streets would be a lot safer. America would be a better place."
Thirty-three years later, depressed and deathly ill, Hunter Thompson blew off the top of his head with a shotgun.
I don't understand the pleasure of gun ownership. I don't understand the thrill of hunting animals. But a lot of people I know and admire enjoy both those things.
As a parent, however, I understand how fear and loathing due to the loss of a child could exceed any imaginable sorrow.
In his novel The World According to Garp, John Irving famously described the brutal workings of the "Under Toad," code-words for "the forces that disrupt human life and sometimes destroy it." The life of a child, in particular.
The Under Toad visited Newtown, Connecticut, last week.
Several parents will never feel sorrow-less again.
It was 1972. The country was deep in the throes of a Presidential election.
Four months earlier, segregationist and gun-loving Alabama Governor George Wallace had lost his bid for the Presidency thanks to a would-be assassin.
I asked Dr. Thompson whether he thought Wallace might change his stance on gun control after being shot five times in the chest and stomach.
"I don't know," Thompson snarled. "But I do know this. Everyone should carry a gun. We all should carry guns. The streets would be a lot safer. America would be a better place."
Thirty-three years later, depressed and deathly ill, Hunter Thompson blew off the top of his head with a shotgun.
I don't understand the pleasure of gun ownership. I don't understand the thrill of hunting animals. But a lot of people I know and admire enjoy both those things.
As a parent, however, I understand how fear and loathing due to the loss of a child could exceed any imaginable sorrow.
In his novel The World According to Garp, John Irving famously described the brutal workings of the "Under Toad," code-words for "the forces that disrupt human life and sometimes destroy it." The life of a child, in particular.
The Under Toad visited Newtown, Connecticut, last week.
Several parents will never feel sorrow-less again.
