A silent, and violent, 4th of July

It’s Quiet Out…

This year seemed to be an unusually quiet 4th of July. I spoke with my neighbor earlier that day and we discussed our feelings about how unusually quiet it seemed to be. There was a lack of energy and vibrance in the air. It was quiet, too quiet, and I was not alone in this feeling.

The fireworks didn’t even last all through the night. By my account, the fireworks were well over by 1 AM. The night was quiet as if the United States wasn’t celebrating our 246th year of independence. 

Nationwide Violence

This year’s independence celebration was certainly silent in terms of fireworks and patriotic displays, but in terms of violence, there was an abundance.

According to the gun violence arhcive, which is an online archive that tracks gun violence incidents, there were 11 gun violence incidents on the 4th. I didn’t see the shooting that occurred in the early AMs on Fremont St on Monday, July 4th. That shooting occurred due to a fight breaking out, and one man shot the other in the “rear-end”, according to local news reporting. The man was treated and later released. If we include that shooting in our count, that makes 12 shootings in one day. I would not be surprised in the slightest if that’s an undercount.

The deadliest shooting that occurred on July 4th was the one that occurred in Highland Park, Illinois. 6 people were initially killed in the initial shooting, with the seventh dying at a later time. There were more than 30 people injured. The shooting occurred at the local 4th of July parade, when sounds of gunfire rang out at about 10:15 AM, according to CBS News.  

In Oakland, California, celebratory gunfire struck four people during an Oakland A’s game, including an 11-year-old boy. In Minneapolis, Minnesota, eight were injured by gunfire along the Mississippi River. In Chicago, Illinois, five were injured in a shooting at Parkway Gardens early Monday morning.

A Year of Mourning

This has been a year of horrific mass shootings. The shooting in Buffalo, New York on May 14th killed 10 and injured 3 others. The community was targeted by a white supremacist, who specifically sought out this community to attack due to the large racial density of Black people. 

The shooting in Uvalde, Texas struck me to the core. 19 beautiful babies were brutally massacred, and two teachers murdered, while the police stood outside the classroom for nearly an hour, doing nothing. I cried multiple times for those children. I could cry again just writing this. I could go on and on about the Uvalde shooting, but that is not the point of this piece. Maybe someday I will divulge my feelings on this incident and the absolute complete failure of an operation it was to save these children.

And on top of everything, on June 24th, the Supreme Court overturned a women’s right to choose, eliminating the protections that Roe v Wade had established for decades. Just like that, overnight and in a blink of an eye, half the country lost fundamental rights about their ability to make decisions for their bodies, their health, and their safety. 

The more I continue to write this piece, the angrier I become. How American is it to have a mass shooting on the 4th of July, the day of our so-called Independence and celebration of freedom? Nothing shocks me anymore, I am no longer surprised. I prepare and fully expect the absolute worst of the worst.

There is nothing to celebrate. There is nothing to be happy, elated, or excited about. We kill our babies in schools. We are not safe anywhere—not in grocery stores, movie theaters, outdoor venues, concerts, not your own home, nowhere. Any thought of safety is an illusionary lie we tell ourselves to prevent us from going absolutely insane from this madness we try to make sense of.

All I know is that, in this country, in the United States of America, there is a sickness in the core of this nation’s soul. The spread is faster and more deadly than anything Covid has done to this nation’s psyche. The sickness is everywhere, in the trees, the water we drink, the ground we walk on, the air we breathe. It is a pervasive sickness that is eating us alive, eating us from within to out. It is our sickness that we have created, ever since the first colonizers landed on this nation and stole from the Native Americans. This sickness is everywhere and we either address it or it kills us. My money is on the latter…

So this 4th, there is nothing to celebrate. Nothing to be happy of, to be proud of. 

That’s all I guess. “Happy” 4th…