Welcome to Bullet Points
Welcome to the inaugural edition of Bullet Points, my newsletter formerly known as Gun Violence 101. Thanks for signing up and allowing me some real estate in your inbox. I surely do not want to crowd your space, but thought that perhaps an email not entitled “Our response to COVID-19” might be welcome during this time where every business we’ve ever shopped at thinks we will feel better once we know how they plan to support us.
It’s been awhile since I’ve written to you. As I brainstormed what I wanted to share this month, I realized I didn’t want to be restricted to only talking about gun violence. I’m doing plenty of that in my everyday life as I work on my manuscript for my book (still can’t believe I’m writing an actual book), and I wanted to figure out a way to share other things with you as well. After all, I am a whole human person and there are a lot of parts that make up my life. I want to share things I am enjoying, books I am reading, articles I found helpful, shows I binged with my husband, you get the point. I think I can do both things here. If you only want to read the Gun Violence stuff, you can do that! If you only want to read the other stuff, you can do that, too! I hope that you’ll read both though. And of course if this is not what you signed up for, always feel free to unsubscribe.
Lately
In the Schumann household we are entering our eighth week of isolation. It has been a lot of things. It's been fun and stressful and overwhelming and good. As I shared on Instagram last week, we can feel a lot of things at once and this has surely amplified that a bit. I think as a society, we are pretty terrible at lamenting. We are even worse at recognizing that we can hold both joy and pain at the same time. But we can. We can make a list of all the things we are learning during this time that we are thankful for, and at the same time we can grieve over the loss of life, the loss of livelihood, and the collective trauma that we are experiencing as a society. I hope that when we come out on the other side of this, in our post-coronavirus age, we might be better at this.
There are a few things that have been helping med during these past seven weeks and I'd love to share them with you.
1 | Fun Beverages | I am all about a fun beverage. A juice, a sparkling water, a nice mixed drink. While other people stocking up on toilet paper, I am adding to the stockpile of beverages. Every time I do a grocery pickup order I make sure to add a new flavor of sparkling water or a new wine to try. It's always a pleasant thought to remember that after Henry goes down for bed I have a little somethin' somethin' to enjoy.
2 | Target Pick-Up | Target pick-up is truly a gift to us at all times, but especially during this time. It's not as good as wandering the aisles myself, but it is fun to pick out a few snacks, toys, or items we need and make an outing of it when there's not really anywhere else to go. It's also about as safe an option as we have now for shopping. Last week I grabbed a couple Burt’s Bees face-masks and some bath crayons for Henry. Both were big hits.
3 | The 90s Country Essentials Playlist on Apple Music | Maybe you're not into country music. But if you are, you need this playlist. Eric plays it in the evenings before Henry goes to bed and it's been really fun to listen to some classics that we grew up listening to.
4 | Peloton Cardio Dance Classes | Peloton recently added cardio dance classes to their catalog and I've been having so much fun doing them. I am not really any good (I am objectively bad), and I laugh a lot while dancing. It's been a really fun workout and always puts me in a good mood. You can access a free 30 day trial here.
Some Shows I've Been Enjoying
The Last Dance. The Michael Jordan documentary series on ESPN is helping to fill some of the holes left by the cancellation of all sports. I really miss the sports.
Outer Banks on Netflix. Okay. I cannot in good conscience say that this is a good show. I actually think it is very bad? But we watched all of it and it held our attention. Despite it's name, it was filmed in Charleston (where we live) and it was cool to see so many familiar sights as we watched. Again, not good, but also good?
Waco on Netflix: Tim Riggins as cult leader David Koresh? Say no more.
Mrs. America on Hulu: the story of how the Equal Rights Amendment became law in America. Right up my alley.
Okay. Now onto some lighter, very casual and easy breezy topics.
Gun Violence in the time of COVID-19
When the current pandemic started and states started announcing stay-at-home orders, I heard people optimistically predicting that crime rates would drop if people were forced to stay home. I can’t blame people for thinking it, because that would be nice wouldn’t it? But me being me, I immediately started thinking about what gun violence during this time would look like, because I know too much. I mentioned on my instastories one day that I was worried about increases in 4 specific areas: accidental child involved shootings, domestic violence incidents involving firearms, suicide by firearm, and violence against hospitals or other establishments.
The good news is that for many types of crime like drug offenses and robberies, crime rates have gone down. The exception? Gun violence.
An analysis of data collected by Gun Violence Archive and reported by The Trace shows that between March 1 and April 19, there were more than 2,000 gun deaths in the United States. This is a six percent increase compared to the same time period in the past 3 years. In the city of Dallas, Texas alone, 63 shooting incidents were reported- a 50 percent increase above the average for this time of year.
It will be some time before we know exactly how COVID-19 and the stay-at-home orders have affected different type of gun violence, but we do already know that according to reporting from NBC News many police departments are reporting an increase in calls concerning domestic violence incidents. I feel like everyday I check Twitter, I see a news story about a child or a teenager who found a gun at home and shot themselves or someone else by accident. On March 18, a 15 year old boy found a gun and while playing with it, fatally shot his 12 year old sister. On March 19, a three year old boy found a gun and fatally shot himself in the head. His heart and kidneys were donated to another child. On April 23, a 12 year old boy fatally shot his 7 year old sister after finding a gun in their home. On April 24, a five year old boy accidentally shot himself with a gun he found in his Father’s pocket. Sadly, I could keep going. I’m tempted to do so just to get the point across, but I think you get it. I could be wrong, but I think once we have the data, we will see a serious correlation between staying at home and gun violence incidents. And in a country that has allowed an excessive number of deadly weapons into the hands of anyone who wants them, we might call it unavoidable. But that would just be a lie to make ourselves feel better. It was very much avoidable.
Toilet Paper and Guns, I Guess
March 2020 brought the biggest surge in gun sales since the time after the shooting at Sandy Hook School in December 2012. The New York Times reported that in March 2020, 1.9 million guns were sold in the U.S. compared to the 2 million sold after Sandy Hook. I guess people went out for their toilet paper and their canned goods and then headed on over to Guns and Stuff and stocked up on a few more essentials. And they were considered essentials, literally. The gun lobby led by the NRA, pushed hard for gun stores to be deemed essential so they could stay open for business, even amidst stay-at-home orders. And on March 30, The White House announced that gun stores could stay open along with your other run-of-the-mill necessities like gas stations and grocery stores.
Why is this a big deal? First of all, 1.9 million guns is like, a lot of guns. Especially in a country where we already have 67 million more guns than people. We know, because we have the statistics that prove that more guns equal more gun deaths. And if the statistics follow the ones that were analyzed after the gun sales surge post Sandy Hook, people will die that wouldn’t have died otherwise. The Washington Post reported that a study done after the post Sandy Hook gun sales spike, estimates that “the 3 million guns sold in the several months after Sandy Hook caused about 60 more accidental gun deaths than would have occurred otherwise. Children were killed in a third of them — some 20 youngsters, the same number as died at Sandy Hook.”
It also begs the question, one I think about daily, what are people willing to kill for? “Responsible Gun Owners” will tell you that one of their rules is that if you have a weapon, you have to be prepared to use that weapon. People aren’t just buying guns or stocking up on apocalyptic levels of ammo because they are hobbyists or want to put them in a display case. They are buying them because they anticipate a situation in which they may need to use them. So what are they going to use them for? People cite fear over scarcity; scarcity of items we need like food and household goods. People fear this type of scarcity can lead to home invasions- people searching for things they need and stealing them. If you were also a viewer of The Walking Dead, maybe you too are having flashbacks of people breaking into homes searching for canned goods, only to be met with an armed squatter who will definitely kill them to protect what they’ve already claimed for themselves.
It’s hard for me to imagine that we live in a society in which people might kill for toilet paper or a pound of ground beef. Maybe it seems like insanity for me to even type that sentence. But, that’s pretty much what it boils down to. If you’re afraid that someone might come for your emergency stockpile, and you’re holding a loaded gun and ready to use it, you have already decided that their life is worth less than your material goods. I don’t think it’s that far off base. After all, we see gun violence deaths over less: a mean look someone gave, road-rage, or a debt of a few dollars. A few years ago a customer at a Walmart fired shots in the parking lot when he saw people stealing a few hundred dollars worth of stuff. It happened in the town I was living in at the time. I remember it because I couldn’t get over the thought that this man was willing to endanger the lives of everyone in the parking lot over some stolen items.
Gun culture in the United States is a culture that fed on the idea of individual freedoms over the collective good, an idea that permeates every area of our society and is rearing its ugly head during the time of corona. People want their rights, the ones where they get to do whatever they want whenever they want, even if it means harming or killing other people. Currently, we are seeing this play out in protests in states across the country where armed white men "protest" the stay-at-home orders at their local government offices open carrying AR-15s and shotguns, yell at workers, and put on a display of power-seeking intimidation for all to see.
The fight to end gun violence and the fight to end the spread of COVID-19 have more in common than you might think. Both are engaged in an uphill battle to convince people that giving up a little personal freedom isn’t a bow to tyranny, but a sacrifice for our collective good.
I'll stop. Though, I could keep going, which I guess is a good thing since I'm writing a book about this.
Challenge
Here's the place where I usually issue a challenge for you for the month. But I think things are already challenging enough? So you get a pass this month.
Thanks for taking the time to meet me here this month, and for engaging with content that is less than uplifting. I often wish I was writing about puppies or those videos where Stanley Tucci makes cocktails (my current obsession?) but alas, I am not. I know there are lots of things you try to think about and pay attention to. Thanks for making this one of them.
I'm not sure what this next month will bring, but we'll meet right back here and chat about it. Until then-- be well.
-Taylor