Here we go again...
Another gun-related school tragedy in the States - another debate between gun-owning, Heartland-living, NRA-loving, Second Amendment-protagonists and liberal, hippie-looking, weed-smoking Hollywoody antagonists. The incident however, ignites more than an internal debate in the US - It is also another incident widening the gulf between Western Europe and USA.
For me, as a European, and perhaps more importantly, as a Scandinavian, today when I hear of such a travesty, the initial feeling, besides that of obvious heartbreak, is not one of surprise or shock, it is rather the typical superficial feeling of "stupid Americans". This feeling is no stranger to me - I have always been confronted with this feeling among other Western Europeans but never had it myself. On the contrary, I have always found myself defending American identity and society, because I felt I had a deeper understanding of America than that.
Then I hear the debate (and we've heard it a million times before) between the two trenches and I start feeling a sense of disconnection with American society. You hear the ridicule of Hollywood actors and other typical left-wing people towards the other end of the spectre, and you can almost sense the arrogance and smirkness in their comments, and you are left with the sense that they have never in their lives met an honest hard-working Midwestern kind-of-guy let alone done any hard work of their own - but then you hear counter arguments from the right wing with their "Second Amendment, Constitutional, guns-don't-kill-people-people-kill-people"- bullshit, and you think to yourself: "Jesus - this is not 1795". And the debate, at least the one that is dominant to the public, seems to lack a voice of reason, a voice of compromise, which could help bring the debate closer to a working solution. And this lack makes you want to turn off the tv (or social media in today's world).
And I am certainly not your typical Anti-American Bush-hating European - on the contrary, I love most of what the US stands for and has to offer. I have lived there on three occasions - hell, I even got married in Vegas, for God's sake. I love the openness of the American people, the beauty of its land, the cities, the open road, the way of life - yup, most everything. I have of course always felt that there was a gap between where I come from and America, but at the same time this gap has also been what has intrigued and drawn me there. Nonetheless, even I feel that the increase in these massacres like Newtown along with the widening gap between left and right in American society or perhaps more accurately, the lack of a common middle ground with its almost inevitable common sense, is enhancing the gap between where I come from and where I still want to be drawn to, namely America.
Sadly.
@nyenstad
