Over and over again we read about or see instances of people shooting people for no good reason. (And if you ask, "is there ever a good reason?" I would probably say no.)
But the shootings that particularly distress me are those committed by "law enforcement" officers charged with protecting the public or keeping the peace, especially police officers shooting unarmed young black males. The police bureaucracy and government officials who do not condemn police brutality, especially police homicide, are enablers at best and co-conspirators at worst.
In my condemnation of violence I include shooters OF police as well, and the enablers who do not prevent guns from falling into their hands. I write this in the memory of University City Police Sgt. Michael King -- a good cop, a gentle man and a friend of mine -- who was shot to death merely because of his uniform.
The more I thought about it, the more I think we need to propose a 12-step program for people who shoot people. I wouldn't call it Shooters Anonymous, because I don't think public servants -- or criminals -- should be anonymous. But I do think they, and we, could be helped with the 12-step approach.
Please read below the fold to see my adaptation (and it didn't take many changes) for the 12 Steps for Shooters and for the co-dependents who allow shooters to continue to abuse their office (or their freedom to carry a gun) and harm or intimidate others.
12 Steps for Police Shooters and Those Who Pay or Support Them
Adapted from the original AA 12 Steps (my changes are in italics)
1. We admitted we were powerless over using inappropriate violence against citizens we are charged to protect —that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of this Higher Power as we understood Him (or Her or them or it).
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God (our Higher Power), to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs and the mistaken procedures and policies that support them.
6. Were entirely ready to have our Higher Power remove all these defects of character and destructive procedures and policies.
7. Humbly asked God (our Higher Power) to remove our shortcomings and help us change our behavior, procedures and policies.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Our Higher Power, praying only for knowledge of This Power's will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to other law enforcement agents or gun lobbyists, and to practice these principles in all our affairs, including changing the policies and procedures that enabled or required our hurtful behavior.
Al-Anon developed because people who loved alcoholics needed support, especially in acknowledging what they could or could not do to change the alcoholic.
Nearly a century ago, we discovered that blanket prohibition of alcohol could not eliminate alcoholics. But that did not stop our leaders and voters from regulating the manufacture, sale and use of alcohol.
By the same token, the proliferation of guns in our society has led police to assume that every object that looks like a gun or any motion toward a belt or other place where a gun might be concealed could be a direct threat. If fewer people had unrestricted access to guns, police would not feel the need to treat everyone they encounter -- especially young black males -- as having a gun and intending to use it.
We in American society have become co-dependents in this unacceptable targeting of young black males by police. Perhaps these 12 steps and other similar approaches could help us step back from this awful hell we are plunging more and more of our families and neighborhoods and police departments into.
"In this world, hate has never yet dispelled hate. Only love can dispel hate." ~ Buddha
"Never doubt that a small group of committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." Margaret Meade