CHICAGO –With less than a week since the Colorado movie massacre, the gun control debate resurrects just as Chicago amends its local gun ordinance.
Wednesday, the Chicago City Council approved Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s latest re-write of the law, permanently barring those convicted of a felony violent crime and enforcing a 5-year ban on those convicted of a misdemeanor violent crime, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. Later in the evening, President Barack Obama addressed gun violence while speaking to the National Urban League in New Orleans, and pledged to work with lawmakers to help cease violence in all incidents — not just sudden massacres.
The Colorado incident, however, sheds a dim light on Chicago’s elevated gun activity this year, and has community activists and organizations that rally for stricter gun control laws demanding more of the government to protect its residents. Until now, neither of the presidential candidates has addressed the issue.
Emanuel, who’s part of the group Mayors Against Illegal Guns, co-chaired by New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, declined to comment on the current gun control debate Wednesday, and has yet to speak out on the issue. Illinois governor Pat Quinn, however, recently spoke out in favor of gun control, showing his support for a ban on assault weapons, and opposition to the conceal carry proposal. He is one of a few local politicians who have taken the debate head-on.
“As a nation, we are better than this. This is not acceptable to have this kind of gun violence,” said Caroline Brewer, a representative for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, “…to have American families and children at risk, everywhere, anywhere across the country, being slaughtered by somebody who was legally able to amass an arsenal of military-style weapons and ammunition, and walk into a movie theater and unload on all of those children and families, parents in a matter of seconds.”
Brewer continued, adding that “We as leaders in this business are working with advocates all over the country to get people involved and demand that our elected leaders not be allowed to shrug their soldiers and walk away from what happens in Aurora, Chicago, Detroit, in cities and small towns all over this country.”
In a statement following the tragedy last Friday, Bloomberg said, “…maybe it’s time that the two people who want to be president of the United States stand up and tell us what they are going to do about it, because this is obviously a problem across the country.” Wednesday evening, President Barack Obama opened a window to the debate calling for “stepped-up background checks for people who want to purchase guns and restrictions to keep the mentally unbalanced from buying weapons,” reports The Associated Press. Those steps, Obama said, “shouldn’t be controversial, they should be common sense.”
While the Aurora shooting injured 71 people — 12 of those killed — to date, there have been 1,262 shooting incidents in Chicago for 2012, up from 1178 in 2011. The murder toll is up to 284, of which 85 percent is typically shootings, according to the Chicago Police Department.
But why, activists ask, hasn’t there been as much attention paid to Chicago’s crime issue nationally–the president’s hometown? Many contend that one reason could be because since it’s in Chicago, murder and gun violence is simply the norm.
“We’re so desensitized that we let it happen,” said Chicago Far South Suburban Branch NAACP President David Lowery, Jr. “It is unfortunate that when gun violence happens in inner-city communities that there is not the kind of attention paid to it that’s being paid to Colorado right now,” Brewer said, “but everyone can relate at going out on Thursday night at a movie theater and not being able to anticipate at any level that someone is going to interrupt that movie with this incredible amount of gun fire. So we are angered and upset and feel just as strongly about gun violence anywhere it happens.”
Cy Fields, Pastor of Chicago-based New Landmark Missionary Baptist Church agrees, saying that many people throughout the world expect violence and gang warfare to be associated with Chicago, however, “ In Aurora, a non-urban city, sort of a static demographic, people don’t expect mass-murder, mass-killing. So it’s a shock in Aurora, but it’s a scorecard for Monday morning in Chicago because it’s become more of the norm in Chicago.”
Fields is part of a group of 70 Chicago-area faith leaders who make up the Chicago Clergy Coalition, a group of faith leaders devoted to helping lead social justice and economic development in the city. The group met for reflection and prayer Monday, and wants to encourage city-wide peace.
Serving in a high-crime community on Chicago’s West side, Fields contends that although Chicago has a murderous reputation dating back to as far as the Al Capone days, “…politicians and policy makers are not excused from making violence reduction part of their political will.” In most recent instances, he said, “[politicians and policy makers] are able to in an isolated sense, protect for NATO or secure with NATO, Chicago police have shown that when they want to stop violence, they’re capable of doing so. So I think there’s lack of political will, creativity, ingenuity and resources.”
When there’s a “lack of political will,” Fields says, the drug economy drives a lot of the Chicago violence and murders, which is often attributed to the lack of jobs, education and other factors. “So there has to be a political will to increase jobs, to create a state-of-the-art educational system that produces responsible citizens,” however, he says, “…the real solution is going to be on a grassroots level: homes, faith institutions, community-based organizations.”
Lowery concurs, stating that for some reason, “The powers that be are not getting to those people to offer them something…economic resources. A lot of those kids have dropped out of school. It’s total chaos.”
Chicago Police Department Superintendent Garry McCarthy detailed some of the ways the city plans to attack murder in a report with The Grio last month. He said that in addition to policy, it will take “incremental change” to transform the city from its violent reputation.
Activists and residents are thinking creatively about how turn the local gun control debate into a national conversation.
According to the Chicago Tribune, Mayors Against Illegal Guns released a report Tuesday by GOP pollster Frank Luntz showing that gun owners and NRA members “overwhelmingly support a variety of laws designed to keep firearms out of dangerous hands, even as the Washington gun lobby prepares to spend unprecedented millions supporting candidates who pledge to oppose any changes to U.S. gun laws,” according to the organization. It says that 87 percent of NRA members feel that supporting the 2nd Amendment goes hand in hand with keeping guns away from criminals. Seventy-four percent of those polled support requiring a criminal background checks of anyone purchasing a gun, while 79 percent support requiring gun retailers to perform background checks on all employees, among other “common sense” gun rules.
“This poll shows plain and simply how seriously out-of-step the leadership of the NRA is with its membership – and how, despite what previous polls say, there really is support for common sense gun laws in the U.S.,” said Mayors Against Illegal Guns Co-Chair and Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino in a statement. Bloomberg added “It’s time for those in Washington – and those running for President – to stand with gun owning citizens who are concerned about public safety, rather than influence peddling lobbyists who are obsessed with ideology.”
The Chicago Clergy Coalition is calling for Chicago to engage in a peace weekend. “We hope that all of Chicago will find themselves in a faith institution to become moved and energized to participate in bringing peace to all of Chicago,” said Fields.
To help encourage a national conversation on the gun control debate, The Brady Campaign launched Tuesday a website called “We Are Better Than This,” asking people to sign petitions requesting presidential candidates to get involved and lead the country in the conversation, in addition to sharing ideas and working with advocates across the country to come together and find solutions.
“We want everybody involved,” Brewer says, no matter what political affiliation, ethnic background, profession or any other difference. “Even if you’re a gun owner or not, we want people of good will who know that this kind of violence is unacceptable to come to the table and work together to find solutions and get those solutions implemented a as quickly as possible,” she said.