Taking a Stand By Sitting Down

The title is mine. The text is a letter our daughter wrote to her elected representatives after the Orlando massacre at the Pulse nightclub. It's timely today with the powerful action by some elected representatives, including her congressman Gerald Connolly, sitting on the U.S. House of Representatives floor demanding action on gun control.

I wish I had such principled representatives. Mine are among the top recipients of NRA funds. Here's to addressing this serious problem and here's to citizens, like Jocelyn Dorfman, and to elected representatives like Connolly, John Lewis, and Donna Edwards, who are taking a stand by sitting down. 

Dear Congressman Connolly,

My name is Jocelyn Dorfman, and I am your constituent in the 11^th District. As my elected official, you are my representative in the Congress. I know that you do not undertake that challenge lightly. I also know that I am one of many voices you were elected to represent. Please consider this letter providing my perspective as a resident and preschool teacher in Fairfax County.

Every day, it is my responsibility and privilege to guide 15 three- and four-year-olds through the challenges of life. I teach them that hands are not for hitting, that mean words can hurt a friend’s feelings, and that we wash our hands after using the bathroom and before eating. I teach them to take a moment to consider a friend’s point of view; to listen when it is their friend’s turn to speak; and to be respectful of their friends, their teachers, and their families. I teach them these things so that they can be ready for kindergarten and school when the time comes, yes – but I also teach them these things so that they can be good citizens of the world. Watching, reading, and listening to the news sometimes makes me feel as if most adults have long forgotten these basic lessons.

I am also a student of American history and government. I know that the United States Constitution is one of the most important documents ever written. However, I also know that it is important to consider the time in which it was written. When Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and the other founding fathers codified this document, it took approximately one minute to load and shoot one bullet with a Brown Bess or Flintlock rifle. When they agonized over every single word of each sentence in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, they knew it was important enough to include “a well-regulated militia” in the Second Amendment. I know that it took me several weeks and some very long trips to the Department of Motor Vehicles to get my driver’s license, vehicle safety inspection, and vehicle registration; it should not be easier than that process to purchase a machine that has no other purpose than to hurt, maim, and kill.

This past weekend, I was visiting the parents who raised me to be aware of the world around me and to be a responsible citizen. I consider myself lucky that I was with them when I woke up to the news that 50 people were killed and even more were injured in Orlando, Florida.

I have a Master of Science in psychology; I am more than aware of the impact mental illnesses can have upon a person. However, the ease and simplicity of the process by which a mentally ill individual can obtain a semi- or automatic killing machine is horrifying. We will learn much in the coming days and weeks about the assailant’s history and potential motivations, but we already know that he was able to obtain and use a weapon designed with the sole purpose of killing a lot of people quickly.

A United States citizen purchased that weapon legally. A citizen who had been investigated by the FBI more than once and who had a history of domestic violence.

In April 1999, at the time of the mass murders at Columbine High School, I was nearing the end of my fourth grade year. At nine years old, I had to process the fact that I might be unsafe in school, a place of fun and learning. Those fears came to fruition in December 2012 when I woke to the news that twenty children had been murdered. The fact that this timeline left out Virginia Tech, which happened during my own freshman year of college; Waco, Aurora, Roseburg, and countless others leaves me nauseated.

At some point, we have to stand up to the NRA and say enough is enough. Let the CDC and other research bodies investigate gun safety. Let there be a legal and prescribed process for obtaining, registering, and re-registering weapons. Let me be able to know that my fifteen students will be safe. 

I am asking you to hear and understand that as your constituent I would like you to vote for, introduce, or otherwise support at least some common sense gun regulation. When flying to visit my parents, I could not carry on a bottle of shampoo greater than 3 ounces – but tomorrow I could walk into a gun store and legally purchase an AR-15.

Let’s require a gun license. Let’s require gun safety courses, like driver’s education. Let’s check people’s eyesight, and also check if they’ve committed a crime since the last time they registered their weapon. Let’s make it so that if you want a more deadly weapon than a shotgun or a handgun, you have to go through a more rigorous process. Let’s make sure that people being watched by the FBI either aren’t allowed to buy guns, or at the very least, make sure that the FBI is immediately made aware of the purchase. Let’s keep guns out of the hands of known perpetrators of intimate partner violence.

I am a native Virginian, and I consider myself lucky to have been born and raised in this great Commonwealth. I am also very lucky to have been raised by two conscientious parents who intentionally moved to a county and state that provided high quality public education, who raised me to be aware of the bigger picture of my county, state, and country; and who raised me to be a citizen of the world. As such, I have always been active in politics at every level, from handing out sample ballots as a five-year-old to working on my father’s school board campaign to voting in every possible election since I was first eligible.

Yet, this is the first time I have written to my elected official.

I write to you now because enough is enough. Thoughts and prayers, while comforting, are not enough. No moment of silence can bring back Edward Sotomayor Jr., Luis S. Vielma, and Kimberly Morris, much less the thousands of individuals who perish from automatic weapons every single year in our country.

Thank you for reading this. You are my elected official. Please hear my voice and make my voice heard in these matters. Please know that hands are not for hitting or for holding assault rifles in our communities.

I’m counting on you to do the right thing.

  

Sincerely,

Jocelyn Dorfman