Guns & Romance

So here we are again: a man walked into a college bookstore in Middletown, Connecticut, and shot a woman in the face. According to early news reports he was her boyfriend. This tragedy raises the issues of more and better gun control, access to quality mental healthcare, and mandatory couples conflict counseling.

Statistics say a woman is most likely to be assaulted by someone she knows. Many of those violent assaults involve a gun. Clearly love and weaponry don't mix. Gun show background checks should be expanded to include pertinent questions such as:

How would you describe the current state of your relationship? Blissful? So-so? Or, I fantasize about the funeral?
Have you purchased flowers and firearms on the same day?
Does watching "Law & Order," "CSI," or any A&E TV show narrated by Bill Curtis make you think you could "get away it?"

It might also be time for Love Marshals: Round the clock, on-call couple's counselors who lay out the ground rules, referee arguments, and ensure everyone's safety. To the woman:

Stay on point.
No combining nine arguments into one.
No setting his clothes on fire.

To the man:
No one-word answers.
No zoning out.
No premature capitulation just so you can go watch the game.

To the combative couple:
"I want this to be a fair fight. No talking about each other's mamas unless, of course, that's what the argument is about. No hitting, spitting, stabbing, or shooting."

If this were The Breakup Argument, The Love Marshall would call for an immediate cease fire complete with a weapons ban and confiscation of firearms. Total disarmament until each of you has fully moved on.

Love is complicated. Science has shown that the chemical make up of the brain while in love looks very similar to mental illness. Add this to any pre-existing pathologies and the situation gets problematic. A broken heart, a misfiring synapse, a chemical imbalance and suddenly you're sitting there in your underwear loading your gun while the voices in head cheer you on.

Doctors don't know why a person opts for gun play over say, the comparatively harmless drunk dialing or texting, but until they do it's probably best that lovers - current and former - are not armed. Harsh? Perhaps, but so is getting shot in the face.

Comments

[Thirdpower]

CT already has state licensing and waiting periods. Guess those worked real well.

[violettefemme]

I never read anything that said he was her boyfriend, he harrassed her a year ago, she got a court order for him to stay away. Sounds like he WANTED her to be his girlfriend.

It would be best if mis-information about a situation like this was not perpetrated by any articles published on Huffpo...it's widely read and leads to mass confusion about facts.

Huffpo's own articles last week were much clearer, and not one word ever said he was her boyfriend.

[plebeianswillrevolt]

Look at John Travolta's new movie. He shoots and kills everyone, innocent or guilty at the drop of a hat. And we gave him so much sympathy when his kid died.... and this is how he repays society to make a buck.

Guns and rampant Hollywood exploitation of violence don't mix, don;t work. ............ get over the gun control diatribe. Give the entertainment industries exploitation of violence.