Outrage Over Gun Violence – Asking the Wrong Questions, Reacting to the Wrong Issues

In the very short time since the mass shooting at The Pulse in Orlando, Florida, there has been renewed outrage and heated debate about gun violence, much of it vicious and based on assumptions and clues that have yet to be properly sifted and sorted. The investigation is likely to be ongoing for some time.

And yet, there are people out there who have all the answers. “Terror!” “Hate!” “Let’s Wall Ourselves Off!” “Let’s Lock Them All Up!” “Bomb Them!”  “Round them Up!” There is a flowing river of fear, hatred, and nastiness that is infecting the entire nation. Our political leaders do nothing to ease the situation, because the common denominator is a sacred cow: “MY GUNS! MY RIGHT!”

While some say “Muslims! Militant Muslims!” Others bend over backwards with “Christians! Militant Christians!” These latter cries attempt to make the point that while in this particular instance, the alleged perpetrator was a seemingly devout Muslim, there have been many more cases in which the perpetrator was a declared Christian, perhaps in a fundamentalist sect.

These two discussion trends (“MY GUNS! MY RIGHT!” and “Religious Affiliation/Militant Radicalized Extremist posing Imminent Danger”) serve only as tools to divide people, not as tools toward societal healing and reconciliation, or safety.

You can’t tell me these discussions are not intended to be ugly. There are too many people invested in the chaos the ugly discussions fuel. Money and political power are at stake. Those who have will win, at all costs. The small amount of democracy our republic yet retains hangs in the balance.

However, programmed chaos is not what I intend to discuss here; such discussion is too deep to dive into for the purposes of this essay. What I want to suggest, in these few lines, is that we need to reframe the entire discussion. We are not digging toward the heart of the issue, but talking around it, by scapegoating specific groups of people.

Fundamentally, we are afraid of what we will have to face, if indeed we really want to find solutions.

“How many gun deaths were done by __(fill in the blank)__?!”
“How many gun deaths were done by people associated with __(fill in the blank)__?!”

I believe these are the wrong questions to be asking, if indeed we want to find solutions. If they are not the wrong questions, they certainly should not be the only questions we ask. The knee-jerk reaction is always skewed toward a particular brand of religion or race, but I'm afraid the truth goes much, much deeper than this.

Here are some other questions that need to be part of this discussion:

How many gun deaths were committed by men (against women and/or children or other men)?

How many were committed by disturbed/afflicted/medicated individuals undergoing treatment?

How many were committed by militant/radicalized individuals?

How many gun deaths ended a domestic dispute?

Gun violence is very closely related to domestic and/or workplace violence – raising the issue of anger management, respect for women and children, authority figures, power struggles. Here is one statistic:

Nationwide in 2013, out of the 1,615 female homicide victims, 1,086 were white, 453 were black, 36 were Asian or Pacific Islander, 21 were American Indian or Alaskan Native, and in 19 cases the race of the victim was not identified.

And here is another:

Considering mass shooting alone ([by legal definition, at least] four people shot dead in a public place), nearly all were male in 2015. About 67% are white, 16% black, and 9% Asian.

Even just these two sets of statistics could be indicative of a trend. These statistics show, far and away, that most murders are committed by white men. While these facts do not provide complete context, the implications should give everyone pause.

More to the point, these bits of information prove we must dig deeper for answers.

I may be out of line, but here’s the thing: Guns are primarily a white male symbol of privilege and control. The point has been made over and over again, for years, even as far back as the signing of the Declaration. When the local NRA folk came through my local 4th of July parade, riding horses and shooting blanks from their weapons (causing babies and dogs to howl all along the parade route), there were a couple of women (white), but was there a black person among them, or any ethnicity other than white? Have you ever seen a black person at an NRA rally, openly carrying? You know the answer to these rhetorical questions; I don’t have to spell it out.

This latest, most horrifying incident was committed by an AMERICAN. Period. His ethnic and religious heritage may be among the factors, but this person was born on our shores. He was likely profoundly disturbed and conflicted (Could it be over sexual identity? Could it be over religious doctrine? Could he have been radicalized? We don’t yet know – we may never really know), but the story is being spun into an international terrorist action, mostly in order to promote inflammatory, racist and politically manipulative rhetoric that obscures one of the biggest problems we face in modern society, and more so here than most anywhere else on the planet. The discussion needs to be reframed around issues even more basic than race and religion: Control issues (along with anger/aggression), often tied to mental illness combined with ready access to high-powered assault rifles and other types of guns.

In most cases, armed robbery aside, the issue is one of control – who has “control”, by what means “control” is exerted, and against whom, particularly when the "control" is directly related to possession of a deadly weapon (gun or other).

Reframed, here is a different description of what happened in Orlando: An angry and desperate American man killed and injured a lot of other American people (of various ethnic, gender and sexual identities, yes, but foremost, they were people, with families and friends and jobs and lives of worth in their community) because he didn’t know how to break through his mental anguish/anger, because he couldn’t connect with people in a meaningful/fulfilling way. Time may tell the tale, but it won’t bring back those American lives that were cut short.

How do we go about insuring such things don’t happen again? We certainly can’t do anything from the knee-jerk discussion angle. So, perhaps more pertinent questions to ask and discuss might include these:

How do we become more accepting of people, who, what and where they are?

How do we support, uplift and include people in all walks of life and work?

How does our society train/enable psyches to be angry, violent or murderous? How can we mitigate underlying causes?

How can we better identify, diagnose and treat people struggling with mental illness?

How can we come to terms with an archaic constitutional right with regard to weapons possession and legislate toward a safe society.

What all must we do to stem the tide of violence and anger, in ways that promote peace, health and justice in our communities?

How can we remove prejudice, judgment, labels and stigma from the picture, and just be people, living cooperatively in community?

Are there economic mitigations that could be brought into the picture?

How do we teach people to be good to one another?

How do we dispel ignorance?

Age old questions, these are. But we need to keep asking them, and commit to finding and working toward real solutions, all the while holding our elected officials accountable to We The People for codifying and instituting solutions that benefit the public good, not bowing to well heeled lobbyists and their masters.

We can take the moment of silence,
kneeling in sorrow or in prayer,
but then all bodies, all voices must rise up,
uniting for the sake of humanity, for sanity,
blending and weaving, moving and smoothing
our differences into loves and strengths,
our weaknesses into meaningful work,
uniting toward the only real song there is:
People, all people, together, one people.

© 2016 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Another Waiting

Waiting,
ever present
in this issue
of living,
encompassing,
as it cannot help but do,
the elegant enigma life,
from birth,
and expansion,
through experience
and arrival at the passage
through which death
may be an another emergence,
if not a healing.

Certainly this life,
this is an exploration,
if you will,
of the complexity
of the soul;
where we are
in each moment,
we think and feel
in a language of
fluidly visible emotion,
on a landscape
of shifting times
and trials,
and waiting,
suspended in either
joy or grief.

For what do we wait?
Will time tell the tale?

Perhaps we’ll never realize
the moment in which we
slip into that possibility
that goes against the
grey grip of fate,
into unforeseen,
unanticipated,
because unimagined,
furthering.

© Elisabeth T. Eliassen 2016

In Mortality

By its four corners, something like a large sheet was gently lowered,
and a voice was heard by one, some, or perhaps many,
“It is good, all is good;
no worries.”

There, on a blooming field of goodness, a fading into night,
the beginning of an end setting forth a next start;
if darkness before dawn is an eye
to a different sort of tomorrow,
surely there is a fluttering of beating wings.

And in the melting of granulation into a murmur of revelation,
wondering about all that came before this gaping emptiness,
great thirst, and heaviness of light,
was all possible done?
Is the stove off or on?

Something echoes as through a corridor,
can it be music?
So unlike any remembered sonic partaking
or moment of music-making,
it seems unlikely.

This may be a dream that is not
(though so many have thought)
or perhaps a movement in the planetary cycle,
pitting every ounce of strength
against every pound of relaxation
to power the stars of night
and set the moon toward reflection.

“We love you, we love you!”
is heard, perhaps not by word,
or perhaps it is a bird,
chirping on the ledge,
in song or pledge.

Here, on this blooming field of goodness,
is the healing place and time;
as She said, “All will be well.”

What a thing it is,
oh, what a thing,
this on, honored one,
on, onward on,
onward on,
on.

© 2016 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

A Flower in the Garden of Delight

My Master hath a garden

Full-filled with diverse flowers,

Where thou may'st gather posies gay

All times and hours.

Where nought is heard but paradise bird,

Harp, dulcimer and lute,

With cymbal and timbrel,

And the gentle sounding flute.

O Jesus, Lord, my heal and weal,

My bliss complete,

Make thou my heart thy garden plot,

True, fair and neat,

That I may hear this music clear,

Harp, dulcimer and lute,

With cymbal and timbrel,

And the gentle sounding flute.

~ Anonymous

While I have been trying to process the passing of my friend, Raymond Martinez, the words of this anonymous Elizabethan poem sang themselves through my head, and suddenly the enormity this sorrow became clear to me, even dear to me –

But, of course, I must explain. (You knew that was coming.)

I don’t quite remember what year it was that I first met Raymond, but it was at a concert of French Baroque music in West Marin; other singer friends had invited me to come hear the program. I remember that when Raymond sang his solos, it was spine-tinglingly beautiful. And the inevitable duet, trio and choruses. I was introduced to Raymond after the concert, and we chatted for a while and then I was swept along to the reception. Before long, Raymond said, “You know, you should come sing with us.” And that was that.

That was that. For years and years and years, I would show up and it was “Oh, goodie!! I get to sing with Raymond, again!” And it was always a delightful time, whether it was sublime or ridiculous. We shared so many musical experiences that were sublime [Purcell: I was Queen Dido and Raymond was Aeneas, and it was exquisite!] or ridiculous [if you weren't there to see Raymond, dressed in a toga-esque costume with breastplates, head topped with a ten-gallon hat, make his grand entrance for "Oedipus Tex" roaring in on a forklift at Toby's Feed Barn in Point Reyes Station, you missed a singularly triumphant moment of ridiculousness in the annals of chamber opera], or even a somewhat disconcerting mixture of both, I can’t begin to catalogue them. But Raymond remembered all of them, and as the catalogue of your history with him expanded through time, so did a small, highly personal language develop between you and he. Heaven help you if you sat or stood near him during rehearsals, because he was a merciless sotto voce jester to whatever comedies evolved in the rehearsal process. He had the most deliciously wicked sense of humor, and he was always pushing the envelope of what he could successfully pitch into the room. Many were the times when I could feel my face burning red, as I struggled to keep myself from exploding with inappropriate laughter. Raymond would toss a cue word, a code phrase or a little sound from the personal language over his shoulder toward you; each of these was a golden thread woven, by means of the shared history, into the ever-unrolling carpet of fun and music.

One might think, reading this, that Raymond was frivolous, but no. Raymond took everything seriously, though he might not always be willing for people to see his serious side. There were glimpses of it, and it was revealed through intimate conversations.

Seasons came and went. Flowers of all kinds came in and out of season. But singing was always in season. We sang church services, memorial services, sunrise services for Easter, and midnight services at Christmas. Summer festivals; winter concerts; Sunday afternoon salons; the odd pick-up gig, here and there; and weddings. Raymond sang at my wedding, along with three other beloved colleagues. Someone else has written about how welcoming Raymond was to everyone he made music with in ensembles; music was never about competition, always about collaboration. Singing and musicking, the moveable musical feast, always and ever in season. And where there was music, there was Raymond, your colleague, confidant, collaborator, even co-conspirator in and of beauty—and fun! And when he wasn’t singing, he was taking in the opera, the symphony, friends giving recitals or concerts, edifying trips to museums of every kind [one day, as I was heading into the Legion of Honor, I heard my name called—there was Raymond! He'd already seen the exhibit and was waiting for a friend to come meet him for lunch. "Come this way— I know a terrific spot for getting pictures with the bridge in the background" So, I followed him. Indeed, it was a breathtaking spot, and he pulled out a film camera and snapped me with the bridge. Then his friend arrived, and after introductions, they went on their way, and I went on in to see the exhibit].

He loved nature; hiking; places of both cultivated and uncultivated beauty. God only knows how many miles he walked during his lifetime. He loved architecture. Life was all about being immersed in the ever transforming and informing experience of beauty. The back garden at Crescent Avenue was his hortus conclusus, a personal cloister of shade and green. He tended that garden, for as long as he was able, like it was a shrine, and shared it with friends as often as he could. As much as he loved this private sanctuary, he loved to happen upon beauty everywhere, and I truly mean everywhere.

Raymond may not have been all that handy with a computer, but his favorite piece of technology was the digital camera a singer friend gave to him. The right size to shove in a pocket, he was always prepared to experience and record his random encounters with beauty. Many of the subjects of the resulting photos were transformed into his superlative artwork, known to most of us through his business, Watercolors of the World. The last time I saw him, he told me about the condition of his health, asked me to pray for him, and then sought to soften this horrible blow by pulling out his camera and showing me the snap of an unbelievably gorgeous spray of flowers on a tree and a photograph of his latest painting, a giant succulent or cactus he saw in Golden Gate Park. “Do you know what species this is?” He asked me. I didn’t know. He knew far more formal names of plants than I did; he had to tell me that white flowers I’d photographed were freesias, not crocuses. But knowing the proper name doesn’t make the aroma of blooms sweet; they manage that on their own, whether we name them or not.

So, this brings me back to the Elizabethan poem. Those words were positively singing themselves through my head this morning, and I realized that Raymond, colleague and confidant, collaborator and co-conspirator, had also been the master cultivator, and of a garden much larger than the one at Crescent Avenue. Raymond spent his life cultivating a very great garden of friends. You and I, dear friends, each of us is a unique flower in Raymond’s garden; family, singers, poets and instrumentalists, all of us are in that great garden!

I think we can honor our friend Raymond’s memory best by being continually in season, blooming to bursting, and spreading, far and wide, our joyful noise of sweet and ever sweeter music.

© 2016 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Lento

Slowing to a halt,
though not a screeching one;
a quiet release
from the burdens and ties
of a driven life
into the arms of silence,
only for the sake of contemplation.

From within an apprehended softness and serenity,
the elements wait to cherish
and to be cherished by
this bit of earth,

embellished, molded and emboldened
into such glory of motion,
as can carry a beating heart that sings
— all nights and mornings meted —

during this most singular unfolding.

Chosen into silence,
more than choosing,
this respite from heedless racing
toward no-end-in-sight
is a mindful pause,
a backward glance,
a look 'round —
in light and dark,
at twilight and dawn
— to see that what there is
truly is there to be and be seen,
changing the yet unchanged,
unbidden and unrestrained.

This time is liminal,
a bathing in the spa of
all possibility,
a training and preparation for
that peace that will visit
when yet a greater silence invades,
enveloping comprehension
like a shroud.

© 2016 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

“The Computer Kid’s Magic Night”; Finally, An Opera About Kids and Technology

The Computer Kid's Magic Night 

by Joann E. Feldman

Friday-March 4, 2016  - 7:30pm

Saturday-March 5, 2016  - 2:00pm

LESHER CENTER FOR THE ARTS

1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek, CA

(925) 943-7469

Tickets on sale now at

http://lesherartscenter.showare.com/TheComputerKidsMagicNight

There has been a great deal of discussion, among those in the opera community (Note: I am not addressing developers of the Opera search engine), about how to interest young people in the art form. The question is rhetorical, and we all know the answer: “Make opera relevant to today’s youth.” Easier said than done.

The smallest kids still enjoy “Hansel und Gretel” (Humperdinck), “Noyes Fludde” (Britten) and “Amahl and the Night Visitors” (Menotti). There are newer entries to the repertoire: “The Little Prince” (Portman), “Brundibar” (Krasa) and “Where the Wild Things Are” (Knussen). What all these pieces have in common is the propensity to limit thematic material to traditional or classic children’s stories and simple moral themes. That’s all good, but does modern treatment of an old story make it modern or relevant? From my perspective, as a parent, writer and singer, relevance must reside in the subject matter, not in its treatment.

There can be no more relevant topic for millennial families than our engagement with technology. Studies have been done, books have been written, online forums exist about this topic that is so challenging to the modern family. The term “screen time” sums up our conundrum with regard to the influence of technology on our kids.

So, I ask you: Has this relevant, modern topic ever been the subject of an opera?

If your answer is “No,” I am very happy to be able to reply, “You are wrong!”

As it happens, the subject features prominently in Joann E. Feldman’s “The Computer Kid’s Magic Night.” If you are surprised to learn this, you will be equally astonished to learn that this 50 minute opera is listed in OPERA America’s Opera For Youth Directory and that it had its premier in 1986. That’s no typo, folks.

Full disclosure: I saw the premier of this opera. My future husband had been cast in the production, offered at Sonoma State University, so I attended. A show about computers and kids! Wow! I found the music to be charming and engaging, the story clever and full of fun. At that time, I was a recent university graduate. I would not own a personal computer for another 5 years (a second-hand Macintosh Plus); I had typed all my school papers on an Underwood typewriter. The very thought of computers becoming ubiquitous, much less more seductive than television, was something I just couldn’t fathom (mainly because I didn’t play videogames and had had very little exposure to computers during my university days). But, I remember thinking, as I watched this show, “How prescient of the author/composer to have seen that the computer can be promoted as an educational tool for kids.”

Looking at the story now, with 30 years of computing life behind me and two teens in high school, I see the even deeper message: Technology is indeed a valuable educational tool, as long as it isn’t so intrusive that it replaces all other ways of learning, all other types of interactions, all other activities.

Parents, educators and kids, this is a wonderful show to spark thought and discussion on this very important topic!

Kudos to Solo Opera for being courageous and cutting-edge in bringing this very timely and relevant opera to millennial audiences, with updated technological references and a fine cast of singers!

~ Elisabeth T. Eliassen is a Bay Area singer (mezzo-soprano), writer (ASCAP), and parent. 

A Preface To Joining

True enough, a blending,
to some extent, a mending
of some breach, a sending
of renewed hope, extending
from now to beyond pretending
that unity is only an appending,
together a mere attending.

No, this is a mystical kenning
to the purpose life is commending,
never a spectrum of solitary rending,
but a transforming and transcending,
willing to work through good and ill, wending
each way, a striving to build, unbending
the furrows of Eden to flower, suspending
any doubt that union is love ascending.

© 2016 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen