Some of the ideas of recent days are useful; some–like arming teachers–are dangerous. But at least America is finally paying attention. The hard truth about social movements in this country is that they don’t gather strength until the comfortable white middle class is engaged. When white civil-rights workers were beaten and killed in 1964, the civil-rights movement moved to a new level. When college students began to be drafted, the Vietnam antiwar movement ignited. And when Archie and Veronica are worried about being shot, “violence prevention” and “youth development” can become real American crusades, not just platitudes.
For years now, an average of roughly 40 teenagers a week have been murdered in this country, nearly 90 percent of them killed by guns. That’s the equivalent of 150 Littleton massacres a year. But they happen mostly one by one, off school grounds–no national-news potential there–and slightly more than half of the teen killers and victims have been black. Those figures still hold true, but the gruesome school shootings are changing the picture. In the 1980s youth violence was associated with poverty and crack. It wasn’t politically correct to say, but it was usually someone else’s children. Not those at Columbine High. You can regret that double standard but still use it to build momentum for change.
Not all the ideas floated lately make sense. In most places, metal detectors do no good; kids just wait until after school to assault someone. “It increases fears without reducing risks,” says James Alan Fox, a criminologist at Northeastern University. The new TV ratings have caused barely a ripple; in fact, they may make kids want the forbidden fruit more. Movie ratings like NC-17 (today’s “X” equivalent) are enforced and potentially important, because that’s where the worst screen violence is. But Jack Valenti’s Motion Picture Association has been so compromised that it doesn’t impose NC-17 for even the most unremittingly violent films like “Natural Born Killers” (the alleged inspiration for at least two real-life murders), only for films showing sex.
As was said about the Holocaust: some are guilty; all are responsible. If President Clinton is going to have any credibility on this issue–a big if–he has to publicly read the names of all the big companies (and their CEOs) that make not just slasher films and gangster rap but also splatter software, the kind that lets kids “virtually” kill people. Simply meeting with gun and entertainment executives will accomplish little; individuals must be named and shamed. Because that is unlikely to happen in Washington, it will be up to Americans to mobilize with selective boycotts. A little of this gets a lot accomplished, especially when it’s done by angered moderates, not the usual right- wing suspects. To start educating themselves, parents can consult Web sites like www.screenit.com, which tell them the content of what their kids are watching.
The NRA has been on the offensive lately, but now gun-control advocates have an opening. The goal should be to start with Clinton’s modest package, which includes cracking down on gun shows and limiting handgun purchases to one a month, which will inhibit some traffickers. The best way to make gun control a first-tier political issue in 2000 is to steer clear of politically hopeless ideas like handgun bans and concentrate on “smart” guns, which use fingerprint recognition to prevent anyone but the owner from firing it. The goal should be to mandate that all guns must be “smart” by a certain date. Because they will be more expensive, that may even require a government subsidy for gun makers–a useful basis for compromise.
Beyond the entertainment and gun industries, lots of other ideas are percolating to the surface. Many parents simply need parental-skills training. A long-term study at the University of Colorado shows that home visits to young at-risk mothers cut child abuse by 80 percent and later arrest rates by 50 percent. With juvenile crime tripling between the hours of 3 and 8 p.m., increased funding for after-school programs is essential and has proven effective in cutting violence (see www.fightcrime.org). Churches must do more to open their doors to youth programs. High schools need to ask whether they’ve gotten too big and should be broken up into schools within schools so kids don’t slip between the cracks. The whole school-guidance system desperately needs to be rethought so that students are assured of regular one-on-one advice from designated faculty advisers. Right now the ratio is more like one guidance counselor for every 150 to 200 students–a recipe for trouble.
Last month I visited a terrific after-school program in South-Central Los Angeles called A Place Called Home. The kids and staff were mourning a good kid killed the night before in a drive-by shooting. An astonishing number of kids came up to say they would be dead, too, if it weren’t for this safe haven. Imagine: every day certain adults actually rechannel student anger and save young lives. The culture of violence in America isn’t going to disappear in our lifetimes. But with any luck, any justice, the campaign against it is at long last underway.
