Quo vadis America?

The United States of America is once again grappling with the senseless killings of a TV journalist and her cameraman while on live broadcast, raising to the fore anew polarizing issues like gun-control, work-related violence and racial bigotry.

The black American shooter, who killed himself when cornered by the police, was a co-worker of the victims who got fired at their TV station for being a “difficult man” to work with.

The sordid videos of the shooting, including those taken by the shooter himself using a Go-Pro “action” video camera and the footage taken by the news cameraman before he himself was shot, made the rounds of social media. Facebook and Twitter immediately shut down the shooter’s accounts where he posted his videos. 

With US President Barack Obama admitting that more Americans die from gun-related violence than from terrorist attacks, anti-gun proponents are expected to mount yet another campaign for tougher gun-control legislation.

First and foremost in the minds of many was how was a man who was clearly unbalanced based on his social media postings about being “a powder keg” ready to explode was able to get access to the gun he shot the victims and himself with.

The shooting also focused the spotlight on the gravity of workplace violence in the U.S., which the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ census put at 14,770 workplace homicide victims from 1992 to 2012, or an average of 700 homicides per year.

Over half of the work-related killings occurred within three work classifications, as follows: sales (28 percent), protective service occupation (17 percent) and transport and material moving jobs (13 percent).

In firing people, psychologists have emphasized that it should be done  in a way that the separated employees will have their dignities intact and that the underlying reasons for the separation should be fully justifiable.

In the touchy issue of gun-control in a nation where gun ownership is protected by the Constitution, it is not clear what America is going to do with the mounting victims of gun violence.  America, where are you going?  -End-

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