As the dust settles after the horrific mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge, the politicization of an event that resulted in the deaths of eight innocent people by gun control advocates is not just untimely but an attempt to shift the blame and narrative of this tragedy.This politicization is inappropriate and distracts from what should be the real focus: warning signs that were missed.Gun control advocates like Wendy Cukier, the president of the Coalition for Gun Control, have been quick to use the shooting as an opportunity to push narratives against gun owners."Strong gun laws and strong implementation of those gun laws do have an impact on levels of violence," she said in her opening remarks while being interviewed on CTV News just two days after the shooting."There is no right to own guns in this country," she continued.This kind of rhetoric might be common in a normal situation, but raising it within 48 hours of a mass shooting risks overshadowing the victims, all while the facts are still emerging.Cukier is not the only one who's taken this position; one scroll on Twitter, and countless posts are drawing a line between Tuesday's tragedy and the broader gun control debate..And while it might be easy to dismiss if it was just coming from accounts like @DarthGeekus47, a post from Yukon MLA Caroline Wawzonek sending condolences while containing the #GunControl shows this isn't limited to fringe voices online.This shift of focus also equates to a shift of blame; instead of the blame being, correctly, on the individual who pulled the trigger, the blame shifts to perceived inadequacies with gun regulations..When a crime can be blamed on a system, rather than an individual, accountability becomes fuzzy, and the commentary shifts from justice for victims to a debate over reforms.This murkiness over blame can also be attributed to the fact that the shooter is dead. You cannot make a corpse stand trial, and therefore, people, hungry for something living to transfer culpability to, look for a substitute defendant in the court of public opinion.The shooter, alive or dead, is the cause of this tragedy, full stop.Jesse Strang, née Van Rootselaar, should be held accountable for this tragedy, not excused from responsibility. Strang took the easy way out; he will not stand trial, and his victims will not get the justice they deserve.By shifting the narrative so soon after the event, the focus is drawn away from the real cause. Strang's internet history showed that this shooting was something he had long fantasized about.Strang had reposted multiple videos glorifying Audrey Hale, a 28-year-old school shooter who shot and killed six students at a Christian school in Nashville, as well as having created a game that simulated a mass shooting in Roblox..What this shows is that Strang had been, at the bare minimum, contemplating committing an act such as this for a significant amount of time.The threat, therefore, is not firearms; it is when an individual like Strang shows increasing signs of social isolation and radicalization, and there is no system to catch it. This issue is especially relevant in small, isolated northern communities, like Tumbler Ridge, a community where firearm ownership is a part of everyday life. Looking at this side of the story, it is clear that the firearm debate is the peripheral issue of this situation. The main social debate should be how someone like Strang was able to display such obvious signs of radicalization with no one catching on.If there is anything that comes out of this horrible situation in terms of reform, it should be focused on mental health resources for young people, early intervention programs, and robust community support systems that can identify and help those at risk.
