The Midwest Building Decarbonization Coalition’s hearts and minds go out to the families and loved ones of those who have suffered loss due to Gun Violence. There has been a series of horrific tragedies that continue to plague our nation. Just in the month of May 2022, in Southern California, we’ve seen 5 wounded and 1 killed at a Taiwanese church, in Buffalo, New York, 10 Black people killed in a racially motivated mass shooting at a supermarket and yesterday in Uvalde, Texas, where a shooter killed at least 19 children and two teachers.
These are sad times for our nation. We are plagued by White Supremacy and a Mental Health Crisis which are not one in the same. We have too many massacres on our hands as Americans and we need to hold our elected officials and our individual ideologies accountable for stricter gun laws and face the lobbyists who continue to push out false narratives about Gun Laws and Gun Violence.
We must resist industries that put profits before people, just like in the Climate and Environmental Justice movement. This is all interconnected. We need to dismantle these systematic aspects of the dominant culture. We need elected officials to serve their constituents and their lives, not corporations and their bottom lines. Our nation needs healing. Our nation needs accountability.
At the Midwest Building Decarbonization Coalition, we are building a movement based on the Jemez Principles, including working together in solidarity and mutuality. As our communities and our country mourns, rages, and fights for life and healing, we are with you. And we will continue to oppose the systems of extraction and profit that normalize violence and death.
Please keep the Uvalde School Community, Buffalo, New York victims’ family members, and Southern California Taiwanese church members, the victims, their families, the students, and teachers who were traumatized by this event in your thoughts and prayers at this incredibly difficult time. Thoughts and prayers are not enough, and they never were. But we also need them. We must always hold space for grief and mourning, and never become numb to the violence and death that has become all too common.
-Midwest BDC Leadership Team
