Just days after the worst school shooting in nearly a decade, the US hosts the country’s biggest gun event: the National Rifle Association (NRA) annual convention .
It is the Easter of bullets and pistols, the great congress of ammunition and rifles, the main assembly of what calls itself “the oldest organization of civil rights of the country” that for more than 150 years has defended only one: the possession and carrying of weapons.
Has been for decades one of the lobbies most influential in the life and politics of the United States, but also one of the most controversial: numerous groups the point to corruption to lobby and invest millions of dollars both in personal expenses of their leaders and in preventing the passage of legislation that regulates access to weapons.
This year, a nearby tragedy casts a peculiar shadow over its summit, the first after two years of the pandemic.
In the same state where the NRA has called its members to celebrate marksmanship and calibers, to show the latest advances in shooting and weaponry, a large group of families still watches over and say goodbye to 19 children and two teachers killed in a shooting.
“ The whole of Texas should be in mourning for this tragedy and, instead, people from all over the United States come here to worship guns”, Lauren Jackson, a woman who has come to protest against the event with a banner with a photo of her children in which she says she wants to see them grow up, tells BBC Mundo.
And it is that the past Tuesday, just after 68 kilometers from Houston, in Uvalde, a remote town on the Texas border with Mexico, a young man from 18 years old snuck into an elementary school and killed 21 people.
- At least 19 children and two teachers killed in a shooting in a classroom of a Texas elementary school
“He barricaded himself in the classroom and started to shoot the children and teachers”: this was the shooting at the Uvalde elementary school that left 21 dead
After the shooting, the NRA expressed regret and sympathy with the victims, although it indicated that it would keep its convention scheduled for three days later, despite multiple calls to cancel the event out of respect for the victims and their families.
“Although an investigation is ongoing (…), we recognize that this was the act of a lonely and deranged criminal,” the NRA wrote in a statement after the shooting.
“When we meet in Houston, we will reflect on these events, we will pray for the victims, recognize our patriotic members and com we will promise to redouble our commitment to make our schools safe,” he added.
Although there are usually demonstrations against the NRA conventions, local media estimate that the protests that took place on Friday were the largest since 1999, when the organization decided to hold its convention in Denver, just one month after the Columbine massacre.
Several artists and some of the personalities invited to this year’s event (including the Governor of Texas, Greg Abbott) finally canceled their participation.
Even some arms companies, such as Daniel Defense, the manufacturer of the rifle used in Uvalde, also decided not to attend due to consid be that this week “was not the right time to promote your products in Texas”.
But, as Johnny told BBC Mundo Ferguson, a member of the NRA, it did not matter who was missing if the “main stars” were going to be: “those of us who really love weapons and do not accept pressure, and our president Donald Trump”.
A Divided Country
Since Thursday night, in the surroundings of the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston, an unusual movement was noted: police and security agents blocked sidewalks and closed sections in preparation for the great event on Friday.
But the next day, Avenida de las Américas, one of the main avenues in the city, it also became a physical ditch: the metaphor of the deep schism that divides the United States.
On one side of the street, hundreds of people, mostly elderly, men, white and bearded, walked with brightly colored outfits with national symbols towards the convention center.
On the front sidewalk, hundreds of other people, mostly young people of all sexes and colors, grouped together with banners to shout expletives at those who were marching to the event on the other side of the street.
“It’s sad to say, but this is the United States, this divided society that doesn’t seem to agree on anything,” Ashton Wood, one of the of the organizers of the protest.
“It is very difficult, because all of us who are here, so To those who are at the forefront like us, we believe that what we are doing is for the good of our country, of our children and of our society, although we cannot be further from the form”, he points out.
Missing Visions
Ferguson says that he has traveled miles to get here from Kentucky, that he could not miss it because “there is no greater freedom than the freedom to defend your weapons” .
He wears a veteran’s hat Gulf War and a t-shirt with a sign that equates school shootings with abortion.
“I am amazed that people complain about weapons when they kill children at school and do not protest for the children who kill without being born”, he says, repeating the message he wears on his clothes.
“Weapons are not what kill. They kill people, I don’t understand why access to weapons should be regulated”, he alleges.
Renee Harrison also wears a red shirt, but, unlike Ferguson, she criticizes what she calls the “hypocrisy of politicians”, who seek mechanisms to stop abortion in the country while “crossing their arms when children die shot at schools”.
“We need urgent measures to be taken. We cannot be the country that prohibits abortion, that prohibits young people from buying a beer until 21 years and that at 18 is already selling them a weapon of war”, he says.
Laurie Fortson is also a member of the NRA and believes that shootings like the one in Uvalde, far from promoting regulations, should lead Americans to buy more weapons.
“In the face of shootings like this, we must buy more weapons “, he tells BBC Mundo.
“It is a way of being protected. I myself have thought about buying another weapon to protect my daughters and granddaughters”, she says as she shows the box to store a revolver.
Robert (he does not want to give his last name), another member of The NRA says that it does not understand the questions after the shooting, because in its opinion, it is not bad for children to learn to use weapons.
“Children should learn to use weapons so that they know how to use them well and when to use them,” he tells BBC Mundo.
“I taught my daughter to shoot since she was 8 years old. Here you see it, there it is 000 years, shooting an AR-18 and look what the aim is,” he explains while showing a video on his phone in which the girl is seen with a rifle in a shooting range.
Jam Hatchete, a Vietnam veteran, says he knows what war is, what killing is and why an assault rifle It should not be in the hands of just anyone, as it can happen in the United States.
“There are weapons that are for hunting and weapons that are for killing. There is no reason for a young man to 12 years have an AR rifle, whose objective is that, to kill. There is no reason for someone to buy a weapon that can do so much damage without many controls”, he comments.
Throughout the day, arguments like this are repeated in one way or another both outside and inside of the convention center, the same among ordinary citizens as among politicians.
In the park in front of the George R. Brown Center, the former presidential candidate -and now candidate for the government of Texas- Beto O’Rourke He called on his followers to unite and take action for “those who will be victims of the next mass shooting.”
On the other side of the park the great star of the evening was Trump, who re he whined, however, that the solution to tragedies like those of Uvalde is not to restrict access to weapons.
“The existence of evil in our world is not a reason to disarm respectful citizens of the law. The existence of evil is one of the best reasons to arm respectful citizens of the law”, he said.
The former president also questioned that USA “have US$26.0 million to send to Ukraine”, but cannot guarantee safety in schools.
“Before building nations in the rest of the world, we should build safe schools for our own children in our own nation,” Trump said to loud applause.
For his speech, the NRA, which promotes the free carrying of weapons in the US, prohibited its members from carrying any type of weapon.
Without solution
The Avenue of the Americas, the street that seems to divide the United States in two this weekend, has a point where two equidistant worlds meet again: the corner of Rusk Street.
There it is Lauren Sander, an Austin elementary school teacher who has traveled three hours to Houston with her daughter, her dog and a sign that asks: “Will my class be next? ”.
He is there asking to chat with the NRA members who start to leave the convention shortly after the end of Trump’s speech.
“I’m exhausted. There are no words to describe my anger. This week I’m embarrassed to be from Texas and that’s why I’m here, to try to explain to gun advocates what it’s like to be a teacher and have 21 5-year-olds in your classroom and fear that at any moment someone could enter to kill them and to kill you”, he tells BBC Mundo.
“Come listen to a primary school teacher”, she challenges those leaving the event, although most don’t even look at her.
Charles, one of the NRA’s “life members” who is attending the convention with his wife, stops.
The two visions that confront the United States intersect in a few minutes in which neither side seems to really want to listen to the other.
The man asks the teacher to arm herself to protect her students. She replies that her role is to teach, not to shoot, that weapons hurt not only those who kill , but also those of us who remain alive.
“Each death in a shooting is a destroyed family, friends, neighbors who will carry a weight for the rest of his life. It is told to you by someone whose father shot himself in the heart and who has had to suffer for it for the rest of his life, ”says the woman.
On the only thing that Charles and Sander seem to agree on is that the United States needs to do something and that massacres like the one in Uvalde will continue to be repeated if nothing is done.
But since the two have very different views on what to do, they end up They abruptly end the argument and turn their backs on each other.
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