This is an opinion column.

There are no answers to some questions. No simple answers. No answers that make any sense. No answers we want to accept.

Still, we ask: Why are children shooting each other?

And time for real talk fam, way past time: Why are our Black children shooting—and killing—our Black children?

Of course, there are more questions: Where are children getting guns? Why do children even have guns?

There are at least some answers to the where—though they aren’t simple answers, either. Answers that make any sense. Answers we don’t want to accept.

We always come back to the whys. And plead for answers. Even if they don’t make any sense. Even if we don’t want to accept them.

Related: Our crimes, our tragedies, our silence; make me stop writing this column

Frederick Morgan is us. He’s a pressure washer and painter in Camp Hill, about eight miles southeast of Dadeville, where four children were killed and 32 more wounded at a Sweet 16 party last Saturday night, allegedly by three children—one 17 years old, one 16, the other 20—who were arrested Tuesday night and Wednesday.

Morgan is “pissed.” “They need to get the ones who are putting these guns in these children’s hands,” he told my AL.com colleague Mike Cason on Wednesday in Dadeville after law enforcement finally shared the names of the first two suspects. “Children killing children, we don’t need that.”

I’m pissed, too. Not solely at the spate of children shooting children that showers too many homes, neighbors, and families with unmerited grief. At all the shootings. At the mass shootings. At Buffalo. At Louisville. At Uvalde. At Nashville. At Sumpter. At Birmingham.

At the myriad domestic shootings that usually don’t reach our timelines.

At the horrific shooting of innocents like the 16-year-old who rang the wrong doorbell (Kansas City), the 20-year-old who pulled into the wrong driveway (Hebron, N.Y.), or the two teenage cheerleaders who inadvertently opened the wrong car door in a grocery store parking lot (Elgin, Tx.)

At those who sprayed potential death into an apartment in the Collegeville neighborhood in Birmingham last night, hitting a woman and a four-year-old girl.

Pissed that Officer Truman Fitzgerald, BPD’s professional voice, had to battle emotions while recounting the horrid scene.

“We have a popular idea in our culture that if we have an issue with someone we’re just going to pull up into a house … and fire recklessly into an apartment,” he said. “I’ve got news for you: you never hit your intended target. … You end up hitting 2-year-old Major Turner. You end up hitting 12-year-old Audrianna Pearson. And tonight we’re on the scene yet again where an innocent child has been struck by gunfire who had nothing to do with this scenario.”

Pissed at all of it.

It bears pausing right here to say this: In these times when children shooting children darken our headlines, most of our young people—the vast, vast majority of them—are conscientious and responsible. They’re aspiring and dreaming and striving to live those dreams.

They do not deserve to be sullied by the foolishness of others, tainted by the terror too many of them know too well.

On Monday, Jefferson County Sherriff Mark Pettway joined a group of Democratic lawmakers in front of a Hueytown funeral owned by Clifford Toney, the grandfather of 17-year-old Shaunkivia “Keke” Nicole Smith, one of the four Dadeville victims.

The lawmakers called for “common sense” action by the state’s Republican supermajority. They pleaded for passage of Sen. Merika Coleman’s long-proposed red-flag law. It’s similar to red flag laws in other states, laws typically passed with bipartisan support. Yet Coleman’s bill, first proposed in 2018, has been in a chokehold of Alabama partisanship.

Maybe someone on the red side of the aisle is pissed, too. Maybe enough of them now to finally pass a law they’ve stymied for five years.

A law that would not have stopped Dadeville. But one that will certainly save someone’s life.

As for the children, Pettway knows where they get their guns and has thoughts on why they use them.

The guns come from three primary sources. “Stolen, from cars and residences” is one, he said. Stolen because the owner leaves them in plain view, or the gun is accessible in a glove or other compartment.

So, gun owners, lock your gun(s) in the trunk when leaving them in the car. Don’t leave them accessible at home, either, even if you’re just leaving for a short time.

Another thing, gun owners—know the serial number. Many stolen weapons are untraceable, Pettway said, because the owner never recorded the serial number. “Take a picture of it,” he said.

Parents also buy guns for their children, the sheriff said. That’s happened for generations, so there’s nothing inherently wrong with it. But folks, know your child. If they’re not responsible enough to make their bed every day, they’re not responsible enough to own a gun.

Get your kid a puppy.

The sheriff added this frustrating source of guns, too: “You’ve got girlfriends buying guns for their boyfriends,” he said. “They buy them legally; the guns in their name.”

It may not make sense, and we may not want to accept it, but it’s an answer. An exasperating one, but an answer, nonetheless.

Now, the why? Why are our babies shooting our babies?

“Because they don’t want to fight,” Pettway quickly responded. “Because of social media.”

Makes no sense, and I don’t want to accept it. But …

“[Kids] used to be seen on social media getting their butts whipped,” he continued. “You don’t see that anymore. Why? Because they started pulling out a gun.

“Early in the social media age, we saw people on there fighting, and they couldn’t fight. It changed—they quickly resorted to getting guns. You didn’t see any fighting after that. They go directly to the gun.

“It’s been years since somebody actually got into a fistfight,” Pettway added. “Maybe girls every now and then, but no guys. A guy will pull out a gun in a minute. They’re not gonna be seen on social media getting their butts whipped. They’ll pull out a gun and they don’t know how to shoot. That’s all it takes.”

Makes no sense, and I don’t want to accept it.

We’ve been hearing “conflict resolution” for some time now, since children began shooting children, transforming their streets into old western movie sets. Into Gunfight at the O.K. Corral.

Into Tombstone.

Birmingham is investing hundreds of thousands in various programs to address youth violence and its varied effects, including mental health, conflict resolution, and a juvenile re-entry program providing resources and support to youth ages 16 to 19 who are committed to the state’s Department of Youth Services.

The investments may be working. We just never know when a child doesn’t shoot another child. We certainly know when they do.

And each time, we ask why?

More columns by Roy S. Johnson

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