The rampage was the final result of his stalking of, and rejection by, Laura Black, a young engineer employed at the company. She was severely injured in the shooting incident, but survived. I did not know Farley or any of his victims, but I had played Laura’s softball team in the company league, and I remember her as an attractive and athletic young woman with a beautiful smile.

The shooting occured in a different building from mine at the ESL complex, so I was unaware of any of the events unfolding, and heard no shots being fired. Security herded my research team into a “tank”
(a steel room that acted as an RF-opaque Faraday cage for our classified IMINT computer system). I had no idea what was going on outside until Security knocked on the door several hours later and ordered us to leave the building. The tank was locked from the inside, and had no telephone or radio access to the outside, so none of us had any idea what the emergency was about. The SWAT team had used the parking lot my car was in as a staging area, so I walked to Togo’s sandwich shop across the street, watched events unfold on TV, and called my wife to come and get me. I remember someone shoving a microphone in my face but I was in no mood to talk.

One incident proves absolutely nothing, but it does make a profound personal impression. The impression only reinforces my own personal experiences with firearms, growing up in the gun culture of rural Florida, and as someone admittedly influenced by the mystique of the gun. It is everywhere in American culture, movies, our history and western heritage, the universal military training of my youth, and in our lore and myth. Even kids who have never seen a gun in their life know how to hold and aim one, cycle a bolt or lever action, load a revolver or slap in a fresh magazine and brush back the slide. The nomenclature and the Manual of Arms is part of our play and entertainment, and the technical specifications of arms and ammunition mastered by an early age. Its jarring to overhear kids showing off their knowledge of guns to each other. Its like eavesdropping on them when they talk about sex. The trouble is, they don’t seem to get any more knowledgeable with age.

This is the problem with guns, it is a problem that may be mitigated somewhat with regulation or legislation or controls, but only partially so. The problem is that Americans are obsessed with firearms, we are fascinated by them, we love fondling them and fantasizing about them. They are psychologically as important a part of our adolescence as are automobiles. Its impossible to escape the suspicion there is some kind of sexual connection to them, linked way deep in the neurons of the lizard brain.

Most individuals can probably handle guns responsibly, but too many Americans have no business playing with them. For them, they are the solution to any problem. Don’t let the constitutional arguments or rights issues fool you, American men are like little boys around guns, they aren’t mature enough to be trusted with them, and we’ll never be safe from them until the damned things are banned. Its not very likely now. A powerful and lucrative industry has arisen to feed this pathology, and successful industries are very powerful in our country.

I own guns and know how to use them, I confess I share that fascination with the firearms mystique. I like guns. But I’m not proud of it, and I certainly don’t see it in political or civic terms, as a right or privilege. I’m honest enough to know why I like them, and I’m just a little bit ashamed of it. They are a coward’s weapon, they allow us to kill at a distance, with little or no skill or forethought required. I am convinced that until they are banned, and several generations have passed to exorcise that puerile fascination from our young men, none of us will be safe.
Most Americans don’t deserve the right to touch one.

A movie, I Can Make You Love Me was made in 1993. Brooke Shields played Laura Black and Richard Thomas played Richard Farley. I’ve seen it. As best I can tell, it is a fairly accurate recounting of real events. I recommend it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Farley

Laura Black