by

JC Schildbach, LMHC

I don’t go out to movies all that often. My wife and I spend plenty of our down time at home staring at movies and TV shows. So when we actually have a chance to go out, and the energy to do so, staring at a screen is pretty far down the list of activities we choose.

Prior to Friday, November 3^rd, when we went to see Blade Runner 2049, the last time we’d been to a movie in a theater was…oh, I don’t know, The Revenant? Maybe Star Wars: The Force Awakens?

So, it’s possible I’m just forgetting things, but before the showing of Blade Runner 2049, there was an announcement about knowing where the exits are, and exiting the theater in an orderly fashion in the event of an emergency which seemed like a new and different thing to me–or at least a new and different tone to an old thing.

There may have been similar announcements prior to movies back when I was a kid, mostly suggesting or stating that the expected emergency would be a fire, but, again, I might be forgetting things, or misremembering them. Still, I’m pretty sure that, despite the long-ago shooting of a President in Ford’s Theater, we weren’t being prompted to think that we might be the victims of a gun-toting psychopath, politically- or otherwise-motivated. Getting shot in a theater was something reserved for really important people back then.

This time, though, the announcement about the emergency exits came after an announcement with the catch phrase “If you see something, say something”, which came after an M&Ms-sponsored announcement not to use cell phones during the movie.

So, in the complete context of the announcements, there was a request to be polite despite modern technology, followed by a suggestion that terrorists might target the movie theater, followed by a none-too-specific reminder that at least one well-known mass-murder had taken place in a movie theater.

In other words, merely by being at a movie theater, we had all become Presidential in our desirability as targets for people looking to make something happen…even if that something was just racking up an impressive body count.

Given that Thor: Ragnarok was playing in the much larger, opening-day, capacity-crowd theater just through the wall to our right, and I was in a much smaller theater, with only about 12 other movie-goers, I figured we were not a prime target.

But still, with the presentation of those announcements, a twinge of panic surged up in me. I quickly dismissed it. (Hey, I’m a trained mental health professional—and in addition to the NRA thinking I’m responsible for stopping mass shootings, I know how to stop anxiety). And by the time the previews were over, and the movie started, I had almost entirely forgotten about the notion of danger. I’m not one to live in (too much) fear, or (too much) paranoia, or to imagine (all that much) danger is around every corner. I know that the chances of being killed in a mass shooting are pretty slim, despite the great deal of attention that is paid to them.

Yet, I was saddened to think that this is what we’ve allowed to happen, what we’ve chosen to accept…that we need to be reminded, before watching a movie in public, (or attending any other event, of any other kind) that we need to be prepared for the possibility that we might get shot, or blown up, or…okay, mostly that we might get shot.

We’ve been directed to think that because guns are a sacred American right, that we all have to live with the possibility that guns will be brought into any situation, anywhere, and that we should be prepared to duck down and slip out in the event of a mass shooting…er, I mean, an emergency.

We’ve been directed to think that because guns are a sacred American right, we should all just start bringing guns into every situation, so that if someone starts shooting at us, we can all shoot back.

We’ve all been directed to believe that this madness is normalcy, the expected price of freedom, although no other developed countries have to live with the expectation that any random citizen—not somebody connected to an extreme political movement, not somebody connected to a network of other like-minded terrorists, not somebody who has to engage in a great deal of planning in order to inflict maximum destruction to make a point—but just anybody, by right of birth into a particular geographical area between Mexico and Canada, can stock up on guns and ammo, and create a name for her/himself (okay, it’s almost always a him) by entering a public place, guns a-blazing.

We’re told that people being murdered in movie theaters, their workplaces, malls, nightclubs, and even in churches and schools, is the price of freedom…to be addressed with thoughts and prayers…to be ignored by lawmakers, who tie the hands of law enforcement, and who then blame counselors, therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, and social workers, for not fixing the problem…all to ensure the profitability of the NRA/gun lobby.

So, sit back, relax, and do your damnedest to enjoy the show (or your day at work, your stop in the food court, the music and dancing, the sermon, your math lesson…), because you never know when your average, everyday, American outing might turn into an average, everyday, American mass shooting.