Chris Christie was right not to meet with the parents of Sandy Hook

I’m not sure that it would have been “hypocritical” as much as it would have been pointless. Impolite as this is to observe, there really is very little that the parents of the victims of Sandy Hook had to add to this question. Chris Christie would not have been asking them how the abomination in Connecticut made them feel; he would not have been working out how best to rebuild their local school; he would not have been mining them for special or first-hand information that was unavailable to anybody else. Instead, he would have been inquiring as to what they thought of a bill that would have reduced the size of magazines from 15 rounds to ten — an objective, not subjective question. And then he would have been harangued or praised for his position.

As a society, we would do well to get over the idea that the victims of random violence are automatically able to give us special insights into our public policy. Sometimes they can; sometimes they can’t. Some among the parents of Sandy Hook presumably know a lot about firearms law; some know very little. But that their children were the victims of random gun violence has nothing whatsoever to do with their parents’ policy expertise. We might as well ask the victims of Hurricane Sandy what we should do prevent extreme weather.

This, of course, goes for victims on both sides of the political aisle. Conservatives like to point hysterically to Evan Todd, a survivor of Columbine who is vehemently against gun control. Some treat him as if he possesses magical powers. He really doesn’t. He’s a man who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Nothing more, nothing less. Given the debate that is full of victims agitating for the other side, I certainly understand the Right’s temptation to push Todd into the fray. Overall, though, we would do much better to treat both groups as what they are: Random and heartbroken victims — people who have a great deal to tell us about what tragedy did to their lives but little that is unique to add to the debate over what we might do to prevent it from recurring.