News of today’s Sandy Hook School massacre stunned the world; though I am removed from 90 percent of television broadcasts, I am sure that everyone is searching for answers that make sense of this tragedy. Through condolence posts, many people have found a token way to release some of their pain through the written word. Dennis Koenig created a public-domain photo-image flag and asked that we pass it round the world as a token image of mourning.
Here is his explanation of the image:
“We need a flag dedicated to mourning and memorializing murdered children.
Any children. Anywhere. Any time. By anyone. For any reason…
…In the flag image I created today for my use on such horrible occasions, derived from a photograph I made several years ago:
Yellow is for the ache of unquenchable longing
Red is for pain, suffering, bloodshed
Black is for death, mourning, sorrow
White rising sun is for compassion, hope, and help “
See his post here: Flag For Murdered Children
Thank you, Dennis.
Zeebra Designs & Destinations 
I’m crying now. This tragedy struck me even more than the many others because these were such little children just like my own. My little girl who still needs help going to the potty or my boy who is afraid of the dark. The innocence and beauty of children. I don’t think I could go on if I was one if these parents. I ache for them. So incredibly sad. I will share the photo. I wish people would wake up and take guns, violence and mental illness seriously. My heart bleeds.
Amiga, the world cries with you. My children are grown, but I am able to clearly think back to when they were that age, precious and trusting, as was I – the daughter of a second-grade teacher. I cannot imagine our storybook world shattered by an out-of-control madman.
Perhaps this tragedy will be a catalyst that prompts much-needed change. We will wipe the glaze from our eyes and realize that apathy doesn’t get results. This story will touch the most calloused of hearts.
May your tears purge your pain.
Love
Lisa
Thanks Lisa.
This makes me sad and angry. There is nothing worse for a parent than losing a child. Losing them in such a senseless, horrific way is so very disturbing. Thanks for your post. BTG
Yes, we are not only sad but also angry, though anger serves no use if we’re not sure who to be angry with. The killer has died; we may never know what made him snap and why the victims were innocents. What can we do to halt this madness? How can one isolate the personalities where mental illness breeds out of control hostility? We will all be sorting through the madness and try to make sense of it. I keep asking, “Why are so many people (killers) so angry, and did modern society help create these monsters?”
z
Thanks for sharing this flag.
Con mucho gusto. Take it and pass it along in honor of those precious children who died.
You all might appreciate this post as well:
I’m crying with you.
so tragic;
thanks for spreading the flag. z
the least I can do…
Reblogged this on poet4justicedotwordpressdotcom.
Reading the comments here and elsewhere, I know the white sun rises. But in some things we are the light of that sun waiting to rise. I agree with Thirdeyemom and Lisa: we need changes.
We need parity between mental health and physical health care services, insurance and funding. (Mental health IS physical health. Our mental reality lives in a physical body, and mental illness is just as debilitating as other illness … and can lead to slaughter of children.)
We need EASY access to GOOD mental health care, as good as a broken arm will get; healing good.
We need to realize that mental illness (whether temporary or life-long) is far more prevalent than most of us know or will believe.
We need a nationwide license to own a gun, and/or to use one, and/or to buy or use ammunition or any gun-related materials or supplies, and getting a license must be a meaningful process, like getting a license to drive a car, and more intensive than that. That is, if we don’t just ban gun and ammunition possession altogether.
I have studied the gun issue enough to see the real power behind it. Money. There is so much money in the gun racket that mere morality will never win, will never get lawmakers to just do the right thing. They must be compelled, by kinds of power that transcend money.
But this yellow, red, black and white rising sun flag is not about any of that, tempted as I was to make it so. it is about the meanings given to its colors. It is about our crying, and our belief in the sun returning for the horror-stricken, especially with our help.
The social, cultural, and political quest for overdue change already has a flag of its own.
-Dennis
I agree, Dennis.
It is wonder-full flag.
“I know the white sun rises.”
What a beautiful statement, worthy of an award-winning opening line to a novel.
health being accepted as physical health, and yes, it’s tragic that it can’t be diagnosed and treated as easily as a broken bone. You are also right about your flag being a token of comfort as well, to those who are struggling with the senseless deaths.
Z
I’m so glad you posted something on this amiga. It’s so horrifying I feel nauseous. He shot his mother in her face… School is supposed to be a safe place. What do you tell those little kids who survived?
I heard on the news that the gunman had a “personality disorder”. Didn’t the maniac who shot all those people in the movie in Colorado also have the same sickness? We have to do something about guns and about those sick people who walks our streets.
Our hearts break, and our psyches have trouble comprehending what makes someone snap the way that this guy did. I can only imagine what all of you are enduring with the press coverage that must be nonstop.
Some mentally-fragile people wave obvious flags, where others seem as normal as the next person. He must have been holding back a lot of frustration. Our best options for helping us understand will come from those trained in the mental health fields. Hopefully they can shed light and help us to understand.
Thank you for your comment,
lisa
Dang-it. I gave up on writing the Great American Novel too soon.
I actually do know the white sun rises, even though it is a nifty line. Been around when it stayed other colors for a long time, so long it seemed hopeless the white would ever return. The key to getting it to come over that horizon was to get help from the right others … beginning with knowing I could not do it alone. They had it with them all the time. Not easy to find the right ones, but they were there.
So true about not doing things alone, though sometimes we realize how alone we really are when most are caught up in their own dramas in life.
Thank you again for sharing that beautiful image, and I hope that it flies ’round the world.
lisa/z
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My thoughts and prayers are with the families…thank you for your tribute.
My heart cries out for all those suffering such a horrible lost. My prayers are with them and all of us. I fear these type of killings will only continue. I pray for its end. I like the idea of the flag.
BE ENCOURAGED! BE BLESSED!
please pass the flag to others. dennis wants to share it feely! z
horrifying, heartwrenching.. couldn’t stop the tears.. thanks for sharing this post and the flag..our prayers are with the survivors and the families
yes, this is one that touched the world. so very tragic. z
Reblogged this on Living It Up in Ecuador and commented:
In memory of all those whose lives were needlessly taken. We join in mourning.
Reblogged this on applecore and commented:
As we grasp for meaning or an outlet for our grief, I find this message appropriate and timely.
Dennis is right.
thanks, hugh!
It is scary when mass murder becomes a subject of epidemiology.
it certainly is; our culture’s created this monster of escalating hostility. if we could only roll back to the days of Mayberry RFD!
But if we could, and we had our wisdom from now, what would we do//could we do to alter the future?
i remember when the ‘explicit lyrics’ warnings were first posted on cds. i thought, ‘uh-oh… here we go..’
today’s youth are so desensitized to so many things we were not exposed to at that age. rap lyrics are often horrid, movies violent.. i remember how the wicked witch from the wizard of oz gave me nightmares, and that was one movie per year – the only time i was exposed to hostile behavior.
oh, rolling back the advancement of our culture would remove a lot of pent-up stress in this powder keg that we call society.
Maybe roll FORWARD to the Jetsons, who had my favorite TV dog?
Clearly the matter is one of long-term change, but it’s not going to happen if it does not get some political will behind it, and that means you and me pushing hard, because the money behind the AGC (American Gun Culture) is, so far, unlimited, because current law favors its profit-takers.
The change will also take a lot more than lawmakers and lawbreakers challenging each other. We banned automatics guns, so the manufacturers sell semi-autos with kits to modify them to automatic. Also, think “Gun Show Loophole.”
It could need some kind of semi-permanent/long-term NGO dedicated to policy counsel to the White House and Congress. It would need the participation of experts in criminology, psychology, psychiatry, education, sociology, weaponry, legislation, law enforcement, economy, history, etc.
Oh, yeah … I know … a not-for-profit university! What a concept! Why not? We have a War College.
I don’t know how it would work, but I don’t mean a presidential commission.
Whatever it is, it has to last longer than the leading bleeding headlines the media will forget when the next big eyeball collector comes along. Paris Hilton comes out of the closet. Donald Trump shaves his head.
oh yes! the jetsons would be a great place!!! thanks for the smile!!!
Beautiful post..
thank you amiga
how are you doing in your new environment?
z
I have not moved yet.. this spring.. I just get all excited and have to keep people in my plans every step of the way. I go there next month to secure my new abode. So excited.. But soon, I’ll be there very soon 🙂
great! you had mentioned being alone at christmas, and i wondered if santa and his elves would be able to find you!
ah, you’ll be there for the spring floods! not really as i am told the farmers are watering their wheat crops for the first time ever because of lack of rain! of course the river’s spring floods depend on the snowfall up north and how/when it melts in the springtime!
happy holidays, amiga!
z
Somehow I don’t think that mother would want to be alive now
😦
you are so correct; a parent’s life after that would be horribly dysfunctional. there would be so much self doubt, so many ‘what if’s’ and so much shame.
So sad.
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The pain still continues and your image still comforts.