As we all struggle to make sense of an act that simply cannot be made sense of, families late last week began burying their children.

America’s latest school shooting, of course, left 21 people — 19 fourth-graders and two teachers — dead and 17 others injured. The man who entered Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, to open fire on May 24 also eventually was shot and killed by a border patrol agent who finally took matters into his own hands, entered the building and ended the siege.

Investigators will continue to probe the situation seeking answers to questions like what set this gunman in motion and why this brutal assault went on unabated for more than an hour. The latest distressful information to come to light is a report that the school district’s police chief inexplicably did not have a police radio that day.

According to an Associated Press story released Friday, the state agency investigating the mass shooting determined the commander, already facing heavy criticism for the slow police response, was not carrying a radio as the massacre unfolded. Texas state Sen. Roland Gutierrez told the AP that a Texas Department of Public Safety official told him school district police Chief Pete Arredondo was without a radio during the attack.

It is unclear how, without a police radio, Arredondo was communicating with other law enforcement officials at the scene, including more than a dozen officers who stood outside the classroom where the gunman was holed up with the children.

I doubt any answers they find will give anyone comfort or closure.

Likewise, I suspect there will be no end to the drama over the issues that arise for heated debate every time a school shooting like this happens on American soil.

These debates will include ongoing arguments over cries for increased gun safety reform (including what our forefathers really intended when they adopted the Second Amendment) or passionate discourse about Ohio’s new legislative move to allow school employees to bear arms.

These are critical issues that should be discussed and debated with serious focus and passionate debate in legislative chambers and in media, hopefully presenting all sides. These debates should not include name calling nor disrespectful attacks on character on all sides.

But we’ve all been around long enough to know that won’t happen, and discussions will devolve to absurd antics.

Undoubtedly, that will include hurtful comments shared on social media in full view of the world and the still numb families of victims and all the survivors or loved ones of victims from every other mass shooting in America. I have no doubt that every time these all-too-frequent shootings occur, those families must be left reeling, reliving the horrific events that changed their lives forever.

It’s already begun.

Last week questions were heating up on Instagram and other social media platforms about whether the entire shooting even happened or if it was just some sort of a sick hoax being further perpetrated by fake news reports because, apparently, that’s just what we journalists do.

The ridiculous claim started when two different men were identified in TV news interviews as the father of a fourth-grader killed in Uvalde. Some TV reports had identified both Angel Garza and Alfred Garza III as the father of Amerie Jo Garza. Angel Garza is her stepfather, and Alfred Garza III is her father.

Someone posted that was clear proof that this shooting was a “hoax.”

A video circulating online, viewed over 13,000 times, was being used to cast doubt on the legitimacy of reports about the shooting.

One Instagram user shared the video, including hashtags such as “#Hoax,” “#Fake,” and “#CGi” alongside the video, which was viewed thousands of times, prompting some to post suggestions that the shooting was staged.

Really?

Of course, this is America, and people have the right to speak their minds, particularly on issues that evoke so much sadness, anger and passion. We should be free-thinkers and openly question.

But when we are doing it, let’s be reasonable. And let’s use both our heads and our hearts.

blinert@tribtoday.com