Although I certainly don't wish to argue with what has been said about certain people manipulating this sad event for their own ends, I think that there is another point here to consider here.
That is what do we do, as the GA community, to make friends out of our neighbours.
If I did not fly, and thus have a handle on the safety issues, I might be a bit concerned by aeros (or indeed light planes flying around me.)
So how do we get the message across that our activities are pretty non threatening.
I know that I showed a local small boy around our Pup last year, when his mother turned up asking if it was possible to look around the flight line.
She was quite astonised when I explained that engine failures are not a disaster because little aeroplanes can glide and land in fields and she was amazed at the low speeds for take off and landing, as she had assumed they would be jet like!
Her parting remarks were that she was very impressed by (a) how friendly people at the airfield were, (b) how much safer flying was than she'd thought and (c) how much happier she would feel seeing us coming and going in the future.
If we could get to people like this more, then maybe we'd have a counter balance against the others.
Problem is I guess, that it's a lot of work to make the contacts - but I would gladly give time towards doing
PR for something I love so much.