Those of us who are viscerally anti-gun, because of all
the senseless and tragic violence associated with the misuse of these powerful
weapons, should nonetheless be willing to entertain the argument that it’s not
guns who kill people, it’s people who kill people.
Granted the tautology—since we’re not talking about
crimes committed by other animals—the argument is still slippery. Obviously it’s people—of all ages,
backgrounds, ethnicities and philosophical or religious persuasions—who pull
the triggers. But the bullets that tear
the mortal holes in the bodies of the victims fly out of the pressurized barrels
of things we call guns.
If the guns weren’t wielded in rage and anger or mental derangement
by people who decided, for whatever reasons, to turn them on other people, that
is, to aim the barrel of that gun at the victim and pull the trigger, we wouldn’t
be talking about gun-related violence and deaths. And we wouldn’t be mourning, in this latest
case of what we’ve come to call a shooting spree (overindulgence in any
activity!), the deaths of twenty-seven people, most of whom were children
between the ages of five and ten.
It may very well be true that we can’t prevent disturbed
individuals like Adam Lanza—or anyone else on the sad list of ignominious rampage
murderers—from venting their frustration in such a way that someone else dies
as a consequence. But with effective gun
control, along with a shift in attitudes towards both gun ownership and use in
this country, we might be able to prevent people like him from possessing guns
when they decide to do their killing.
And if this were the case, we probably wouldn’t be talking about the untimely
deaths of twenty-seven people in a single violent incident in the suburbs of Connecticut.
You have to wonder why the gun lobby concentrates its
rhetoric and finances on the right, not
just the privilege, to own and use
guns, and the zealous prevention of any tightening of restrictions on gun
sales, licensing, or ownership. What are
they really concerned about? You’d think
that, if they really gave a damn about the right to hunt and defend oneself
(another slippery slope), instead of the right to have access to an unlimited
variety of deadly weapons, they would jump on board and support ideas like that
of Dr. Stephen Hargarten, a leading authority on gun violence, who has
advocated a public health approach to the problem of gun-related deaths,
analogous to “product changes and driving laws that slashed deaths from car
crashes decades ago, even as the number of vehicles on the road rose.[1]”
Remember: cars don’t
kill people, drivers of the cars kill people.
Including themselves. But
car-related deaths are considered a public scourge, and any government who has
among its obligations the prevention of harm to its people (this is often cited
as the President’s primary
obligation!), has no qualms, and far less opposition, when it seeks different
and varied means by which driving-accident deaths can be reduced. These range from a stiffening of the drunk
driving penalties, strict controls regarding speed limits, and both highway and
car safety requirements that apply to both manufacturers and those responsible for
maintaining the condition and ensuring the quality of our public roads.
Not to mention all the hoops one has to jump through to
get a driver’s license in the first place, including the passing of both
written and practical examinations that are meant to test one’s ability to
safely operate a motorized vehicle.
Why not require the same thing for the owners of
guns? Is it really asking too much, as a
first step towards demanding that if the society wants to embrace gun use and
ownership as if it were an “inalienable”
right, those individuals wishing to exercise this right should have a license that’s
at least as difficult to obtain as a driver’s license?
Once again, this won’t necessarily prevent someone like Adam
Lanza from doing what he did—apparently he didn’t have a gun license and had no
problems securing the weapons illegally.
But it could be a first step in the right direction. And together with a wider public health
approach, which would include educating people about the very real dangers that
the use of firearms entail, and how many accidental and suicidal deaths are
committed with guns every year in this country, we might begin to at least
alter the terms of the debate and slowly shift attitudes here away from the
violent-video-game mentality that so entertainingly confuses fake death with
real death, from which no one ever returns.
Perhaps you can argue that it’s not guns who kill people. But you’ve got to admit that in the cases I’ve
been referring to it is indeed the irresponsible
and problematic attitudes expressed through the irreversible action of some
people’s guns that account for horrors like that which we all witnessed
yesterday.