So why is it that some people seem incapable of phrasing the killer argument properly?
If someone or some people are killed by people using guns, why not say so? Why do I see the phrase "killed by guns" so often here, especially here, where presumably people are a little more educated than the hoi polloi?
It seems to me that the weight in any gun control argument ought to involve the shooters, not just the weapon of choice. I ask because it seems weak to claim that guns kill people, and since clearly they don't do anything without a shooter, being unable to act autonomously. However, people do kill and maim each other using guns, bombs, knives, and so on.
To center your argument around the weapon du jour and not to place the blame securely on the people who buy, hold and use guns is a losing proposition from the start.
I'd like to see postings about these insane, dumb, careless, feckless or reckless people who kill and maim others using guns be more focussed on the perpetrator than the weapon. Don't you think it would both have more impact and be more accurate if we did? I think you would have to agree.
So why do so many make such clearly inaccurate statements in postings about the killer issue of the day, which is people who are violent, not guns, pressure cookers, poison gas or knives? I guess that's a rhetorical question and what I really want to say is STEP UP THE ANTE - place the blame squarely on the people who kill and maim. Address the root cause and you will get a better response, IMHO.
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Killing with a knife takes a lot of physical effort, and killing with a bomb takes technical expertise. Killing with "and so on" usually takes some amount of physical effort and/or technical expertise, or a combination of both, coupled with the requirement to be relatively close to the victim (strangling, bludgeoning, smothering, "and so on"
. Shovels and axes are unwieldy and messy, and drowning someone in a bathtub or a swimming pool is iffy at best.
OTOH, killing with an easily obtainable and readily accessible gun is relatively simple, because that is what guns are designed and manufactured for, and are very efficient at getting the job done. Point, aim, and pull the trigger -- mission effortlessly accomplished. They are perfectly legal to buy, practice with, and handguns are easily concealable. Yes, the "shooters" weapon of choice is a gun, because nothing deals death quite so beautifully as a tool designed for the purpose.
So I agree that it is "insane, dumb, careless, feckless or reckless people" who kill other people -- and themselves. It's just that guns are designed for that purpose, easy to get, and make it ever so much easier to get the job done. Most suicides by gun are successful, whereas other methods of "attempted suicide" often fail. Just like an unsafe automobile, or a faulty household appliance, an unsafe (unlocked, loaded, and accessible) gun is a public health issue.
The RKBA/Gungeon argument goes something like, "but the gun is just an inanimate tool until it is fired by a person, and it is these people that we need to blame, and not the gun." I would just like to take that one step further: it is indeed "people" that we need to blame, but the people are our politicians who have been bought and paid for by the gun manufacturers and their bag-men, the NRA. It is these people who have allowed the scourge of unaccountable and unregulated guns to plague our nation.
These are the people who have allowed the unfettered proliferation of lethal weapons to be inflicted on our society, and have allowed those "insane, dumb, careless, feckless or reckless people" easy access to fucking guns and absolutely no accountability for the source of the guns used by them. They have allowed and enabled this epidemic of gun violence on this country for nothing other than greed and profits through outright corruption.
So if you really want to phrase the "killer argument" properly, blame the people who are the source of the problem of gun violence: the right-wing, greed-driven, arms dealers, promoters, and politicians who don't give a rat's ass WHO gets to "keep and bear" guns as long as the profits and pay-offs keep rolling in.
