It has been several weeks now since the tragedy in Newton.
My own heart still aches for all the children who have been affected by the
violence there. As for the families of the children who were murdered the
problem is that I can partially image how horrible it must be and it brings
chills and makes me sick to think about it. My empathy and my prayers go out to
you all.
This tragedy has seemed to have stoked the fire of the gun
control crowd. The President went so far as to “promise” to do something. I
have read statements from multiple public figures calling for new legislation
so that “this never happens again”. In some areas lists of registered gun
owners have been posted publicly in an attitude of singling out “dangerous”
individuals. I realize that my opinion in the grand scheme of things is
practically irrelevant, however, thanks to living in America, I still get to
have one.
Before I express my opinion let me make a few things clear:
Yes I own guns. No I am not a member of the NRA. Yes I think people should be
allowed to own guns. No I am not a psychotic, fundamentalist nut case with an
underground bunker full of ammunition just waiting for Armageddon so I can
start blasting zombies. Yes I teach my kids that guns are ALWAYS dangerous, to
NEVER point a gun at anything that you do not want to kill, and I keep guns and
ammo separate and secured.
So what about gun control? Or better yet why don’t we get
rid of guns from the public altogether? There are reasonably thoughts on both
sides that can be debated. I am not writing this to comment on rational
reasonable debates. I am writing this more as a prayer that folks would stop
and think a moment about what they are saying. There are three main fallacies
that are fueling the current gun control movement.
“We have to make sure this never happens again!”
This is
a wonderful utopic idea, but it is also totally impossible. For the atheist
crowd this is the idea of mental health. Until all mental health problems have
been eradicated or can at least be pre-identified 100% of the time, murders and
mass murders are still going to happen. For us Christians we understand that
things like this will continue to happen and only get worse until sin, death
and satan are locked away forever. In the same way as you can not legislate
morality so can you not legislate mental health. If this was possible then we
should simply make it illegal to have murderous thoughts.
“Guns killed my child.”
I hate
to say it because it is so simple that it sounds stupid, but it is true. Guns
do not kill people, people kill people. If you had the power to make every gun
and every gun making plant disappear off the face of the earth forever murder
statistics would change very little. If you get rid of guns there are still bow
and arrows. If you get rid of bow and arrows there are still swords. If you get
rid of swords there are still knives. If you get rid of knives there are still
slings and stones. If you get rid of slings and stones there are still clubs. If
you get rid of every inanimate object that can be used by one person to kill
another person guess what you are left with? At the beginning of Genesis we
read that Cain killed his brother Abel with his bare hands. For the atheist
there are two ape men beating the snot out of one another until one dies. Murder
has been around as long as humans have existed. Guns just happen to be the
current contemporary method. As I said above, you will never stop murder until
you stop the need/desire to murder.
“If we got rid of certain types of guns we could limit the
death toll.”
While a
fallacy, this is the one that seems the most reasonable on the surface. If we
got rid of all guns with large capacity magazines that would prevent someone
from shooting up a theatre full of people or a classroom full of kids correct?
If you have to reload the gun after every shot then someone, anyone, can take
the shooter down while they are reloading. 12 people were killed in Aurora and
28 were killed in Newton. A person carrying a handful of single shot guns could
never have come close to those death tolls. So obviously this would mean no
more mass murders in the double digits, right?
In 1989 Ted Bundy was executed for killing 35 people that
were proven to have been killed by him. He is suspected of possibly killing
many more. The only time he touched a gun was when he struggled with an
arresting officer to try to get the policeman’s gun.
On April 22, 1999 Luis Garavito was captured. He confessed
to murdering 140 children, 139 of those have been confirmed. He is under
investigation for the murders of many more. His victims could in reality number
more than 400. He never used a gun to kill any of his victims.
On April 19, 1995 Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols detonated
a bomb in Oklahoma killing 168 people including 19 children under the age of 6.
McVeigh easily purchased the material needed for less than $5000. No guns
needed.
On September 11, 2001 terrorist used packing knives to
hijack commercial airliners. These airliners were then used to attack various
sites. Without the use of a single gun, 2,996 people were murdered.
Friends, the real truth is, where there is an evil twisted
will, there will always be ways.
