The Drama of Gun Violence

I need to say up front that I support the 2^nd Amendment, although certainly not as is sometimes implied by lunatics on the Right as the Constitution in total.  Many of my friends, including my best and most beloved friend, are gun owners.  I understand their arguments with regard to the right to bear arms.  Well all but one – that is the idea that guns don’t kill people; people kill people.  This is the equivalent of saying instruments don’t play music; people play music.

Consider.  One of the most beautiful pieces of music ever written is Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 5, 2^nd Movement.  Had the skilled fingers of a violinist never met the strings of the violin, Concerto No. 5 would never have been heard - since by its passive nature even Mozart’s music cannot play itself.   If the rage and volition of the Aurora shooter had never met the power and expedience of the trigger the violence in that theater would likely never have occurred. 

 Does it meet the test of reason that Joshua Bell would stand before a concert audience and hum Concerto No. 5 while his violin sits silently behind him in a chair?  Accordingly, does it meet the test of reason that the Aurora shooter could have killed or wounded all of those people with a knife or a ball bat at a remove – is that not the advantage of a  gun to inflict damage at a distance?   Moving in close enough to his targets to use a more personal means of destruction and smoke aside, wouldn’t someone or a number of some ones been able to stop him?  Wouldn’t he have known that?

Therefore asserting the passivity of the weapon is not exculpatory because it does not reckon with efficiency or the assailant’s protection.  The drama of gun violence is a symbiosis, reciprocity of aggressive action and passive reaction in which the gun co-stars.

 Support the 2^nd Amendment if you are so inclined.  I may even support it with you.  However, don’t expect me to support a simple-minded and tortured argument that insults my intelligence.