The shooter who killed six at a Virginia Walmart left a “death note” addressed to God stating the events weren’t planned but felt like evil was leading him. Unfortunately, the ‘evil’ narrative is similar to many other historical accounts of many atrocities. After the shooting, President Joe Biden stated he would try and legislate against automatic weapons. (I concur, but good luck. However, that’s not my broader point.) Mass shootings account for less than 1% of the roughly 40,000 people killed by guns each year. While the number of people killed by guns is way too high, the presumption that ‘Evil’ or ‘Satan’ leads them is more likely a symptom of mental illness.
Tag Archive: Gun Violence
NRA General Counsel Bob Dowlut has been a key architect of the gun lobby’s campaign to basically get as many guns into the hands of ‘Good Guys’ as possible. He helped oversee the NRA’s effort to strike down Chicago’s handgun ban, is the longtime secretary of the organization’s Civil Rights Defense Fund which spends millions assisting gun owners in court. His journal articles have been cited by federal judges and are quoted by pro-gun activists.
So what’s the problem? Well, Dowlut himself killed a woman with a firearm.
As Mother Jones reporter Dave Gilson wrote:
“Two days prior to Dowlut’s confession, Anna Marie Yocum was murdered. She was shot three times, once through the chest and twice in the back, likely at close range as she’d either fled or fallen down the stairs. Two .45-caliber bullets pierced her heart. And after several days of interrogation, Dowlut confessed, led police to the weapon, recovered the weapon and matched the bullets from the victim.”
Prosecutors tried and convicted Dowlut. After serving serving six years of a life sentence, Indiana Supreme Court found police overzealously violated Dowlut’s constitutional rights during the confession. Hence, police denied Dowlut a lawyer despite multiple requests.
Dowlut moves forward in his life, receiving a law degree and becoming the NRA’s General Counsel.
I find it strange how the NRA spokesperson Wayne LaPierre actually has the gaul to say “put more guns in the hands of good guys,” when Dowlut in fact appears to be one of them ‘bad guys.‘
Life is stranger than fiction.
As Mr. Gilson’s so eloquently poses: “Was Dowlut railroaded or is he a ‘Bad guy with a gun?” Some will claim Dowlut turned his life around, became a model citizen and advocate. And all that may be true. But what of the question I ask, “How about Anna Marie Yocum? How would she feel?” Oh yeah, she’s dead.
Martin Luther King noted:
“The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate…Returning violence for violence multiples violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: Only love can do that.”
Several weeks after his death, the designer of the AK-47, was quoted posthumously as saying his invention had brought him unbearable “spiritual torment” and that torment was unbearable. Designed in the last year of World War II, many would consider the AK-47 a leftover. But the weapon had purchasing power: durability, low production cost, availability, and ease of use. Used by the Russian armed forces for decades, and copied by the Chinese, the weapon is also a favorite of freedom fighters, terrorists, rebels, militants and other non-state actors the world over – featured photo’d in the hands of child soldiers.
But can a designer be responsible for the incredible amount of death worldwide? Thinking for several days, I’ve come to the conclusion that the issue is too broad for one person’s sole responsibility. There’s a micro and macro level of events that must be parsed over prior to any personal indictment.
On the micro level, I was an 18-year-old post high school graduate when the military plopped an older M14 Sniper Rifle into my hands. Turns out I was a natural. I could see the wind-blowing via the trees, felt humidity levels and had an eerie ability to calculate distance and wind speed in half a second. I could shoot apples at 800 yards with little effort.
Upon engaging the enemy, there was only God and I. Unless it was night, target acquisition was easy. Scope to target and variables was calculated, insert the cartridge and halfway through exhalation, the shooter squeezed the trigger. There was always slight recoil, a quick grimace from the target followed by red juice. In less than three seconds, a man’s life ended.
At the macro level, I recall Major-General’s Carl von Clausewitz famous quote, “War is the continuation of Politik by other means.” Technically speaking, a weapon’s designer cannot be responsible for idiocy of leadership. As Eisenhower said, “… farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil, and you’re a thousand miles from the corn field.” It is true of war as well.
Could any tribunal convict Kalashnikov death by an World War II deigned AK-47 in South Africa when murder received that weapon from a dealer in Botswana, who acquired that weapon from a drug lord in Ethiopia, who purchased that weapon from an arms trader in Lybia, who procured the weapon during a weapons trade one year earlier in Afghanistan who received the weapon from a corrupt military officer in another part of the world? Are not all these traders and buyers equally guilty? And is the rest of world, including you and I just as responsible for turning a blind eye?
Having been in almost every one of the places just mentioned, that murder would have occurred … regardless of weapon of choice.
“The longer I live, the more often that question gets into my brain, the deeper I go in my thoughts and guesses about why the Almighty allowed humans to have devilish desires of envy, greed and aggression,” Kalashnikov continued.
The question whether a specific weapon or war is ever justified, and if so under what circumstances, is one which has forced itself upon the attention of all thoughtful men. The objects for which men have fought in the past, whether just or unjust, can no longer be achieved by war itself. From a personal perspective, from time to time, I am haunted by those last few seconds seen through a scope. I still see the terror and fear.
So I ask you my loyal readers. While I haven’t fired a weapon in the 30 years since leaving the military, I reflect upon Mikhail Kalashnikov comment, “If my assault rifle took people’s lives that means that I, The Unknown Buddhist, … am responsible for people’s deaths?”
War is a strange game. Maybe as “Joshua” (War Games 1983 film) said, “The only winning move is not to play.”