Tuesday, July 29, 2003

"To Stop Gun Violence, Go to the Source"

That's the title of this Washington Post column by Jabari Asim. There's more than a little common sense that you hardly ever hear in this piece. Such as:
In between going to work and teaching my sons to duck and cover, I never paused to think about gun-control ordinances, and I doubt the predators who tormented our block did either. It was hard to get worked up about such laws, which clearly had little relevance where we lived.

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Some folks see flaps over firearms as clashes between the gun lobby and peace-loving liberals. Similarly, the battle brewing between Hatch and Washington officials is cast as a fight over home rule, not public safety. Neither of those confrontations may mean much to an ordinary citizen who just wants to get from her car to her house without a bullet bringing her down.

All this debate tends to overshadow a distressing fact: it is not firearms that disproportionately harm black people; black people disproportionately harm black people. I can't help concluding that folks who really care about the health of besieged communities should concentrate on the shooters instead of the guns.
Go read the whole thing.





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