Don’t blame the rock

Another terrible mass killing has occurred. This will be seized upon as something that could be eliminated if guns were illegal, but this is wrong thinking. Making guns illegal will not solve the problem of gun violence.

Consider a rock. It does not do anything. A rock is not evil because it has no brain, no power, no ability to do anything by itself that could be right or wrong. A rock is morally neutral.

All things are morally neutral. We call them bad or good based on the way they are used. A knife is good if used to cut food and bad if used to cut someone.

The same with a gun. It does not do anything until someone does something with it. It is good or bad depending on how it is used. A gun is morally neutral.

If someone throws a rock, do we blame the rock? No. You blame the person who threw the rock. The same with the gun.

People are not morally neutral. They make choices of doing good or evil.

We cannot solve the problem of violence by making illegal everything a person might use to be violent with. The problem is the person, not the gun or rock.

Timothy Rasmussen

Nine Mile Falls