On Those Who Say “Guns Save Lives”

A sentiment reflecting a tragically self-centered perspective on life itself, and no understanding of salvation.

Guns end lives.

Sometimes on purpose, oftentimes on accident, but always before that life should, could, or would have otherwise been ended. Gun violence, at its best and most optimistic, creates a marketplace where we exchange one life for another, devaluing all life by the act of putting a price on it at all. Life should be invaluable. At its worst, gun violence catalyzes a series of otherwise manageable emotions into actions that are irrevocable, echoing on for decades as open wounds in our collective heart.

To take the gun rights movement to its logical conclusion, we are left with a society where everyone is armed, because to not be would be reckless. To see guns brandished in public everywhere we go, to feel the constant threat of our life being taken by another unless we take theirs — forced constantly to assess the value of others’ lives, something none of us can or should do. I’ve walked those streets; they offer no salvation.

We don’t have true agency to decide not to live in a society any more — we’re bound to one another. But we can choose if we want to ensure that society protects us and affords us a sense of safety, or if we want to live in a collective agreement that every individual is pitted against every other, responsible for the preservation of their own lives.

I hope we can start making our way back toward a society based on mutual compassion and protection, not this one heading toward mutually assured destruction.