Letters to the editor
Share with others:
On July 1, I opened the Post-Gazette and found these two articles: one about a 14-year-old boy who was accidentally shot in the head by his cousin ("Boy, 14, Shot in Head by Cousin in Hunting Cabin") and another about a 16-year-old who was shot several times on a playground ("Teen Shot Five Times on North Side Playground").
Statistics from the Centers for Disease Control show that each year there are about 13,000 gun-related deaths in the United States (this figure does not include a much larger number of gun-related suicides). To put this in perspective, since 2000, we have slaughtered more of our own citizens with firearms than were killed in the Vietnam War, Korean War, Gulf War, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the 9/11 attack combined.
Common sense tells me that when the writers of the Constitution provided for the maintenance of local militias in the Second Amendment, they didn't anticipate a day when children would walk into schools with high-powered rifles and open fire on their classmates.
We don't have to live in a society that feels like the Wild West of the 19th century, and we don't have to accept the view that this kind of slaughter is an unavoidable price of our personal freedom. In fact, we lose our freedom when we become powerless to stop such violence.
As one important part of the effort, we should all fight for dramatically stronger gun control measures. Unfortunately, a majority of the current Supreme Court seems to agree with the powerful gun lobbyists when they tell us that we would all be better off with more guns in our lives, not fewer ("Gun Rights Expanded," June 29). It will be a long, slow process.
CHARLES A. ETTENSOHN
Regent Square
The logical truth
Sue Amos' letter ("Patriarchal Stance," June 30) is almost laughable. By referring to a woman's "inner patriarch" she suggests that any pro-life woman has a tiny man running around inside her head dictating her choices. She obviously doesn't know too many women in the Catholic Church.
First Published July 6, 2010 12:00 am
