The Problem With ‘Public Health’ Approach on Guns

So-called gun violence is one of those things that will be a problem until it’s virtually eliminated. The difference between me and some people is that I also think any other kind of violence is just as bad, that it’s the violence part that’s the issue, not the instrument used in that violent act.

Others, of course, seem to think otherwise.

And some of those have spent years pushing for a public health approach to so-called gun violence.

Once again, we’re seeing it fire up in the wake of Minneapolis, but also after a violent summer in Philadelphia.

Penn Clinical psychiatry professor Paul Kettl has joined a growing number of researchers calling for a public health approach to gun violence prevention. 

In a Sept. 4 opinion article for The Washington Post, Kettl challenged the assertion that psychiatrists can identify school shooters and criticized rhetoric that assigns blame in the aftermath of mass shootings. Rather than scrutinize mental health professionals, Kettl suggested a different avenue for preventing future incidents.

“We need to focus on public health measures, meaning gun control laws, and having more care available for schools and children,” Kettl said in an interview with The Daily Pennsylvanian.

…

In light of the shooting, Sara Solomon — who serves as the Penn Injury Science Center deputy director — told the DP that “spreading kindness and love” can be used as a “strategy” to curb instances of violence.

Spreading kindness and love would be fine, but Kettl has already made it clear he thinks gun control should be in the mix, too, and that’s where I have an issue.

Especially as he “cautioned against” blaming families for the actions of violent offenders, claiming that there’s no way they can be responsible for someone’s every action.

Which would be fine, but it also ignores that many families in these violent communities have done nothing to steer their children away from a violent lifestyle, which involves striking back at anyone seen to disrespect them or their friends. That’s the core of the cycle of violence that exists, which means that pretending they hold no responsibility, all while expecting the rest of us to pay the price, is ridiculous. Sure, some kids go down a dark road despite the best efforts of their parents, but far too many parents simply don’t even try, and that’s a big issue.

Then we have the fact that, unlike disease or accident, all of these fatalities come at the hands of someone acting willfully to take another life. Pretending that the gun is the problem, as gun control ultimately does, is morally reprehensible, especially as one tries to shift blame away from people who might have been able to prevent it.

Moreover, this is the post-COVID era. A public health approach to anything needs to be viewed with a certain degree of skepticism, but especially when you’re talking about civil liberties.

It wasn’t that long ago when a “public health crisis” caused our schools to be closed for years in some places, for businesses to be bankrupted because of closure mandates, for our entire lives and economy to be shut down over a virus that we were repeatedly lied to about.

Anyone willing to trust our civil liberties to the so-called experts is someone who probably should be ruled as “mentally defective” and stripped of their gun rights in the first place. That level of stupid should come with a warning label, at a minimum.

Editor’s Note: The radical leftist wing of the medical establishment will stop at nothing to enact its radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.

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