Costas is a great sportscaster and a smart guy, but he didn’t show it last night during Sunday Night Football. In commenting on the Jovan Belcher murder/suicide, be said both victims would be alive today if they didn’t have guns. As if he couldn’t have used a knife. Or his muscles.
During the broadcast, Costas stopped to discuss the murder/suicide that shocked the NFL over the weekend when Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher shot and killed his girlfriend before turning the gun on himself. Costas said that future cases of domestic violence wouldn't end with death if there were tougher gun control laws.
Glenn, however, strongly disagreed with Costas's statements.
"This is not about guns. This is about the culture," Glenn argued. He said that we currently live in a culture that glorifies death and violence and cheapens life.
Stu also said that no one is placing the blame on the player, rather trying to place the blame on guns. He pointed out that many sportscasters were saying players and fans would end up paying tribute to Belcher and come together to honor his memory.
Pat also pointed out that some are wondering if concussions caused some kind of brain injury or mental illness, which could lead to attacks on football and the NFL. Both he and Glenn pointed out that again the immediate blame is being placed on guns.
Costas explained:
Writer Jason Whitlock, with whom I do not always agree but today said it so well that we may as well just quote or paraphrase from the end of his article.Our current gun culture, Whitlock wrote, ensures that more and more domestic disputes will end in the ultimate tragedy, and that more convenience-store confrontations over loud music coming from a car will leave more teenage boys bloodied and dead.’
Handguns do not enhance our safety. They exacerbate our flaws, tempt us to escalate arguments, and bait us into embracing confrontation rather than avoiding it.
In the coming days, Jovan Belcher’s actions and their possible connection to football will be analyzed. Who knows? But here, wrote Jason Whitlock, is what I believe: If Jovan Belcher didn’t possess a gun, he and Kasandra Perkins would both be alive today.
Stu decided to play a game of Mad Libs to show how ridiculous it was to ban guns because some people die from them. Using the example of pools, Stu pointed out no one bans swimming when people drown. Nor do they blame dishwashers when people slip and fall and land on knives that are pointed up (seriously, this happens).