Don't Blame the Message OR the Messenger

I submitted this to the opinion desk so whether they publish it or not, here you go!

Over the past few days, everyone from Adolf Hitler to Sarah Palin (although, to some people, there is no difference between the two) has been blamed for the horrific shooting in Arizona. Reports say that the suspect, Jared Laughner’s, Myspace page cited Mein Kampf and The Communist Manifest as his favorite books (http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/31967). How can one be both a Nazi (state control) AND A Communist (control by the people)? But I digress

However, the Tea Party, Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck have also been cited as influences on the suspect. That their “vitriolic” and “violent” messages drove the suspect to kill a democrat to “take his country back.” This paper even furthered this line of thinking in an opinion piece run Monday that featured quotes by only conservative people, some of which, I know for a fact (since I heard them said) were either sarcastic or in jest.

Let’s stop and look at this for a minute. The suspected shooter was a devoted Tea Party member, loved Hitler, and was a communist? Now, I’m no political science major, but a few of those ideals seem diametrically opposed to each other.

So I propose a third person to blame: the person who actually carried out the attack? How about we blame the man who bought the gun and pulled the trigger? I know this concept of personal responsibility is completely foreign to Americans (I mean, it’s not like our founders based our government on it or anything), but we should use this idea.

I listen to Beck and Palin on an almost daily basis, and somehow I’ve never felt motivated by these people to go on a killing spree. I’ve read The Communist Manifesto and watched MSNBC, and yet those views have not caused me to attempt violent overthrow of the government.

So instead of blaming everyone else for this tragedy, let’s blame the person who actually committed it. Yes, he may have been a troubled young man, and all of these ideals may have influenced him, but only the shooter is actually responsible for his actions.