According to the Bible, there will come a time when we will have no more need of war, when nations will beat their swords into plowshares. It sounds like a wonderful time, when we put away warfare and violence and focused on peaceful pursuits. I would love to still be alive to see that day.
Yet, I’ve seen nothing to suggest that we’re remotely close to that time.
Until then, those who beat swords into plowshares end up plowing for those who didn’t.
Which is why people who do this stuff bother me so much.
Philly blacksmith Shane Claiborne and artist Jacob “Chris” Hammes are forging guns into gardening tools, bullet barrels into benches and closed minds into open hearts.
Why it matters: The duo teamed up on a new art installation they’ve nicknamed Kensington’s “Peace Garden,” intentional word play since “piece” is slang for the decommissioned guns that make up the community space.
The big picture: Kensington, long considered an opioid epicenter, has experienced a disproportionate amount of Philly’s gun violence.
- Rather than shy away from that harsh reality, Claiborne and Hammes stared down the barrel of loaded guns, holding community buyback events over the last year to gather parts for their project.
- The artists offered “guns for groceries” gift cards.
Of course, they claim it’s also cathartic for families of people killed, which I can see. If they blame guns for what happened, it probably would be cathartic or something.
But what these guys don’t get is that they’re not accomplishing anything. People trade guns for grocery gift cards? Awesome. How many of those guns were stolen and handed over for the card that was then traded for money to someone else? How many were inoperable pieces of crap?
Now, how many were actually guns likely to be used in a crime that now won’t happen?
The answer is zero of them fall into that last category. We know because this is essentially a buyback, and those have been shown over and over to accomplish absolutely nothing.
That means this art is more than just sculptural; it’s performance art. It’s a couple of guys virtue-signaling about how they’re doing something good while accomplishing absolutely nothing for their city. It’s about making a name for themselves as a couple of the “good ones” without having to do anything except something they would do otherwise.
There’s no sacrifice. They’re just using a particular material for their art that they’d be using an alternate source for otherwise. That’s literally it.
Now, they’ve got the right to do so. I wouldn’t begrudge them that right.
But I’m not going to just pretend they’re doing something amazing when they’ve accomplished nothing and are just either lying to themselves or others, if not both, about all the good they’re doing. The criminals are still getting guns. Bad people are still doing bad things. The effort here is accomplishing something between “jack” and “squat.”
Sure, it might be cathartic for some to bang on a piece of steel that used to be part of a gun, but that’s about the limits of what “good” is being done.
Editor’s Note: Political theater doesn’t equal public safety, and melting down guns won’t stop violent criminals.
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