Colbert: Doing nothing after shootings ‘unnatural’ and ‘inhuman’
Stephen Colbert on Monday urged Americans not to feel hopeless in the wake of a shooting at a Texas church that left 26 people dead.
During his late-night show, Colbert said everyone is heartbroken when mass shootings happen and wants to do something.
“But nothing gets done. No one does anything. And that seems insane. And it can make you feel hopeless,” Colbert said.
{mosads}The late-night host said he doesn’t know what to do, but added that hopelessness is not the answer.
“You cannot give up in the face of evil,” he said.
“Nothing gets done to control the guns that kill 10,000 people a year around America, not just in these mass killings,” he continued.
“And doing nothing, as I’ve said before, is unacceptable. But it’s unnatural, it’s inhuman. It just goes against our nature — we want to fix things. You want to respond to something terrible like this, not just now but at any time in human history.”
Colbert said there are some “evil” people out there who want others to feel powerless.
“Because if you feel powerless enough, you know what might make you feel more powerful? Going to buy a gun,” he said.
“It’s a vicious cycle.”
But Americans have to remember they still have the power to vote, he said.
“Vote for someone who will do something because this is an act of evil and the only thing necessary for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing,” he said.
His comments come after a gunman opened fire at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, on Sunday.
President Trump said Monday that the mass shooting was not a “guns situation.” Rather, he said, the problem was with the shooter’s “mental health.”
He previously said after the shooting that it was a “little bit soon” to talk about the issue of guns.
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