Regarding Bob Costas’s gun-control comments in the wake of Jovan Belcher’s murder-suicide:

• As difficult as it is to control handguns now, the advent of 3-D printers is going to make it virtually impossible to ban any physical object.

• An NFL player with money will have no trouble getting a gun in a capitalist society–or any society, really–if he wants one, regardless of law. There’s no sense in creating a black market that makes it even more difficult to track weapons.

• Costas and Jason Whitlock (whom he referenced) are correct in saying that the gun culture makes us less safe and can escalate violence. But the prevalence of guns stems from a myriad of social and cultural issues that is not going to be reduced by legislation. That doesn’t mean that the number of firearms among young people can’t be reduced, but you can’t erase manifestations without dealing with the underlying causes and influences. That requires a great deal of education, not the quick fix of legislation. Laws have had very little success in reducing drug use and handguns are no different.

• If you really want to protect football players in particular, present an editorial about how they should stop playing football or fans should not watch or attend the games. Brain-related injuries will damage and kill more members of the NFL than handguns will. Such injuries cannot be reduced by technological innovations because even helmets with space-age protection can’t stop the brain from being jarred within the brain fluid as a result of violent contact. There’s really no workaround for the NFL: It’s a killer.•