Larry Penick – a La Plata County resident who decided to shoot a .22-caliber gun at a dog named Lexi – is quoted as saying, “I didn’t mean to kill any dogs” (Herald, Feb. 18). Really? Then why would he choose to shoot his gun at all? Is it because, as the saying goes, “guns don’t kill people (or dogs) – people do?” Which one is Penick in that sentence? Is he the gun or the person? Because both kill. And Penick’s additional quote about having dogs “not chained up” raises another issue about this man’s mind, the mind of someone who exhibits no regard for a species that – by all factual accounts – treats each other and the people around them better than humans manage to.

Penick is certainly human – and certainly a heartless member of that species. What was his motivation, if he did not mean to kill a dog? Would he have fired at children chasing a cat? Or might he have decided to intervene in a more humane way? Dogs aren’t the problem in this equation. You do the math.

Nancy Brockman

Durango