None of the many recent killing sprees by crazed individuals on US city streets could have been stopped cold with the application of two cafe chairs and a milk crate.
Yet these simplest of objects, grabbed in haste, were all that several good Samaritans needed in Sydney’s CBD yesterday to end a violent rampage that had left one woman dead and another wounded.
These passers-by did whatever was necessary to prevent further bloodshed by pinning down an out-of-control 21-year-old man until police arrived to take over.
Acting instinctively and with remarkable bravery, they will no doubt go down as heroes.
But this tragedy could have — and more likely would have — ended very differently if it were not for a certain healthy culture that exists in Australia.
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The heroes would most likely have failed, and indeed been victims themselves, if the alleged perpetrator had carried a rapid-firing gun that could kill at a distance.
It has long been accepted in this country that the best way to limit the risk of senseless murder is to limit access to guns. It would seem to be a no-brainer.
A gun is so lethal in the hands of a person with ill-intent against ordinary civilians going about their daily lives in a crowded city that the possible carnage can be on a scale too terrible to imagine.
Yet this is precisely what happens in the US, daily, as no common sense prevails to take steps on stopping lone gunmen causing such unnecessary loss of life.
The failure to take any meaningful action to rethink an American pro-gun culture that permits such easy access to weapons would seem irrational — despite so many other admirable qualities to be found in the US among its people.
The story in the streets of Sydney could have ended shockingly worse yesterday.
Most likely there would have been more dead, and no heroes.
Violence by mentally disturbed people can be difficult to prevent in any country, but the comfort we have of limiting access to a killing machine lies at the heart of our safety.
Brad Norington is a former Washington correspondent for The Australian
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