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Phrasing it that way puts the weapon in the foreground of the reader's mind and the shooter in the background. That may be the the grandparent's intent, but if
by Zak 13y ago
Phrasing it that way puts the weapon in the foreground of the reader's mind and the shooter in the background. That may be the the grandparent's intent, but if not, "with" might be preferable to "by".
- mikeash 13y agoGiven that this entire discussion is about the weapon, it hardly seems wrong to put the weapon in the foreground of the reader's mind.
- aaronem 13y agoGiven that there would be no discussion to be had about this or any weapon absent there being people ready and willing to employ them, it hardly seems sensible to argue about weapons as a proxy for arguing about the uses to which people put them.
- mikeash 13y agoSo, should we never talk about things without also talking about the people? Do we need to word every discussion about computers as, "When a person using a computer accesses the hard disk..."?
- aaronem 13y agoIt seems you've failed to notice the dependent clause in my last sentence -- the one beginning "as a proxy..."