In the beginning, there was the Word.
Back in the 1970s, people loved hunting and shooting at targets just as much as they do now. But no one needed to have a slew of semi-automatic weapons, and no one thought that sensible gun regulations would ever endanger their right to own a gun, because it never has.
Dante is comparing our boys to the most violent, blasphemous things you can think of and saying, “Nope, these guys are eviler! They’re worse than cannibals who eat babies while dressed as priests saying the Lord’s Prayer backwards.”