Liberal versus Conservative
The liberal talking heads have been emphasizing gun control pretty much down the line. Nothing very creative from them, although one Seattle liberal radio talk show host pointed out that it would have taken a very, very strict set of gun laws to have thwarted this particular shooting, because of the particulars. However, the Mayor noted what I said yesterday: Gun control might not be able to prevent a particular shooting from occurring, but over time it will save lives statistically. A ban (partial or total) would have some net positive effect.
On gun-related crime, yes. What about other crimes?
Suppose you banned guns entirely. It becomes much harder to get guns, and gun-related crime goes down. Meanwhile, the number of crimes that could have been stopped by a gun skyrockets, since many of them don't actually require a gun to commit. Is that a price worth paying?
The conservatives have been emphasizing the immigration angle, and, apparently as a defense to the attacks on gun rights now underway, they have also been spinning the murder as overhyped. One right-wing radio talk show host in Seattle said today that people are driving this event way out of proportion, because more people die every day in this country from things like car wrecks than they do from shootings. So, he reasoned, what is all the fuss? (He's actually got a point, except for two things. One, a more calm public reaction will do nothing to prevent these shootings from happening. Two, the "fuss" is that premeditated murder is a more culturally harmful event than a car wreck.) A few minutes later the radio host started saying that illegal immigrants come into the country, infest our cities with crime, shoot police officers, and who knows what else--because at that point I turned off the radio. He's a bullshitting bastard, and it is scary that so many people feel the same way as him right now.
Here in Texas, we see a lot of illegal immigration. And I hate to break it to you, but the guy has a point on the crime angle. Though given the fact that such a comment was immediately followed by "shoot police officers," you're quite right in assuming that the only reason he's saying that is because he's a retarded fuck.
Dehumanizing Diversions
It came out today that the killer left a letter raging against women, rich kids, campus debauchery, and perhaps some other things. I suggest to you all that these elements of the story are a diversion. They are meant to dehumanize the criminal and make it easier for us to think less critically about why this shooting occurred and how it can be prevented. In other words, the hype surrounding these details is our pop culture's own numbskulled attempt to cope with the tragedy in its own numbskulled way. Don't fall for it. We should assume that the killer was a human being just like the rest of us, and that whatever grievances drove him to this crime were at least somewhat based in society. I am not saying that we should absolve him of his legal responsibility for these crimes, but I am saying that a wiser society will look first at itself when one of its people goes bad, and only second will it look at the person who committed the crime.
This is another thing I hate to say, but the killer actually has a bit of a point; to some degree, it
is society's fault. That hardly constitutes a reason to commit mass murder, but according to everything I've read about him, he was shunned and mistreated constantly throughout his life. There's only so far you can push someone before they'll snap. Unfortunately, this is a problem that has to be fixed at the social level.
The Second Amendment
Scrap it. If people want to have guns, let them damn submit to some regulation. I don't necessarily support a total gun ban, but neither do I support a Constitutional Amendment worded so broadly that right-wingers (and libertarians) falsely construe it to mean that private citizens should check their own government with the threat of violence. That is absurd in today's world.
Given the size of our country and the probable mass of defections, it might actually be possible to contest the government with guerrilla warfare to some extent, though I don't hold out much hope for such a revolution actually toppling it. If anything, by becoming an outfit of tyranny the government would end up virtually shutting down the economy, bringing its scheme to a grinding halt in fairly short order. Violence may be a solution, but it's rarely the best one.
Illegal Guns
To those who keep arguing that outlawing guns will give criminals absolute power over the rest of us, stop being deliberately dense. For one thing, the authorities would still be armed, and they are ones best equipped to deal with all of this. For another thing, the implicit argument behind arming private citizens is that they will be able to defend themselves and others against armed criminals. Gun battles between private citizens is a very bad solution! Most people would be overwhelmed by adrenaline and would make bad decisions in the heat of a gun battle. I know many of you around here feel bold, smart, and able to function well under pressure. I also know that many of you are none of those things. So it is with the rest of society. If more people brought guns to a shootout, unintentional shootings would soar. Think of the chaos! At the time of the shooting, you have no information about what is going on...yet you expect to make sound decisions about who to shoot? Bullshit. Life is seldom that easy.
The implicit argument behind letting the authorities handle everything is that they know best in every situation. All one has to do is look at the violence that goes on in many of our major cities to see that this is hardly the case. Of course, I don't trust other people to make those types of decisions, either, which is why I believe that mandatory gun training really ought to be instituted in order to purchase firearms.
So too are England, Singapore, Germany...and Canada. I looked it up. All of these are countries with significant gun restrictions, and all of them have a far lower rate of intentional gun violence than does the United States.
And all feature cultures that are quite different from ours. If I lived in one of those countries, I wouldn't mind not being able to arm myself, since I probably wouldn't need to. Over here? Not a chance. I don't know why, but this country seems to be particularly vicious even when guns aren't involved.
There does seem to be a cultural factor in play. Some societies are simply far more averse to gun violence than others, without regard to restrictions on guns. We have a violent, freewheeling, vigilante culture in many parts of America. But, dash it all, we also have a whole friggin' lot of guns.
I was about to mention that. Japan's culture is quite subdued, generally speaking. People are more focused on not fucking up their entire lives at the age of 15 to be bothered with the fine art of busting a cap in someone's ass.
Making guns illegal will not stop criminals from having guns. Criminals such as burglars. A home invasion is a situation in which a private citizen (the resident) owning a firearm can be of great benefit. If the burglar isn't armed, a hasty retreat is no doubt his response, thus minimizing the time spent burglarizing. If they are both armed, well, that's a bit trickier. Hopefully you manage to spot the burglar before he knows you're awake and armed. In such a scenario it doesn't matter if the police still have their guns because they won't be able to get there in time to help you.
And, statistically, you're more likely to use those home-protection guns to shoot a friend or family member than a burglar.
Even if I didn't have a great deal of trouble believing this, the mere presence of a gun is often enough to scare a criminal away. In fact, this is what happens far more than the criminal actually getting shot.
