More Guns!
The NRA has mutated a long way from its
1871 origins to now serving as a surrogate for weapons manufacturers under the
guise of protecting a second amendment that was never under attack any more
than praying in school has been. They created a threat that didn’t exist and
then built a base to support the agenda of militarizing a civilian population
to protect us from immigrants, criminals, terrorists, crazy people, gangs,
media and last but certainly not least our own government. Without fail
whenever guns are in the news negatively their argument is that what is needed
is more guns.
Yes, government is in the above list.
Why? Because a fear often expressed in defense of having military weapons in
the hands of civilians is that we will lose our Constitutional Second Amendment rights and that our guns will be
taken away! Who would do that exactly? Who would come for our weapons? Ah yes,
the Government! More specifically our soldiers or federal police. The NRA and
pro-police Neo-Republicans champion having arms for us to use against our own
soldiers (Government) and police. This is their ultimate fear and their
rallying cry. The government, a.k.a. our friends, neighbors, police, fellow
citizens and family members that are serving will be coming for our guns.
Be
ready to shoot them when they do.
Up front. I am not going to take up
arms so that I can shoot at our own soldiers and police. They aren’t a threat.
They aren’t coming for my guns and I choose not to live in the weird paranoid
ultra-conservative neo/Nazi/Confederate/White Supremacist world where they are.
Save the guns!
Whenever there is a slaughter of
children there follows a national demand for action even though such deaths are
a small percentage of gun deaths overall. The NRA immediately hits the streets
with propaganda explaining how any laws limiting weapons are wrong and
advocating fixing everything BUT weapons. Weapons are innocent bystanders! The
arguments are usually kicked off with “they’re after our second amendment
rights!” Followed by misdirection and deflection. Our culture of violence is
blamed. Video games are blamed. Parents are blamed. Our educational system is
blamed. The authorities are blamed. The kids themselves are blamed. Not
enforcing the laws we have is blamed. (That last one is truly ridiculous given
the NRA has worked on a national scale to eliminate laws pertaining to weapons
and advocates getting weapons in the hands of as many people as possible.)
They’re a large part of the reason why we have citizens walking the streets
with long guns.
One of the most effective memes that I
have seen circulated had a phrase that truly encapsulates the entire argument. “Let us take a moment to honor the sacrifice of
our brave schoolchildren who lay down their lives to protect our right to bear
arms.” There is NO constitutional
right to slaughter and/or endanger our fellow citizens. The Constitution
provides for the rule of law. Regulating fire arms is a part of that law.
Body Count
I’m not going to waste a lot of time
here with statistics. Here’s what I believe is most relevant to the ongoing
problem of how do we dig ourselves out of the mess that we’ve created. Between
1984 and 1994 there were 19 incidents involving 6 or more people dying
resulting in 155 deaths. Military style weapons were banned from 1994 until
2004. During this time there were 12 incidents resulting in 89 deaths. In 2004
the assault weapons ban was allowed to expire. Between 2004 and 2014 there were
34 incidents resulting in 302 deaths.
Now in the scheme of things the above
number of deaths isn’t really that big a number when separated out from all the
other gun deaths. Mass shootings grab our attention though and make us acutely
aware of the problem that we as a nation face—the proliferation of arms. So the
NRA makes dead children an irrelevant statistic in the grand scheme of how many
people die annually. Well, they aren’t irrelevant. They shouldn’t be
marginalized because enough of them aren’t dying yet.
Hardened America
When we have actual firefights taking
place in the streets, movie theaters, night clubs, schools and churches, the
NRA will have succeeded in attaining their goal of market saturation. Some
might say that we’re there already. Not quite. In a firefight all sides will be
throwing lead. Then when maximum carnage is taking place the NRA can declare a
victory and will be the quintessential arms dealer lobbyist for having supplied
all the combatants.
Our Republic as envisioned by the NRA
and Neo-Republicans will be an armed camp with a militarized civilian
population, militarized police force, militarized educational system,
militarized government with hardened schools, theaters and just really anyplace
that provides for a concentration of people. We’ll be going through metal
detectors everywhere. Those that can afford it will live in hardened homes or
protected enclaves; armed guards everywhere. Corporations and the ultra-rich
will be like warlords and have mini armies protecting them. What a beautiful
paranoid world they envision for us to live in.
Gun's rights
OR we could as a nation begin taking
things in another direction and start electing people who aren’t opposed to
passing legislation to commence de-militarizing the nation. It’s going to take
decades to build a peaceful society but it can be done and is worth pursuing.
We need to stop passing legislation to
protect the rights of guns as if they are somehow innocent bystander victims in
all of this and put people first. There’s nothing wrong with regulating
inanimate objects. Realistically it’s going to take years of concentrated
efforts in multiple areas to turn things around. In the meantime we’ll wait for
the next body count to make the news.
Hunting people
We need to elect people that believe
fully automatic weapons in general aren’t necessary to our civilian population.
Military styled weapons need to go. High capacity magazines need to go. Open
carry needs to go. Permitted conceal carry that requires training should be
encouraged. People may want AR15s to hunt but they really don’t need AR15s to
hunt. If people are afraid of their government then elect people to office that
aren’t fanatics. The above are just a few suggestions and not in the least nor
meant to be comprehensive. As a nation we need to stop electing dithering
politicians and elect those that will be serious about arms control and willing
to do something.
I think that it’s only appropriate to
finish this with words from a survivor of a school shooting. The link below is
to an essay from Emma González in Teen Vogue. Her closing words in a video
presentation at the same link. “Why are we doing this?
Because it’s about damn
time someone did.”