Insanity + Stupidity = 30 killed students
Today we see again another reason why our
government gave it's citizenry the right to keep and bear arms. Yet, somehow
this tragedy will be turned around by the abolitionists to explain why we need
to ban guns. The full reason was the governments realization that any nation
with a military runs the risk of abusing it's people at the hands of the
military - and thus the citizenry has the right to defend itself against "a well
regulated militia". For a full discussion, see my previous posts on this
topic.
In an enormous tragedy over 30 students were killed today when an (obviously) insane gunman entered the college campus and began shooting (executing) the students. The tragedy of all this is that gun abolitionists will use this as yet another example why we should ban gun ownership in this country. The problem is that their logic is completely flawed.
If you have not yet heard the news, go to any of the major news websites for the story, such as CNN
WHO IS TO BLAME?
Let me pose a question or two.
When grand-ma falls down the stairs, and breaks a hip or perhaps even dies - who do we blame? Do we blame the maker of the stairs? Do we outlaw all stairs because of the number of stair related deaths? Or, instead do we say that's terrible. But, in the end the stairs were a necessary part of grand-ma's life and unfortunately accidents do happen.
When someone steps out into a highway, in front of cars traveling at speed - do we blame the maker of cars? Do we outlaw all highways with fast traveling cars? Do we seek out the Ford and fine them for making a dangerous vehicle? Does the evening news track down the local dealership and talk to the salesman who sold the Explorer in question? No.
What we as Americans want is a safe country. In search of that, we typically go after the easy answer and this situation is no different. The person wielding the weapon is gone and we cannot take vengeance out on him. And even if we could, there would still be a number of us who believe that the gun itself is the problem. But it is not.
WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
I think we need to step back and identify why people kill so that we can identify the seeds of criminal acts, then take appropriate action. To this end I would like to hold a discussion on the various forms of death caused by people who use guns. Notice here that I did not say cause by guns. Guns are not the cause but rather those who use the gun.
First, we need to categorize the various types of deaths involving guns. For ease of discussion I am not going to get into, or allow discussion regarding, the legal terms - but terms that everyone can understand simply. Therefore I submit that there are a limited number of the types of deaths which involve guns. There are only two types of deaths which involve guns, or any weapon for that matter - intentional and unintentional. While Intentional has many sub-categories including: Protection, Desperation, and Criminal - the unintentional death has none. Whether you say a person was careless, uninformed or just plain stupid - it matters not.
On the other hand it certainly does matter in the case of intentional deaths.
PROTECTION
Within this category you include all forms of deaths which are forced by the killer onto the victim (and I use that term begrudingly). This category of death is carried out by our military in times of war, our police in the execution of their duties, and by every day civilians who are exercising their right to keep someone from killing, raping or robbing say a member of their family.
DESPERATION
Within this category I include those who know that killing is wrong, but must commit acts, such as robbery, in order to survive. I am not talking about a user of drugs who robs in order to support a habit, but a person who has had extremely bad circumstances and must commit an act, say robbing a store, in order to obtain money to purchase food. This person is desperate and can see no other way out. The other desperate act is of course suicide for the same reason.
CRIMINAL
This act is committed by a person without regard for life. Such acts are committed by hardened thieves, drug addicts, rapists and just plane murders.
THE SANE AND THE INSANE
There is a significant difference between a desperate person and a criminal. The difference is the knowledge of what they are doing is wrong and whether or not they care. The desperate person cares, but can not act otherwise, while the criminal does not care. The former can be dealt with compassionately, the latter cannot. Relief can be sought for the former, it cannot for the latter. The former is sane, the latter is not. In this description - as you see from my writing - I define sanity as the ability to understand and desire to abide by the moral statues of society while the insane cannot or will not.
THE PROBLEM
The problem with this topic is that there are well meaning persons who will argue that if handguns were banned, this tragedy would not have happened. They have two significant flaws in their logic.
LOGIC ERROR 1
The first problem with that logic is that you are applying reason to a person who has lost all reason. The insane will not be bound by the logic that a reasonable person holds to, and the desperate cannot. By implying that once you outlaw something - no one can participate in the activity fails to reason that the criminal, especially the hardened criminal, will always find a way to break the law.
LOGIC ERROR 2
The old adage is true - despite the fact that many misunderstand it's meaning: "When handguns are outlawed - only outlaws will have handguns". Here is the point. Once you outlaw handguns, then I - being a law abiding citizen - will not be able to obtain one. The criminal, knowing that I probably don't have a gun, will feel free to break into my home - point his illegal handgun in my face and threaten my life if I don't give him my money, my car, or whatever else he demands.
Failing the ability to obtain a gun, the hardened criminal or the desperate person shall obtain another weapon which will provide him or her the advantage over their intended victim. Remove the all possibility that anyone (including the criminal) can get a gun and the criminal know can be safe in the knowledge that YOU the victim has no gun. He will try and find a gun, failing that - he will get a knife.
If you still do not see my point ask yourself this question. How many "On-Duty" policeman are robbed every year at gunpoint? I do not submit that there are none, I am sure there are a few but the numbers will tell the story. Remove any doubt that the your are armed at least as well, if not better, than the criminal and you reduce the chance of becoming a victim yourself.
AN ARMED SOCIETY IS A POLITE SOCIETY?
I don't necessarily subscribe to this argument, it is also flawed but it does raise a good point. If, you believe that people are completely without control of their emotions and that the only thing from keeping the car next to you from cutting you off is that you might have a gun - then that says more about our society than I care to address. However, the other argument is also problematic - do you believe that arming the citizenry of this country will result in open gunfights at every street corner?
I believe that somewhere in the middle might be the actual truth. There are a number of societies in our country that have concealed or open carry laws in place. And from those societies I do not see daily headlines spouting new numbers of mass murders committed at the local livery stable. I believe that says a lot.
Now, with a large percentage of guns running through the populace there may be an initial culling of the stupid. I do not wish to enter into that argument other than to say (flippantly) that perhaps it is time for a small culling of the gene pool.
SO WHY HAVE A GUN?
Lets look at the criminal act as it stands currently and reverse this situation a bit. Put back into place the public's right to keep handguns. In fact - go one step further. Make every person in this country take a gun safety course and certify them in gun safety in elementary school, junior high school, high school and college. Then pass a reasonable law which states that (effectively):
Any U.S. Citizen may purchase and openly carry a firearm who:
- maintains a current weapons certification
- has reached the age of 18
- has not been convicted of a felony
For the purpose of this argument the age of 18 was chosen because they are entering adulthood
For the purpose of this argument current certification must be held, and therefore maintained (ie: re-certified every 3 years)
AND may not be a convicted felon
Then, in this current tragedy - there would have been a number of SANE students TRAINED in proper firearm use carrying their weapons openly at this college. The first time the INSANE pulled his weapon, pointed it at another student and pulled the trigger - he would have been promptly and rightly gunned down where he stood. I do not believe that there would have been the mass carnage so many anti-gun advocates would have you believe. First, there would be a number of those people who would pause in their reactions - mostly from the shock of what was happening. Then, there would be a few who would react and end the situation.
In the end - two people would have been dead. TWO, not thirty-two.
The abolitionists would argue that many people COULD have been shot. This is true - in the stress that occurs when one SANE person makes the mental decision to shoot another there is a great amount of stress. There is the possibility that the SANE person, in the commission of a right and lawful act may (PROTECTION CATEGORY) injure another. There is even the possibility that they may accidentally kill another person. However, given proper weapons training and frequent certification this possibility is minimized and is NOT a valid argument when weighed against the knowledge that an INSANE person will continue killing until of two things happen:
1) That person takes their own life
2) The police and or SWAT team arrives (would you want your student to wait that long), then makes the decision to attempt to kill the INSANE person who is killing students at random.
The salient point here is that cannot reason with the insane. Pass a law which states that the citizen cannot carry weapons and you enable the insane to carry out their wildest wishes. Pass a law which states that a properly trained citizen can carry a weapon and you have enabled the citizenry who wish to legally protect themselves, to do so. You have not forced those who do not wish to carry weapons to do so. Everyone is happy, except those who mistakenly believe that abolishing weapons will put an end to crime.
Rape, murder, robbery, drug dealing are all illegal yet they continue to occur. People die falling down the stairs - and we have not outlawed stair making. Why would guns be any different? In fact, a number of years ago at Columbine we should have learned that it is not. We should have learned that, were the teachers armed as is their legal right, lives would have been saved. But we did not learn that lesson - and we will not learn it today.
In response today President Bush said that schools should be a safe haven for learning, and I submit that as long as the government, the state, the county, or even the public school system itself maintains laws or rules which effectively prohibit those within that system from defending themselves, then people will continue to be slaughtered needlessly in growing numbers.
Many Americans will never know how completely and utterly helpless you feel, when someone points a weapon at you and demands something of you. Even worse, in today's criminal society adhering to their demands does not ensure that you will survive the encounter.
I have been in that situation, aboard a military installation walking home at night when out of the dark a man pulled a gun, pointed it my chest and demanded my wallet. I was unarmed, I was at his mercy, and for the first time in my life I was completely terrified. Nothing I could do would have stopped that person from killing me had he decided to do so. I could not have close the distance between us and wrestled the weapon from him, I could not have run from him - all I could do was to obey him and pray that he didn't decide to kill both my friend and myself anyway. The only thing that was assured was that both I and my associate were probably law abiding members of the community, aboard a military installation and we were not armed.
Had the situation been otherwise, the person may have thought twice about approaching two, well trained and probably armed members of the forces, before pointing a weapon at them and making ANY demands.
Now, before you say that the thing which saved us was that we were NOT armed - I urge you to read your news a bit more closely. CRIMINALS DON'T CARE ABOUT THE LAW. More and more frequently they are killing their victims if for no other reason than a dead victim cannot identify you in a court of law. You will never be able to eliminate the criminal element from the argument, or apply legal standards to that criminal element. As I said, even if you remove all possibility of handguns (or any gun) from this nation as a whole - the criminal will seek the upper hand. The criminal will then use, perhaps a knife, a bat, a club, anything to increase the odds of success.
I pray that none of my readers EVER have to experience what I experienced. You may not be as lucky as I was on that night. I also pray for the families of these innocents who died so needlessly. I cannot even begin to fathom what this country has lost this week. I do know that such situations will only continue until we come to grips with the fact what we are currently doing isn't working - perhaps we need to take a different approach.
Perhaps an armed society would be a polite society after all.
Other opinions:
Pro Gun: Ted Nugent to CNN
Anti-Gun: Tom Plate
Not to put too fine a point on it, but please note here that I could have easily use either of the following terms:
Pro Freedom: Ted Nugent to CNN
Anti-Freedom: Tom Plate
Or Perhaps these:
Pro Child Safety: Ted Nugent to CNN
Pro Child Killing: Tom Plate
Or even these:
Pro Self Defense: Ted Nugent to CNN
Pro Criminal Activities: Tom Plate
In an enormous tragedy over 30 students were killed today when an (obviously) insane gunman entered the college campus and began shooting (executing) the students. The tragedy of all this is that gun abolitionists will use this as yet another example why we should ban gun ownership in this country. The problem is that their logic is completely flawed.
If you have not yet heard the news, go to any of the major news websites for the story, such as CNN
WHO IS TO BLAME?
Let me pose a question or two.
When grand-ma falls down the stairs, and breaks a hip or perhaps even dies - who do we blame? Do we blame the maker of the stairs? Do we outlaw all stairs because of the number of stair related deaths? Or, instead do we say that's terrible. But, in the end the stairs were a necessary part of grand-ma's life and unfortunately accidents do happen.
When someone steps out into a highway, in front of cars traveling at speed - do we blame the maker of cars? Do we outlaw all highways with fast traveling cars? Do we seek out the Ford and fine them for making a dangerous vehicle? Does the evening news track down the local dealership and talk to the salesman who sold the Explorer in question? No.
What we as Americans want is a safe country. In search of that, we typically go after the easy answer and this situation is no different. The person wielding the weapon is gone and we cannot take vengeance out on him. And even if we could, there would still be a number of us who believe that the gun itself is the problem. But it is not.
WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
I think we need to step back and identify why people kill so that we can identify the seeds of criminal acts, then take appropriate action. To this end I would like to hold a discussion on the various forms of death caused by people who use guns. Notice here that I did not say cause by guns. Guns are not the cause but rather those who use the gun.
First, we need to categorize the various types of deaths involving guns. For ease of discussion I am not going to get into, or allow discussion regarding, the legal terms - but terms that everyone can understand simply. Therefore I submit that there are a limited number of the types of deaths which involve guns. There are only two types of deaths which involve guns, or any weapon for that matter - intentional and unintentional. While Intentional has many sub-categories including: Protection, Desperation, and Criminal - the unintentional death has none. Whether you say a person was careless, uninformed or just plain stupid - it matters not.
On the other hand it certainly does matter in the case of intentional deaths.
PROTECTION
Within this category you include all forms of deaths which are forced by the killer onto the victim (and I use that term begrudingly). This category of death is carried out by our military in times of war, our police in the execution of their duties, and by every day civilians who are exercising their right to keep someone from killing, raping or robbing say a member of their family.
DESPERATION
Within this category I include those who know that killing is wrong, but must commit acts, such as robbery, in order to survive. I am not talking about a user of drugs who robs in order to support a habit, but a person who has had extremely bad circumstances and must commit an act, say robbing a store, in order to obtain money to purchase food. This person is desperate and can see no other way out. The other desperate act is of course suicide for the same reason.
CRIMINAL
This act is committed by a person without regard for life. Such acts are committed by hardened thieves, drug addicts, rapists and just plane murders.
THE SANE AND THE INSANE
There is a significant difference between a desperate person and a criminal. The difference is the knowledge of what they are doing is wrong and whether or not they care. The desperate person cares, but can not act otherwise, while the criminal does not care. The former can be dealt with compassionately, the latter cannot. Relief can be sought for the former, it cannot for the latter. The former is sane, the latter is not. In this description - as you see from my writing - I define sanity as the ability to understand and desire to abide by the moral statues of society while the insane cannot or will not.
THE PROBLEM
The problem with this topic is that there are well meaning persons who will argue that if handguns were banned, this tragedy would not have happened. They have two significant flaws in their logic.
LOGIC ERROR 1
The first problem with that logic is that you are applying reason to a person who has lost all reason. The insane will not be bound by the logic that a reasonable person holds to, and the desperate cannot. By implying that once you outlaw something - no one can participate in the activity fails to reason that the criminal, especially the hardened criminal, will always find a way to break the law.
LOGIC ERROR 2
The old adage is true - despite the fact that many misunderstand it's meaning: "When handguns are outlawed - only outlaws will have handguns". Here is the point. Once you outlaw handguns, then I - being a law abiding citizen - will not be able to obtain one. The criminal, knowing that I probably don't have a gun, will feel free to break into my home - point his illegal handgun in my face and threaten my life if I don't give him my money, my car, or whatever else he demands.
Failing the ability to obtain a gun, the hardened criminal or the desperate person shall obtain another weapon which will provide him or her the advantage over their intended victim. Remove the all possibility that anyone (including the criminal) can get a gun and the criminal know can be safe in the knowledge that YOU the victim has no gun. He will try and find a gun, failing that - he will get a knife.
If you still do not see my point ask yourself this question. How many "On-Duty" policeman are robbed every year at gunpoint? I do not submit that there are none, I am sure there are a few but the numbers will tell the story. Remove any doubt that the your are armed at least as well, if not better, than the criminal and you reduce the chance of becoming a victim yourself.
AN ARMED SOCIETY IS A POLITE SOCIETY?
I don't necessarily subscribe to this argument, it is also flawed but it does raise a good point. If, you believe that people are completely without control of their emotions and that the only thing from keeping the car next to you from cutting you off is that you might have a gun - then that says more about our society than I care to address. However, the other argument is also problematic - do you believe that arming the citizenry of this country will result in open gunfights at every street corner?
I believe that somewhere in the middle might be the actual truth. There are a number of societies in our country that have concealed or open carry laws in place. And from those societies I do not see daily headlines spouting new numbers of mass murders committed at the local livery stable. I believe that says a lot.
Now, with a large percentage of guns running through the populace there may be an initial culling of the stupid. I do not wish to enter into that argument other than to say (flippantly) that perhaps it is time for a small culling of the gene pool.
SO WHY HAVE A GUN?
Lets look at the criminal act as it stands currently and reverse this situation a bit. Put back into place the public's right to keep handguns. In fact - go one step further. Make every person in this country take a gun safety course and certify them in gun safety in elementary school, junior high school, high school and college. Then pass a reasonable law which states that (effectively):
Any U.S. Citizen may purchase and openly carry a firearm who:
- maintains a current weapons certification
- has reached the age of 18
- has not been convicted of a felony
For the purpose of this argument the age of 18 was chosen because they are entering adulthood
For the purpose of this argument current certification must be held, and therefore maintained (ie: re-certified every 3 years)
AND may not be a convicted felon
Then, in this current tragedy - there would have been a number of SANE students TRAINED in proper firearm use carrying their weapons openly at this college. The first time the INSANE pulled his weapon, pointed it at another student and pulled the trigger - he would have been promptly and rightly gunned down where he stood. I do not believe that there would have been the mass carnage so many anti-gun advocates would have you believe. First, there would be a number of those people who would pause in their reactions - mostly from the shock of what was happening. Then, there would be a few who would react and end the situation.
In the end - two people would have been dead. TWO, not thirty-two.
The abolitionists would argue that many people COULD have been shot. This is true - in the stress that occurs when one SANE person makes the mental decision to shoot another there is a great amount of stress. There is the possibility that the SANE person, in the commission of a right and lawful act may (PROTECTION CATEGORY) injure another. There is even the possibility that they may accidentally kill another person. However, given proper weapons training and frequent certification this possibility is minimized and is NOT a valid argument when weighed against the knowledge that an INSANE person will continue killing until of two things happen:
1) That person takes their own life
2) The police and or SWAT team arrives (would you want your student to wait that long), then makes the decision to attempt to kill the INSANE person who is killing students at random.
The salient point here is that cannot reason with the insane. Pass a law which states that the citizen cannot carry weapons and you enable the insane to carry out their wildest wishes. Pass a law which states that a properly trained citizen can carry a weapon and you have enabled the citizenry who wish to legally protect themselves, to do so. You have not forced those who do not wish to carry weapons to do so. Everyone is happy, except those who mistakenly believe that abolishing weapons will put an end to crime.
Rape, murder, robbery, drug dealing are all illegal yet they continue to occur. People die falling down the stairs - and we have not outlawed stair making. Why would guns be any different? In fact, a number of years ago at Columbine we should have learned that it is not. We should have learned that, were the teachers armed as is their legal right, lives would have been saved. But we did not learn that lesson - and we will not learn it today.
In response today President Bush said that schools should be a safe haven for learning, and I submit that as long as the government, the state, the county, or even the public school system itself maintains laws or rules which effectively prohibit those within that system from defending themselves, then people will continue to be slaughtered needlessly in growing numbers.
Many Americans will never know how completely and utterly helpless you feel, when someone points a weapon at you and demands something of you. Even worse, in today's criminal society adhering to their demands does not ensure that you will survive the encounter.
I have been in that situation, aboard a military installation walking home at night when out of the dark a man pulled a gun, pointed it my chest and demanded my wallet. I was unarmed, I was at his mercy, and for the first time in my life I was completely terrified. Nothing I could do would have stopped that person from killing me had he decided to do so. I could not have close the distance between us and wrestled the weapon from him, I could not have run from him - all I could do was to obey him and pray that he didn't decide to kill both my friend and myself anyway. The only thing that was assured was that both I and my associate were probably law abiding members of the community, aboard a military installation and we were not armed.
Had the situation been otherwise, the person may have thought twice about approaching two, well trained and probably armed members of the forces, before pointing a weapon at them and making ANY demands.
Now, before you say that the thing which saved us was that we were NOT armed - I urge you to read your news a bit more closely. CRIMINALS DON'T CARE ABOUT THE LAW. More and more frequently they are killing their victims if for no other reason than a dead victim cannot identify you in a court of law. You will never be able to eliminate the criminal element from the argument, or apply legal standards to that criminal element. As I said, even if you remove all possibility of handguns (or any gun) from this nation as a whole - the criminal will seek the upper hand. The criminal will then use, perhaps a knife, a bat, a club, anything to increase the odds of success.
I pray that none of my readers EVER have to experience what I experienced. You may not be as lucky as I was on that night. I also pray for the families of these innocents who died so needlessly. I cannot even begin to fathom what this country has lost this week. I do know that such situations will only continue until we come to grips with the fact what we are currently doing isn't working - perhaps we need to take a different approach.
Perhaps an armed society would be a polite society after all.
Other opinions:
Pro Gun: Ted Nugent to CNN
Anti-Gun: Tom Plate
Not to put too fine a point on it, but please note here that I could have easily use either of the following terms:
Pro Freedom: Ted Nugent to CNN
Anti-Freedom: Tom Plate
Or Perhaps these:
Pro Child Safety: Ted Nugent to CNN
Pro Child Killing: Tom Plate
Or even these:
Pro Self Defense: Ted Nugent to CNN
Pro Criminal Activities: Tom Plate
Posted: Mon - April 16, 2007 at 07:13 PM If this blog entry was of use to you, why not show your appreciation by donating to support the site? Just click on the MAKE A DONATION button on the right hand side of the page! It's all handled by PAYPAL.
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Published On: Apr 20, 2007 01:37 PM
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Published On: Apr 20, 2007 01:37 PM