Liberalism and Guns
It is unlikely that the progun, and antigun factions
will ever truly understand each other. Each group often wonders at the
insanity of the other. They may be able to comprehend each other's arguments,
but the mindsets of these two philosophies are so divergent that it is
hard to see true empathy and understanding ever developing. This is not
to say that there is no common ground between them, au contrair;
to hear them speak, you would think that both groups are in perfect agreement,
and stand for all of the same things. Both proclaim that their positions
uniquely address the problems of crime, insecurity, violence, public malaise,
and morals. One difference seems to be on the matter of trust and of responsibility.
Liberals tend to place a great deal of trust in centralized institutions,
and a perfect, collective form of fairness which would attempt to equate
all things with all other things so much so that, for many of them, the
preferred method of government is some form of socialism. Conservatives,
from the founding fathers on, have had a healthy distrust of government,
but an abounding faith in the individual, and in what has sometimes been
called an enlightened self interest. Rather than a collective quantifiable
fairness, they tend to favor a more individualistic approach. Liberals
tend to live in a world of ideas, idealism, and intention rather than a
world of acts. Firearms, personal wealth, and individualism tend to inject
an unpleasant dose of concrete reality into this world.
An attempt to define these belief systems by defining
the words "liberal" and "conservative" would suggest that a liberal will
approve of change while a conservative will object to change. There is
a grain of truth to this, though with the epidemic of liberalism infecting
our government, media, and educational institutions, Conservatives may
now be more open to change, and liberals more opposed to it than the previous
definitions would indicate. It is also interesting to note that at the
founding of this nation, those who were the most violent advocates of change
believed in what we would now call conservatism, while those who strongly
opposed them stood for much of what today would be called liberalism. This
might sound strange, but a look at what the fathers of this country revolted
against --- high taxes, unresponsive centralized government, trade restrictions,
and constant government interference in their personal lives --- sounds
very much like what liberalism tirelessly seems to advocate. On the other
hand, those freedoms for which the founders of this country risked lives,
fortunes, and reputations --- public expression of ideas and opinion, individual
firearms ownership, the sanctity of private property and personal wealth,
the individual pursuit of happiness along with the freedoms to chose life's
own course --- are the very things which the left rallies against, or interferes
with.
Perceptions and definitions
The definitions of liberal and conservative blur somewhat,
as people are individuals, and there tend to be few "pure" members of either
group, however there are certain issues which have such a polarizing effect
on people that they can effectively define the terms. These issues are
abortion, gun control, taxes, capitol punishment, having a strong military,
and the legalization of drugs. There is a group of secondary issues on
which there can be some divergence, these issues are immigration (legal
and otherwise), trade and protectionism, pornography, and how much control
the government should have over schools, etc. A closer look would indicate
that responsibility would seem to be a major factor. In the conservative
view, each of us is responsible for the conduct of our lives. In the liberal
view, a higher authority should be responsible for us all, since "fairness"
requires that we be monitored and supervised to prevent any inequalities
from occurring. In sporting terms, the conservatives strive to make a level
playing field, while the liberals strive to see that each team gets the
same score. Ideally, the liberals would not have the game played at all,
but simply award the score to each team, eliminating the need to have a
playing field. There is also the matter of freedom, which both groups claim
to be all in favor of, however the definitions of freedom to which the
two groups ascribe varies widely. The liberal desire for freedom seems
to be a desire to be free from worry, and from the need to
make tough decisions as to the manner of one's life, deriving neither the
benefits nor suffering the consequences of their actions. Conservatives
pursue the freedom to make these tough decisions, and to deal with life's
worries according to one's own perceptions, and best judgment, reaping
the benefits or suffering the consequences accordingly.
These differences in the perception of what constitutes
freedom, and of the definition of what responsibility is, may give a hint
as to why liberals and conservatives position themselves as they do on
certain issues. This removes some of the perceived contradiction in beliefs
of these groups. As an example let's take the abortion and capitol punishment
issues. It would seem that a pro life position would be against abortion,
and capitol punishment, but this is, by and large, not true. Most conservatives
believe in capitol punishment but oppose abortion. How could this be? The
answer is simple when looked at from a point of view of personal responsibility.
According to the conservative point of view, a felon who has committed
some heinous crime is responsible for it, and must pay. Responsible, decent
people who have committed no heinous acts have a right to be protected
from him, as their interests out weight those of the felon. Though
the felon is given less consideration than the law abiding folk, this is
a level playing field, since any law abiding citizen who turns to crime
can expect similar treatment. Liberal dogma takes quite a different approach.
The felon is not held strictly responsible for his acts. Despite what he
has done, he is still considered to be on a par with those whose actions
remain within the law. He must be worked with, rehabilitated, and educated.
This is the liberal way of giving both teams the same score no matter how
the game itself was played. What of the abortion issue then? A conservative
will insist that a couple who conceives a child be responsible for it,
and not commit murder in order to spare themselves the inconvenience of
caring for it. The liberal point of view on this is that a woman (the man
having long since disappeared) should not be held responsible for the rest
of her life for one little mistake. So according to the liberal outlook,
abortion of an unborn baby is acceptable, but capitol punishment of a convicted
felon is not. According to the Conservative point of view, abortion is
wrong, but capitol punishment is an acceptable response to some forms of
criminal activities.
When applied to the gun issue, these standards show
clearly which direction the two groups would have to take to remain consistent
with their beliefs. Conservatism will support the individual in his right
to defend himself and be responsable for his own security. Liberalism will
require dependence upon the police and the government, individuals not
being qualified or competent to deal with their own security. Personal
defense is also a difficult and unpleasant undertaking (excuse the pun),
and difficulty and unpleasantness is to be spared us at all costs, even
if those costs include our freedom and the right to decide our own life's
course. As a society composed of the irresponsible, and the unaccountable,
we can certainly not be trusted with firearms. Though we have not yet become
this sort of society, the barrage of liberal policies are rapidly changing
us into one.
passing the buck
Part of this is because of the idea that exists in certain
mindsets, that it is possible to outsmart or shortcut human nature, or
the way the universe works. The people who think this way generally consider
themselves to be more clever than, and a step above, the rest of us common
folk. To this way of thinking, the direct approach is far too unrefined
and lacking in the subtleties and refinements, possible to the more complicated
and intricate minds such as they themselves possess. They disparage the
simple minded, direct approach that those of us less endowed with their
own gifts, brutishly employ. This type of mindset refuses to believe that
the best way to stop crime is to stop criminals. The liberal solution to
the crime problem is to "work with" criminals, rehabilitate, educate, and
socialize them. This also embraces the notion that criminals are a class
different from themselves (a lower species with limited potential, but
suitable for taming), rather than a state in which an individual places
himself. There is a similar attitude regarding "the poor", and of poverty
itself, which is considered to be an attribute of a class of individuals
rather than a state in which an individual may find himself. The tools
of their crime prevention program include social workers, counselers, teachers,
and "supervision". Part 2 of the liberal crime prevention program has to
do with ending poverty. This fits in well with a catch phrase that has
come in to vogue, "poverty is violence". This is a pretty loose definition
of the word "violence", but as always, it is not for certain clever minded
individuals to be constrained by the direct meaning of words, rather it
is the indirect underlying cause of the meaning of a word which is important
( I hope it is realized that I am just being sarcastic here). Of course,
Lyndon Johnson tried to end poverty back in the sixties with his "Great
Society" programs. These programs knocked down entire functioning neighborhoods,
replacing them with hellish housing projects, while raising taxes, and
initiating a round of inflation which made many middle class people suddenly
poor. It would seem that the best way to end poverty would be to let people
keep more of their money, but this is far too direct a solution to appeal
to the tastes of the intellectual left; most of the anti poverty programs
put forth from this quarter involve taking money.
It is interesting to contrast the liberal
and conservative viewpoints regarding the recent incident in Michigan involving
a six year old boy who killed a classmate. The boy's father is a drug addict
currently in prison; his mother, too is an addict. At the time of the incident,
the boy was living with his uncle in a crack house. The gun he used to
kill his fellow student was stolen, as was a shotgun found amid all of
the drugs in the house where he lived. Everything about this boy's life
conspired to doom him, only the manner of his destruction being in doubt.
Yet despite all of this, our friends on the left tell us that this is a
gun issue rather than a social one. We are told that more restrictions,
more rigorous licensing requirements, or mandatory trigger locks would
solve these problems, as if this boy's uncle would have licensed, or put
trigger locks on the stolen guns he possessed. Even a casual look at the
facts of this case, and at many of our other social ills as well, will
show this to be a result, not of a deficiency of liberal social policies,
including gun control, but an overabundance of them. Liberal policies involving
decriminalization of drugs, has aided a blossoming of the drug culture,
particularly among the poor, who are least able to afford them. Liberal
policies enacted to "free" people from the requirements of marriage and
moral behavior have reaped a bounty of unwanted, unloved children, unacknowledged,
or abandoned by their fathers, and beyond the abilities of their mothers
to raise alone. These same policies have made sex, and the traditional
commitments associated with it, frivolous, recreational pursuits, thus
eroding much of the power and security of the family. Liberal policies
on abortion, in response to the huge increase in out of wedlock pregnancies,
erodes our respect and concern for human life. Liberal policies on education,
welfare, and the work ethic seem determined to create a class of
uneducated idlers unwilling, and unable to do anything with their lives.
Liberal social policies enacted into law, require that huge government
agencies be created to intrude these policies into our lives. The crushing
taxation needed to sustain a nonproductive entity like a government agency
reduces the wealth, and therefore the standard of living of the society
as a whole. Liberal policies on crime seem determined to trivialize the
stigma, and minimize the consequences, for the criminal. The cumulative
result of these combined liberal policies sometimes assumes the form of
a six year old boy who will take his uncle's stolen gun and murder a classmate
with it.
It is a pretty good indication that a stand on a
major issue is wrong, when the nature of the argument has to be continually
changed in order to defend it, or when the terms of an argument are relentlessly
picked apart. This is the case with many, if not most of the tenets of
liberalism. The most blatant is the argument put forth by the pro abortion
activists. One of the major bits of semantic maneuvering (termed spin,
in an attempt to put a new spin on spin) used is the definition of their
own position as being pro choice, rather than pro abortion. I suppose that
by this definition the pro gun group is actually pro choice, as are those
in favor of euthanasia, legalized drugs, gambling, prostitution, and probably
child abuse (Not that child abuse is a good thing, it just ought to be
left up to the individual whether or not he wants to do it --- at least
that's what the pro choice position would be). I suppose that in the early
and middle part of the last century, those in favor of the continuation
of slavery could have made the argument that they were pro choice. Not
necessarily pro slavery, you understand, just of the opinion that each
individual ought to be free to decide on their own, and that no government
agency ought to be able to interfere with their free choice. No one asked
the slaves, of course, as slaves had as little recognition in the eyes
of the law back in those days as an unborn child has today. This introduces
another shift in spin that the pro abortion activists use, the implication
that an unborn child is something other than a human being. This maneuver
was necessary in order to turn the argument away from the unwinable position
taken, that ending the life of a baby before it has a chance to be born
is not a morally wrong thing to do.
In a similar manner, the ownership of firearms has
been blamed for many social evils and ills, which can more justifiably
be attributed to the epidemic of liberal policy enacted during the second
half of the twentieth century. This may be somewhat of a defensive posture
on the part of those who consider themselves liberals. As was mentioned
above, much of what ails this nation is a result of the liberal agenda
to give complete reign to every sort of self indulgence, self indulgence
being the liberal definition of freedom. Up until a hundred years ago or
so, firearms were so common in this country that it seemed nearly everyone
was armed, yet there was, by today's standards, nearly no crime at all.
The justice system was considerably more harsh than today's, and people
were expected to work or starve. There was also little of what we would
call enlightened social policy. Though we were a very diverse society of
immigrants, there was no such thing as multiculturalism, and the new immigrants
desperately trying to learn the language and become Americans, would have
considered the call for such a thing ludicrous. There was no income tax
in those days, since there was little government interference in peoples
lives, and no need to maintain costly government agencies. People were
free to succeed, and were encouraged to do so by the prospect of failure
and it's consequences. This open and free society is abhorrent to much
of what liberalism stands for, and for generations, liberals have been
doing their best to dismantle it. Under those conditions, in a bit over
a hundred years, America grew from a collection of separate colonies precariously
hugging the eastern seaboard of this continent, to the greatest, wealthiest,
most individualistic nation the world has ever seen. Since that time, the
growth of liberalism has attacked and eroded the family values, economic
and personal freedoms, along with the moral and work ethics and standards
of behavior, decency, and personal responsibility which had for generations
been the foundations of our culture. This cultural war has ignited an outbreak
of crime immorality, selfishness, and violence which is sweeping the nation,
and which we are told can be solved by a further increase in liberal policies.
In short, liberal policies if fully implemented would produce a society
of irresponsible, selfish, hedonists. I agree that, in a such a society,
people can not be trusted with firearms.
Hedonism and heathenism
Surely liberalism has rendered the strangest interpretation
of the Constitution possible, when they bother to pay it any mind at all.
This interpretation casts the founding fathers in a rather poor light,
portraying them as shallow, self serving and self indulgent types. There
is a hedonistic interpretation by which the first amendment is used to
defend pornographers, and the most vulgar possible speech in what are claimed
to be song lyrics, while enshrining the press as a sort of a fourth branch
of the government. This same first amendment is claimed to offer
no protection for the expression of personal opinion, or particularly opposition
to the "progressive" views advocated by most of the liberal establishment.
This interpretation looks at the Second Amendment with repugnance, but
unable to ignore it's presence, interprets it as being in place for the
protection of sport and recreational shooters. This was actually put forth
in defense of the assault rifle ban, along with much other gun legislation,
that these arms have no legitimate sporting use. The Fifth Amendment has
been interpreted as a protection extended to criminals, to the extent that
a criminal caught in the act may not even be charged if procedural mistakes
are made during apprehension. At the same time it's application to the
property rights of law abiding citizens has been ignored, particularly
with regard to environmental issues and policies regarding eminent domain.
It is actually possible that modern liberalism has embraced a policy by
which freedom to express opinion, responsibility for individual security,
and freedom to have the use, enjoyment, and dominion over our own property
are held in such low regard that it's followers can not imagine these rights
being protected by the Constitution. So according to our friends on the
left, the fathers of this country rebelled against legal authority, fought
a war in which many were killed, and threw an entire continent into chaos
and hardship so that they could draft a constitution which would let them
utter vulgarities, read pornography, go hunting, commit crimes with impunity,
and participate in popularity contests to decide who would run their lives.
Recently a sports figure has been suspended
and fined for making a remark which some have considered to be racist.
What is interesting about this is that it was taken so seriously when compared
to the flippant attitude taken regarding the criminal activities of so
many other sports figures. There are athletes who use and deal drugs, who
commit violent acts including assault, and rape, and who, in general, behave
as thugs both on and off the court or the playing field. A player can choke
his coach, threaten fans, and fire a gun into a building without arousing
much indignation or incurring any professional censure, but heaven help
him if he gives any indication that he disagrees with the current enlightened
positions held by the liberal press or politicians. The player in question
gave voice to a personal opinion, which he has the right to do. Naturally
I do not care for racial divisiveness, but this seems to be a tactic more
often used for effect by our friends on the left than anything that could
be considered part of conservatism.
Interestingly enough, though the supreme court found
that restrictions on abortion were a province of the individual states,
there is nothing in the Constitution regarding abortion. The decision of
the high court was made on the basis that the issues were too muddled (is
a fetus a person, and so is abortion murder?) for a comprehensive decision
to be made by the nation as a whole, and that the states should regulate
abortion. Though there is nothing in the Constitution about abortion there
is certainly a reference to free speech, and there is no muddle about this
at all; it is definite and without any trace of ambiguity. An individual,
even a sports figure, has a right to say what he wishes, and the whole
point of having rights guaranteed by a constitution is that said right
should be inviolate and not dependent on the whim of particular groups
or individuals. The case of Marge Schotz a few years ago was similar, and
similarly driven. In neither case were the remarks meant to be disparaging,
though this would make no difference in the constitutionality of the matter.
These were simple statements of opinion, and of perceived fact, and yet
despite Constitutional protections, a pretty vigorous persecution of these
individuals was allowed. I wonder what would have happened had Marge Schotz
been a younger woman who, instead of making a remark considered offensive
by some, had had an abortion performed. In such a case, what would have
been the reaction had she been fined and suspended for this. There would
have been a storm of outrage at this shocking event, from the ranks of
the intellectual left.
So we are not, according to the left, allowed free
expression of opinion, firearms ownership for defense, or security of our
property, but surely freedom of religion is written into the Constitution.
Like many liberal interpretations of freedom, this is presented as a guaranty
of freedom from religion, rather than freedom of it. This part of
the Constitution has been used to remove school prayer, delete references
to God from public documents, slogans, and ceremonies, and in general try
to ban, discourage, and diminish religious beliefs, or at least discredit
them. This has also been used vigorously in an attempt to block freedom
of choice in schools. The anti religious bias is understandable considering
the belief set of the left. Religion sets forth a standard of behavior,
principle, and morality to which all are accountable and responsible. This
has set the left against what they like to refer to as the religious right,
time after time. The major battles have generally taken place over abortion,
immorality, and homosexuality (which the religious right considers a form
of immorality), but there have been other minor disagreements. The biggest
problem with religion is that it sets forth the belief that there is one
set of standards and one higher authority set above even the government
and the progressive policies which the left tries to impose through it.
These people can recognize no authority or set of standards above their
own, and even the suggestion of such a thing is as disturbing to them now
as it was to the groups who conspired with the government to have Christ
killed 2000 years ago.
So there you have it. This is what liberalism contrives
to make of us, an immoral, irresponsible, indecisive people, concerned
only with shallow self indulgence, and unable to direct our own lives.
People such as this are certainly not fit to own or carry guns. There have
always been these types of people in the world, but never have these traits
been encouraged, and treated as virtues, at least not in a nation which
has lasted for any length of time afterward.