Category: gun control

I Have Come to a Grimm Realization

Wow.

I was preparing a response to a Facebook post, and came to a horrible conclusion.

The post was one of those images that said: “Why is the 2nd Amendment the only one that requires a permit.”

This is what I realized.

The 1st Amendment:
The Speech, Assembly, and Journalism clauses are (by “law”) a fast track to the terror watch list.

The 2nd Amendment is highly contentious, but it really does tend to get trampled.

The 3rd Amendment… Well, this one is pretty much the only one that is good to go. I guess it is because it would be SUPER obvious if they fucked with this one.

The 4th Amendment gets new wholes poked in it every few days. There is a constant, gradual, erosion of the definition of reasonable.

The 5th Amendment, thanks to a recent court decision, is admissible as evidence in a court of law. Pleading the 5th now has the same legal impact as pleading guilty.

The 6th Amendment has been questionably enforced darned near from the start. Impartial is often active fought against by lawyers, and peers has rarely been enforced.

The 8th Amendment is a crap shoot at best. It is pretty much entirely at the whim of the judge to decide what is appropriate, as well as what is cruel and unusual.

The 9th Amendment is pretty much ignored by law makers in its entirety. It is almost as if it doesn’t even exist.

The 10th Amendment has been up for dispute pretty solidly… And the rights of the people presented there? I am not sure if that line would have even made it into the constitution if it were drafted at any point after 1900.

So, yeah, the 2nd Amendment gets abused, but it is far from the only one. The bulk of the Bill of Rights is pretty much under constant attack.

It is ok to have pet issues. It is ok to focus your energies on fighting for a single issue, or a few issues. Just don’t burry the other issues in the process. Do not make light of other issues or pretend they don’t exist.

Fight your fight, but don’t make it harder for your neighbor to fight their fight either. When it comes time to stand together, you don’t want to have to question if you are on the same team or not.

We are Freaking Out Over Nonsense

So… I see a trend, and it is not just on the right.

People are picking up on “scandals” and “outrages” that are being fed to them by their respective “wings” of the media.

People are getting all worked up on little things that are at most slights, and offenses.

People are freaking out over things that are flat out not true and have been debunked a thousand times over, because their favorite pundit is still pushing the issue.

You know what else is happening as a result?

It is a heck of a lot easier for the media to conveniently overlook some pretty heinous stuff. It is a heck of a lot easier for the media to run horse and pony shows while the real news is overlooked, ignored, or worst yet, flat out changed.

Stephen Colbert has a slogan for his show: “When news breaks, we fix it.” There is a reason for this. He is a satirist, and that is how he sees the real “news” media most of the time.

If we are taking the horse and pony show, and seeing it as real news; If we are accepting all the little nit picking details as controversy; then it is a hell of a lot easier for the media outlets to feed us the party line. It is a lot easier for them to make out normal people as criminals and heroes as villains.

We have wars going on that are not legal under international law. These wars are only called wars when it is convenient, such as when they want to invoke the espionage act.

We have secret laws: you know the thing that once sent famous politicians into a frenzy because they were introduced in other countries. These secret laws are being used to clamp down on first, fourth, and fifth amendments.

We have journalists under investigation by the FBI and CIA for… Yeah, journalism. Peaceful activists are on FBI watch lists, and potential whistle blowers dare not speak up without fleeing the country first (or at least preparing to do so).

Let me ask you this: What is a bigger issue, protecting your already existing right to say “Merry Christmas” that no one is trying to take away, or the fact that pretty much all of our online communications and the meta-data on all of our phone calls is being stored away in a massive database out in the desert? Now, which one have you heard more about on the news?

Don’t Politicize This?

This kind of boiled over in response to the commentary in a thread on FaceBook. Someone posted a picture that was commenting on the behavior of a politician, and someone else took it to mean that the person was being super pro-gun, and he didn’t like it.

What ensued was an argument on gun control, with people stepping in to scream “More Guns,” and “Guns Bad,” and of course, the ever present “Calm down!”

I think I need to find time to sit down, and start putting my ideas on paper and working through them and such.

One thing, from my perspective, is that we need to do something. Even if we cannot do everything, we need to do what we can.

I don’t think that “taking away all the guns,” is the right answer. Neither is a total free for all.

The problem is that the only time there is any public will to discuss the issue is when something like this happens, and it is in the public eye. The only time there is any political will to talk about the issue is when there is the public will.

Any time something like this does happen though, three factions come forward immediately whose only solid task in the grand scheme of things is to distract from the issue in a three pronged attack, until the public will dissipates (Americans have the attention span of squirrels).

Group one screams from the rooftops “GUN CONTROL, ALL GUNS ARE BAD.”

Group two declares loudly and proudly “IF THERE WERE MORE GUNS THIS WOULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED.”

Group three, and they are the most dangerous because they pretend to be the “moderate” and “the voice of reason,” says “WE CAN’T POLITICIZE THIS, IT WOULD BE WRONG! DON’T TALK ABOUT IT!”

The truth is, the moment it happens it is politicized. The truth is, something does need to happen. The truth is that taking away all guns would be just as bad as a free for all.

We do need to talk about it.

We need to talk about it rationally. We need to think it through. We need to look at all the issues, not just the ones that we like.

We need to look at the fact that the second amendment is there for a reason.

We need to look at the fact that there are states where you can’t prevent a diagnosed psychopath form getting a gun.

We need to look at the fact that even in states with reasonable gun laws, there are loopholes.

Background checks, cool down periods, license requirements, and educational requirements: These are all good things. They help to keep the majority of guns out of the hands of idiots and the mentally ill. Ok, maybe it doesn’t keep them out of the hands of idiots, but it helps to make sure they know what they are doing.

People who do things like what happened on Friday are mentally ill in most cases. In most cases they got their guns completely legally. In most cases, no laws were violated until people started to die. This needs to be looked at.

In many cases, the people in question were being treated for various disorders. They were still able to get guns.

In some cases, they got the guns from relatives who had them legally, and just didn’t keep them locked up very well (again, an education issue).

So, yeah, there is an issue that needs to be discussed, and all sides need to bring their ideas to the table.

We need to look at the issue of guns.

We need to look at the state of mental health care in our country.

We need to look at the issue of education on gun ownership AND gun rights.

We need to recognize that the 2nd Amendment serves a purpose, but that it does not impose upon us a duty to ignore the obvious.

For those who are screaming “WE NEED MORE GUNS,” grow up, learn about society, and look around.

For those who are screaming “BAN ALL GUNS,” read a history book. Read the constitution. Learn about what was going on in the lives of the men who wrote the constitution.

For those who are screaming “DON’T POLITICIZE THIS!” Well, you don’t want to be at the table anyway. Either make yourself useful, or stay out of the way.