My latest column is up at the Chronicle–and, with any luck, will be my final column about guns and their control (a thoroughly exhausting topic). From here on out it’s nothing but puppies with lightsabers!
The Ann Arbor Chronicle | In It For The Money: Brawling About Guns
Maybe more to the point, I can have a deep and genuine affection for guns, and still believe that maybe it’s time that we get past our core American notion – one effectively enshrined in the Second Amendment – that violence is a valid and respectable solution to our problems.
We characterize “debate” as a rational process of sorting competing ideas, but it isn’t. In America, “debate” is just another word for “brawl.” No one learns a new point of view when they are jumped in an alley or hop into the monkey knife fighting pit; you show up with what you’ve got, and pound on each other until someone flees or collapses.
If you are about to take exception to this characterization, then riddle me this: If you are “rational” and “pro-gun control,” then why the hell aren’t you already familiar with the SCotUS 2007 opinions? Isn’t an understanding of the current state of the Second Amendment sorta-kinda vital to “debating” about the Second Amendment?
And if you “rationally support gun rights” – likely because of personal safety issues – then why aren’t you already concerned that guns appear to protect people once for every two times they hurt someone? Would you take meds your physician prescribed while noting nonchalantly, “Oh, FYI, if these pills do anything at all, there’s a 64% chance they’ll hurt or kill you, and an unknown – but very high – likelihood they’ll do nothing. But they might also save your life. Maybe. We haven’t really done the research on that. Make sure to drink plenty of fluids!”
. . .
We characterize “debate” as a rational process of sorting competing ideas, but it isn’t. In America, “debate” is just another word for “brawl.” No one learns a new point of view when they are jumped in an alley or hop into the monkey knife fighting pit; you show up with what you’ve got, and pound on each other until someone flees or collapses.
If you are about to take exception to this characterization, then riddle me this: If you are “rational” and “pro-gun control,” then why the hell aren’t you already familiar with the SCotUS 2007 opinions? Isn’t an understanding of the current state of the Second Amendment sorta-kinda vital to “debating” about the Second Amendment?
And if you “rationally support gun rights” – likely because of personal safety issues – then why aren’t you already concerned that guns appear to protect people once for every two times they hurt someone? Would you take meds your physician prescribed while noting nonchalantly, “Oh, FYI, if these pills do anything at all, there’s a 64% chance they’ll hurt or kill you, and an unknown – but very high – likelihood they’ll do nothing. But they might also save your life. Maybe. We haven’t really done the research on that. Make sure to drink plenty of fluids!”
. . .