Gun control: in crisis there is opportunity
As you can see from today’s headlines on memeorandum, the Parkland shootings are being used as a springboard for advocates of more gun control.
This is hardly unusual; it’s regularly done after each such event. Some would say these tragedies are exploited by the left, and that the Parkland students appearing on talk show after talk show to plead their gun control cases are being exploited as well.
Well, they’re certainly being used. But Democratic and leftist causes advance from the use of emotion to drive policy, and these are real emotions of grief, anguish, and anger that the students have. The point is that adults are supposed to be driven by something else: facts and knowledge, preferably knowledge of reality, history, and liberty. Students are in school to learn those things because they are presumed not to know them yet, and adults are there to teach them.
But in recent years it seems there’s been less and less of that going on.
If you think about the Vietnam protest years, that was driven by students, too—college students for the most part, but sometimes high school students as well. How many of the protestors (I include myself here, although the only protest I really attended was the march on DC in the fall of 1969) knew much of anything about geopolitical reality, history, wars hot andor cold, the actual feelings of the South Vietnamese people, or really much of anything except the frightening specter of the draft that was facing them or their siblings and friends?
And yet we had a combination of emotions—heartfelt, life-shaking emotions, because it was all a potential matter of life and death to us—and propaganda by the left and the MSM. It was a combination that ultimately led to the end of the draft and our pullout from Vietnam. Both things had consequences for the US and the world (not just for Vietnam), and included the knowledge on the part of all subsequent foreign actors and enemies that the mighty United States could be defeated by a combination of tenacity, propaganda, and emotion.
The right is not averse to using emotion, either. It’s just that the emotions are different and the policy positions often end up on the other side of each issue. For example, the left would say (and does say) that the right uses fear of the Other, the stranger—xenophobia—to set immigration policy. The right disagrees. I’m not arguing the merits here; I’m just pointing out the competing arguments.
Because I tend to be more simpatico with the causes of the right, liberty (as in the right to bear arms) means a great deal to me. As an emotional person, I also would deeply love for schools to be even safer than they are now (which, factually and statistically speaking, is fairly safe already). One such death is too many for me. But I believe the best solutions lie mostly in the approach of the right rather than the left, and I believe that in taking that position I’m relying more on history and facts than on emotion.
The left, of course, would differ.
[NOTE: However, I happen to be somewhat in favor of the expansion of gun control to include some form of red flag laws. This might even be an issue on which many on left and right could agree.]
Shooters feel safe to kill in Gun Free Zones. Proposed by Biden, signed into law by Bush the Elder. One would think this law would be changed, given how many have died as a result. Yet I see no bills for Trump to sign.
How did we become so stupid?
Cruz and people like Cruz might be effectively neutered by a point system. Multiple disturbance calls and mental issue referrals might not in any instance ever add up to a serious offense. But the sheer number could still work like a point system.
It’s ridiculous in such cases to wait until you finally have a major offense and tragedy.
Not to worry, the NRA is on the job:
One thing that strikes me as different with the Children’s Crusade approach these days is that I get a strong sense of adult puppetmasters behind the scenes.
Maybe I’m wrong about the Parkland kids, but it’s hard for me to believe they got organized this quickly to get out in front of cameras and make demands without the guidance of woke teachers, parents and media people back in the shadows.
The anti-war student protests of the Vietnam era were much more of a grassroots phenomenon which piggybacked onto the energies of the already strong civil rights movement, what was left of the ban-the-bomb movement and the strengthening pacifistic hippie movement.
The anti-war youth movement had little adult supervision. There were some college professors, religious folk, and celebrities who made common cause but the anti-war movement was mostly on its own and preferred it that way. “Don’t trust anyone over 30” was a New Left overstatement but had more than a kernel of truth.
Of course the woke teachers of today are either aging veterans of the anti-war New Left or its direct inheritors.
“Red flag laws aim to fix this by giving family members and law enforcement officers the ability to petition the court to temporarily seize the firearms of someone believed to be at risk. If a judge is convinced that the person poses a danger, they can quickly order them to surrender their firearms. Within a few weeks, the court holds a full hearing on whether the restrictions should be dropped or extended for up a year. The gun owner has opportunities to petition to have their weapons returned.”
Emphasis added.
Can these laws help reduce suicide and murder?
Almost certainly.
But what about the negative consequences (unintended, and not-so-un)?
The reason that such laws have been slow-walked in many cases is the not-unreasonable fear that the “temporary” will become permanent, and the “few weeks” morph into “lots of months” — while an unjustly targeted gun-owner spends time and money fighting against ideologically motivated judges and personally vindictive complainants.
If you think that won’t happen here, I refer you to Mr. Mueller and his current investigation, as well as the drift of “common sense” laws about asset forfeiture, child protective services, Title IX, etc. from the original rational intent to the wildly oppressive implementation we have seen take place.
Carefully crafted legislation and vigilant oversight of prosecutors and judges might make it work, but we seem to lose the zeal for all of that after awhile.
I like to point out that the late great USSR banned guns. No gun for you, comrade. When the USSR collapsed we got a look at the crime statistics and they had a murder rate twice the USA rate. Naturally, they had a very low murder rate using guns but they had high murder rates using knives, clubs, rocks, strangulation, stomping, etc. The lack of guns was no impediment to murder. The USSR was like Chicago, a gun ban and a high murder rate.
A couple of posts on the current shooting case (I haven’t researched them all, but just to get out of the MSM bubble).
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2018/02/19/school-shooting-was-outcome-of-broward-county-school-board-policy-now-local-and-national-politicians-weaponize-kids-for-ideological-intents/comment-page-4/#comment-5038860
https://bigleaguepolitics.com/mother-exploited-shooting-survivor-turns-cnn-vip-anti-trump-activist/
https://nypost.com/2018/02/17/school-shooters-brother-committed-to-mental-facility/
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2018/02/20/no-cnn-commentator-the-nra-didnt-train-the-florida-shooter-thats-a-total-gar-n2451732
“The JROTC program has been around for decades, it’s a federally funded program sponsored by the armed forces that the NRA happens to dole out grants for regarding marksmanship exercises. So, the military is now being put in the crosshairs of the progressive media slime machine to push for the Second Amendment’s abolishment? It’s absolutely pathetic.”
* * *
And of course, these three heroic young people were also “funded by the NRA” in exactly the same way as the shooter.
https://www.axios.com/army-awards-heroism-medal-to-three-parkland-students-1eccc7ed-a7ce-4502-b6cd-f47ae5b3f8be.html
“The U.S. Army awarded Medals of Heroism to 15-year-old Peter Wang and two 14-year-olds, Alaina Petty and Martin Duque who were killed in the Parkland, Florida shooting, Buzzfeed reports.
They were all members of the Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps and the Army is presenting their parents with the medals at each of their memorial services.
Wang was killed in his ROTC uniform and held a door open so that others could escape from the shooter, according to his cousin.”
* * *
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2018/02/gun-control-hysteria-sweeps-the-left.php
“nstead of addressing these mental health and law enforcement issues intelligently, the Left has peddled misleading statistics and outright lies in order to push its anti-gun narrative. CBS News, for example, absurdly claimed that it is easier to buy an “assault rifle” in Florida than to buy cold medicine:”
* * *
Peddling false news in hysterical tirades is guaranteed to make gun-rights supporters wary of any “solutions” suggested in the aftermath of a shooting, even “common sense” ones like the Red Flag Laws and David French’s “restraining order” — which I would personally support, but only if carefully drafted and having sufficient oversight of prosecutors and judges, and even then in the full recognition that they will drift toward suppression of all gun-rights eventually, because we’ve watched “weaponized justice” in action for many years now, and know how that happens.
Maybe I’m wrong about the Parkland kids, but it’s hard for me to believe they got organized this quickly to get out in front of cameras and make demands without the guidance of woke teachers, parents and media people back in the shadows.
They didn’t. There most certainly is an effort behind the scenes to push for gun control. The difference is that this time, there is much more coverage and political wailing going on than in times past. The difference? Trump. While he’s president, anything that was a problem before is going to portrayed as 100 times worse.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2018/02/childrens-crusade-2018.php
“Today, left-wing organizers will lead high school students into the Florida legislature, where they will demand that old chestnut, a ban on AR-15 style rifles. It isn’t clear why anyone thinks 15-to-18-year-old kids have any special insight into the issues relating to mass murders by the mentally ill, but of course that won’t stop the left. One wonders whether the young people who will harangue Florida legislators even know that an “assault weapons” ban was tried a couple of decades ago, and was allowed to lapse because it was a complete failure. One wonders, too, how many of them know that the rifle is the least popular of murder weapons, ranking, according to the FBI’s statistics, well below knives, shotguns, blunt objects and bare hands.”
(discussion of other aspects of the case follow, well summarized)
“These are all legitimate issues, but I’ve seen no indication that Florida liberals are encouraging their child crusaders to talk about any of them. Nor do I expect to hear anything about these issues from the other young people who are now being organized by liberals in various states around the country.”
The NRA just keeps plugging away — from this past December:
Expansion of gun control? It is to laugh.
CNN Int interviewed an Occupy Wall Street organizer about the shooting. They are obviously trying to get all activists worked up about this. What next–BLM and Antifa.
I consider what they are doing to be child abuse of the students. I remember when a friend’s mother died when I was in college (senior year). Some in our circle had never been to a funeral, and when she returned to school, they were completely unable to talk to her or even listen to her about what she was going through. These school kids need some time and lots of help to process what happened. They don’t need CNN interviews. One session with a grief counselor isn’t going to do it. They need lots of grown ups who can help mentor them through life.
A great black humor scene in the “Breaking Bad” show was when the principal hands Walter White a microphone to speak as a teacher at a high school assembly where they are processing collective grief in the aftermath of a deadly aircraft collision over Albuquerque.
Walter is caught by surprise and gives a useless, rambling speech. After a couple minutes the principal interrupts him and mercifully takes back the mic.
What only Walter and the show’s audience know is that Walter is indirectly responsible for the collision and deaths.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-8FB6k8jik
Which is about how I feel when it comes to therapeutic group exercises after a tragedy.
But, but, but the NRA, and Trump, Trump, Trump. My feels….
Those who blame the NRA know little or nothing about the NRA. The NRA is a not for profit orrganization that promotes marksmanship training and firearm safety training. It has an affliated for profit organization that engages in lobbying and, for example, has produced a federal law that requires a felon caught in possesion of a fiream to receive a minimum sentence of 5 years. Unfortunately, prosecutors routinely ignore this law and rarely seek prosecution. The NRA also supports strongly enforcing existing laws that would mandate reporting to the NICs system all convincted of domestic abuse or those with mental health issues. Reporting at the local, state, and federal levels is a hit or miss affair.
The idea that the NRA is reckless and irresponsible is a false narrative.. Focusing on the cosmetics of a rifle is just plain silly, there are various rifles that are capable of firing characteristics similar to the ‘evil’ AR15. Firearms are not the problem. If you do not recognize the real issues involved. well, you are lazy.
BTW, I do not own a semiauto rifle. I do own one semiauto handgun which accepts a 7 round magazine. But I know the ultimate agenda of the left which in plain language is disarm the peasants. Because the left is dishonest about their agenda, and because 99% of them are willfully ignorant about firearms in general; there can be no real conversation with them. Of course the lie, after lie, after lie does not help.
There are a few issues where I disagree with the NRA, the first one that comesto mind is the so called bumpstock. As a member I let them know when I disagree, but over all, to me the NRA is a necessary organization that does a lot of good things.
When current gun laws are being regularly enforced, at both the Federal and State levels… THEN we can talk about the pros and cons of “Red Flag Laws”.
Until then, it’s a propagandistic dog and pony show designed to build public support for incremental gun confiscation.
And parker is entirely correct about the NRA, while Ann has clearly swallowed the Left’s kool-aid.
Leave us alone, don’t mess with our stuff, an average NRA guy. Let us have our Bibles, Bullets and Bourbon and leave us alone, the guns we own are not shooting us schools, churches and music events. Leave us alone, if we ever have to use our guns for self defense a lot of us are proficient. Let us be and leave us alone, the NRA is not now, has not been and never will be your enemy.
GB…right on the money.
Here’s a piece from Mitsu, an occasional commenter here, replying to a liberal who was leaving liberal groupthink on gun control.
I can’t make much sense of it. Does New York City really feel safer than most of the country? Doesn’t Mitsu realize automatic weapons are already banned? Do mass shootings really deserve special attention, as opposed to, say, ongoing gangbanger slaughter? Plus I’m not sure of his statistics.
I think mass shootings deserve special attention because they are a category of violence which has the tendency to be far more random than other categories of homicide. In other words, reducing the rate of stranger homicide greatly increases the predictability and stability of one’s life: which is why New York City feels so safe today compared to most other parts of the country: overall homicide rates are low, but stranger homicide has fallen to extremely low levels (e.g., there was one year recently in which Manhattan had zero stranger homicides). Mass shootings are very frequently stranger homicides and for that reason have a disproportionate psychological effect which I believe is not entirely unwarranted. Yes, we have an overall homicide rate far in excess of that of other industrialized nations: but also a mass shooting rate far in excess of other industrialized nations.
Banning, for instance, automatic weapons seems to be an obvious measure which even the NRA supports: and banning bump stocks or other modifications which convert semiautomatic weapons to automatic weapons similarly is a no brainer. Politically viable and sensible. I would go further and ban semiautomatic weapons beyond a certain effective range, in general, though that seems to be politically unviable at present.
Consider for instance the impact of the Vegas shooting: what do you think the effect is going to be on outdoor festivals near tall buildings? It changes one’s concept of personal safety, with I believe widespread psychological and social consequences far in excess of the raw numbers killed: it removes your sense of control over risk. Stranger homicide is a special category which deserves to be singled out.
https://medium.com/@syntheticzero/i-think-mass-shootings-deserve-special-attention-because-they-are-a-category-of-violence-which-has-5931fd2c7786
4chan tells ABC News that Nick Cruz is a member of a white supremacist group: GET THIS STORY OUT RIGHT NOW NO NEED FOR A FACT CHECK
NY Post discovers Nick Cruz has an African-American half-brother that went target shooting with him: BURY THIS STORY, DOES NOT FIT THE NARRATIVE
A nice essay on the right to, and need for, self defense.
(The original includes many links which do not show up here.)
https://shadow.affsdiary.com/2018/02/22/the-right-to-self-defence/
“…
The right to self defence is the defence of the person — the right to be able to say “NO I AM NOT LESS THAN YOU — even if you try to beat me down I WILL NOT SUBMIT!”
It isn’t just with guns, despite the common idea that this is the case — it’s also the right to fight back. It is the right to defend those under your care, and to take the responsibility that you have been entrusted — especially true for teachers. Parents entrust their children to schools, with the reasonable expectation that the adults will look after them.
You cannot defend those under your care if you have less capacity to do so than an attacker. And contrary to common belief, disarmament only results in more vulnerable victims. I’m small and tough, but I am also small and easily overpowered; especially if facing more than one opponent. I am only intact because my response to the violence I’ve been given is to become even more violent and terrifying far out of proportion to my size. Because I valued me more than valuing the other person who thought it’s acceptable to attack me.
I am not alone in that belief. I am not LESS than my attacker — that person does not have the right to beat on me unopposed and without resistance. And it is especially telling that a survivor of the Columbine Shooting thinks this too — that the children in schools shouldn’t be sitting targets. Guns are not the only weapon available, make no mistake — a car is just as deadly, if not worse, a weapon — just look at how often that common item is used in terrorist attacks. Yet no calls for ‘car control’ are made. But preventative measures that rely on people present at places where the vulnerable are do work — it’s just not as reported in the media because it doesn’t serve their agenda. They choose to ignore that multiple laws in place that should have prevented shootings were not properly followed, which resulted in the criminals getting weapons. if we cannot expect the law to be followed despite so many warnings, reports and red flags, (and we do not reasonably expect criminals to follow laws, we have working brains) then the only people who the people can count on are themselves, and those willing to protect others.
More schools are following the Israeli Method of protecting their students, that gun free zones only protect the criminals looking for unprotected targets. Standing your ground to fight and protect is not a wrong, it is the correct thing to do when faced with someone or something that wishes to end your life or those around you.
You deserve to live. You deserve to survive. There is nothing wrong with fighting for your life. There is nothing wrong in protecting yourself, your loved ones, and those around you.
Don’t let someone else declare you are less worthy of life. Beware those who think they deserve more protection than you do, with things they don’t believe you should have. They want you unprotected for a reason, and that reason is never good for you.”
I think allowing school officials to red flag students with discipline problems or safety concerns is the way to go. I’m not really willing to consider bans based on age, which is another idea floating out there.
Of course there will be some abuse and cases of people dropping the ball. This is the government we’re talking about. There’s always a trade-off.
Naturally, I also support having armed security, medal detectors and spot checks at schools. With a few measures like that, I think we can decrease mass shootings, and take some pressure off the 2nd amendment.
If you think about the Vietnam protest years, that was driven by students, too–college students for the most part, but sometimes high school students as well.
They were driven by the KGB disinformation operations. The students convinced themselves and others that they were the leaders of the movement.
They were driven by the KGB disinformation operations. The students convinced themselves and others that they were the leaders of the movement.
Just like Putin elected Trump!
More seriously, just about everyone my age knew guys our age who went to Vietnam and returned dead or broken.
The war had been going on since we were in primary school. Although our leaders were constantly assuring us that the war was necessary and we were about to win if only we would put more friends in harm’s way — or even ourselves if male — the war kept going and so did the dying.
We didn’t need KGB disinformation to notice this.
Ymar sakar:
Who was behind the demonstrators is actually irrelevant for the purposes of this post. Whether people agree with you or not, the point I was making in the post has to do with the public face that pressured and drove politicians to abandon the war, and the public face that both reflected and influenced public opinion, that then pressured politicians.
There were adults, too, of course, both in front of the cameras and behind the scenes. That’s not what I was pointing out. The kids—teens and young adults—were the public drivers of the antiwar movement, and they demonstrated en masse.
Aesopfan, above at 12:40 —
Bravo!
Just like Putin elected Trump!
That does not follow the logic.
Who was behind the demonstrators is actually irrelevant for the purposes of this post.
I take that to mean who is behind the people control and utilizing a crisis as opportunity is irrelevant as to the purposes of this post.
However, that’s just wrong. Since there is opportunity in a crisis, there is a method to the logic and madness.
Repeating the age old status quo belief that anti war movements were run by students and grassroots, rather than the truth that most of them were astroturf organizations funded by domestic and foreign powers, isn’t going to get to the heart of the opportunities available in people control: aka gun control.
the public face that both reflected and influenced public opinion, that then pressured politicians.
The order of events doesn’t go quite that way around. The presupposition is that the elected officials are elected and thus invested with the power to decide matters of policy.
Since the Demoncrats were already allies of Marxist Russia, wars including Vietnam were already predetermined in advance that the US had to lose and retreat. The anti war “student movements” were thus the pretexts that the politicians needed, yes, but it was not the people pressuring the politicians. That was more of a byproduct of the original crisis opportunity.
The kids–teens and young adults–were the public drivers of the antiwar movement, and they demonstrated en masse.
As reported by the MSM propagandists, yes. Most of that was an illusion cooked up to create the reality.
We didn’t need KGB disinformation to notice this.
Without defectors like Yuri Bezmenov and other presentations, Americans would think the MSM and the people noticed many things. In truth, they noticed not a thing but were made to notice and think in certain patterns. It is called manipulation and Americans are not used to the anti pride concept that they can be manipulated. Especially the “youths” that grew up with a social paradigm mostly constructed by astroturf and MSM propaganda that they believe is “high functioning thinking”.
Also, for those Americans not conscious enough to get it, without MSM propaganda, they would not know how many IED attacks happened in Iraq on a daily basis. They knew this in 2005-2007, because the MSM propagandists made sure to mention it so that Americans would notice it on a daily basis.
However, what are the daily casualties for Afghanistan from IEDs and other issues, during Hussein’s era…
Yes, I’m sure Americans tell themselves that they “notice” casualties. It’s mostly a pride filled shame of course. They don’t notice anything except what they are made to notice by the powers that be in the USA. It is easier to convince a con artist to stop his cons than to convince a mark that they were fooled.