A Day In The Anti-Life - Guns 'N Poses!

As a patriotic American citizen I well and truly support the Second Amendment, the one that gives all citizens the right to bear arms. It's a right which in its purist form leads to an anarchy of sorts, but within the confines of the other nine Amendments and the Constitution as a whole can be balanced successfully. I'm not one of those folks who blames guns for shooting incidents, but that said without access to certain tools, then certain jobs would be much more difficult. The shooting-de-jour is singular in that the targets of the attack this time are not random citizens but political leaders. No one was killed aside from the shooter himself and that seems to have been something of a real stroke of luck that armed defenders were on hand to step in and solve the problem. So those who suggest that no guns are the answer don't face up the reality of our place and times. Guns are tools, and like any tool must be used for what they intended. So just like I keep a tire iron in my car for emergencies, I see that having access to weapon of greater potency might be useful. I don't need to have it myself, even though that's allowable, but I do want access to it through surrogates.

In the United States today we seem to divide ourselves into camps, "tribes" is the word in common parlance lately, and some of those camps are armed. But while the need for guns is indisputable, the use of guns to attempt to bring about political change is an order of the last resort. But the United States itself is the result of armed rebellion, and civil conflict was necessary to keep the States together. We use military might to protect the economy and the more ethereal freedoms we enjoy. Guns are not going away. But that some see a need to resort to them today domestically points to a desperation and a chipping away of the social fabric. We've now had pretty much three full decades of "I've-got-mine-fuck-you" as the ascending credo of our society. The social contract which was bonded onto our society after the economic collapse of the 30's and the common cause conflict of the 40's is tattered. The poor are poor because they are weak and the rich are rich because they are strong. That's an attitude which has leached into our political debates. The down and out are left to fend for themselves and then are told their troubles are the result of their low character. A nation which some yearn to label a Christian one, seems to have Christian charity low on its priority list.

None of this is said to justify any behavior. There is no justification for taking up arms against innocents -- and that holds true for innocents in foreign lands who fall victim to missile strikes. But since those victims are not couched in a comfortable suburban community we are not shocked by those innocent killings. We accept them as collateral damage, arguably the most heinous phrase in modern lingo. From the deranged perspective of the political revolutionary, the deaths of a few Congressmen on a baseball field might be labeled collateral damage. From that misguided perspective which is able to alienate itself from the common humanity of fellow citizens, there are justified killings. It's ludicrous and many will properly label it "evil". But let's not be too smug about that evil as we pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off and thank the stars the republic still stands. The whirlwind is still with us.

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