An armed society is a polite society

[Willie Escalade]

Another article sent to me...

http://truth-out.org/buzzflash/comme...polite-society
____________________
WILLIAM RIVERS PITT FOR BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT

"If only one of the teachers had a gun..."

One did. She owned several, in fact. Her son used them to kill her, her colleagues, and 20 children.

...so you'll pardon me if my respect for the "Responsible Gun Ownership" argument has taken a long walk off a short pier.

I know I know I know I know, you own an AK-47 or an AR-15 and the world didn't end...because you're responsible, right?

Is everyone you know responsible? Everyone with even fleeting access to your "Arsenal of Freedom"? Is everyone who might rob your home responsible?

...pssst...

You don't need an assault weapon. You really really really don't.

You're going to defend yourself against a government that has nuclear weapons, stealth bombers, drones, SEALs and the United States fa-chrissakes Marine Corps with your piddly-ass AR-15? Good luck with that; send me a note from the front.

Grow up.

You don't need it. You want it. End of file.

Your right to bear whatever fantastically lethal thing you set your cap to is infringing upon everyone else's right not to die in another God damned bloodbath.

You don't need it.

You want it.

There's a difference.

And that's the beginning of real reform, if you decide to accept it.

Make the very Christian decision that you will, in fact, be your brother's and sister's keeper.

You don't need an AR-15 or an AK-47.

You just want it.

Other people want them, too. See: Newtown.

Exert a little self-control over your desires. Your ability to responsibly enjoy an AR-15 is NO LONGER argument enough to defend their wide, wild availability.

This is not rocket science. This is basic humanity, and enlightened self-interest.

The old saying goes, "An armed society is a polite society."

Well, we've been an armed society - 300 million guns and counting - for a long while now.

I'm sure everyone will be very polite at the 20 funerals for those 20 kids.

Mission accomplished.

[Odelay]

Glenn Reynolds, an A-list conservative blogger speaks to this issue with a quote from the past:

“After a shooting spree,” author William Burroughs once said, “they always want to take the guns away from the people who didn’t do it.” Burroughs continued: “I sure as hell wouldn’t want to live in a society where the only people allowed guns are the police and the military.”

In case you didn't know, or had forgot, William Burroughs along with Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsburg sort of defined and created the whole Beat Generation back in the 1950's. He's also famous for this:

Their life in Mexico City was not especially happy. One September afternoon in 1951, they began to drink with friends. Eventually, Mr. Burroughs, who was quite drunk, took a handgun out of his travel bag and told his wife, ”It’s time for our William Tell act.” There never had been a William Tell act, but his wife laughed and put a water glass on her head. Mr. Burroughs fired the gun. The bullet entered her brain through her forehead, killing her instantly.

As I said in another thread, these bloggers making ridiculous arguments are not to be taken seriously. Reynolds can't even scare up a good historical quote from a responsible gun owner.

[robertlouis]

Why not take it one step further and make it compulsory for every citizen to be provided at government expense with a weapon as a gift for their birth to be kept in the crib so they can get used to it and then train them in its use once they've acquired basic motor skills? Makes for maximum safety.

Same logic.....

[robertlouis]

Just in case anyone comes after me for being a sanctimonious Brit who doesn't understand the issues, just let me add that I almost certainly have more indirect experience of the effects of an event like Newtown than most if not everyone on this board.

My aunt was a teacher at the primary school in Dunblane in Scotland in 1996 when Thomas Hamilton made his way into the school and shot dead 16 children and one teacher. My aunt was able to save all her pupils except one who had gone to the toilet and was shot in the corridor. That one death will haunt her for the rest of her days. She has never worked since and took early retirement when it was offered. My aunt was a robust, outgoing, fun person. She is now prematurely aged and incredibly nervous. Should she have been armed? Don't be fucking stupid!

That horrific event means that the UK, and Scotland under its semi-independent government no has some of the toughest gun control laws in the world. Yes, there have been two further events since then, but there is nothing like the carnage wreaked by guns on a daily basis in the US. Our deaths due to firearms in any measurement you want are minute by comparison.

Do I feel safer living in a country where gun ownership and use is tightly controlled? Damn right I do. Only a fool would think otherwise.

[beandip]

Quote:

"I do believe that where there is only a choice between cowardice and violence I would advise violence," Gandhi wrote in his famous work, Doctrine of the Sword.

more here.....

http://www.naturalnews.com/038372_Gandhi....

[trish]

So prove there's only one choice.

[Stavros]

Quote:

"I do believe that where there is only a choice between cowardice and violence I would advise violence," Gandhi wrote in his famous work, Doctrine of the Sword.

more here.....

http://www.naturalnews.com/038372_Gandhi....

Beandip offers a link to a website with an article written by someone called Mike Adams who has no real interest in Gandhi, and even less in the context of British India in which Gandhi wrote his article, The Doctrine of the Sword in the journal Young India in 1920. Adams has hit upon this article for the simple reason that if he can show that one of the 20th century's most famous pacifists was in fact an advocate of violence, it therefore follows, as Adams puts it
Had Gandhi been alive today and witnessed the senseless loss of life at Sandy Hook Elementary school, he would have advocated arming the principal and giving her a chance to protect innocent lives through the use of defensive violent action.
-the emphasis in bold is provided by Mr Adams

Adams and beandip can re-write history as much as they like, but not only did Gandhi not advocate violence of this kind, in the context of 20th century Connecticut, it is the opposite of what he suggested. The founding idea, is contained in the paragraphs that follows the one cutely edited by Mr Adams:

I do believe that, where there is only a choice between cowardice and violence, I would advise violence. Thus when my eldest son asked me what he should have done, had he been present when I was almost fatally assaulted in 1908, whether he should have run away and seen me killed or whether he should have used his physical force, which he could and wanted to use, and defended me, I told him it was his duty to defend me even by using violence Hence it was that I took part in the Boer War, the so-called Zulu Rebellion, and the late war. Hence also do I advocate training in arms for those who believe in the method of violence. I would rather have India resort to arms in order to defend her honor than that she should in a cowardly manner become or remain a helpless witness to her own dishonor.


But I believe that nonviolence is infinitely superior to violence, forgiveness is more manly than punishment. Forgiveness adorns the soldier. But abstinence is forgiveness only when there is power to punish: it is meaningless when it pretends to proceed form a helpless creature. A mouse hardly forgives a cat when it allows itself to be torn to pieces by her. I therefore appreciate the sentiment of those who cry out for the condign punishment of General Dyer and his ilk. They would tear him to pieces if they could. But I do not believe India to be helpless. I do not believe myself to be a helpless creature. Only I want to use India's and my strength for a better purpose.

Neither Connecticut nor the USA is helpless, the officials in the school were not mice being charged by a cat; arming them would not have been part of the Gandhian concept of satyagrah because he would not have believed teachers in the USA in the 21st century needed to be armed in the first place.

Dare I say it, there is a world of difference between India under British rule in 1920, and the independent USA in 2012.

Gandhi said, in the same article
Nonviolence in its dynamic condition means conscious suffering. It does not mean meek submission to the will of the evildoer, but it means the putting of one's whole soul against the will of the tyrant...And so I am not pleading for India to practice nonviolence, because she is weak. I want her to practice nonviolence being conscious of her strength and power. No training in arms is required for realization of her strength...


beandip, attend to the sources, rather than the siren voices.


The full article by Gandhi is here:
http://www.salsa.net/peace/conv/8weekconv2-1.html

[beandip]

Aaayyyyup. Sure.

[beandip]

anyone catch what he said in 4chan? Jacked on Fanapt.

[beandip]

One more time for the stupid people here. Spoons made me fat. Chopsticks would prevent me from getting fat.