Print this post.Does the stashing of weapons at home provide true security? The NRA says, “Yes!”
But what do you think?
By Case Wagenvoord
Heston’s boast: “From my cold dead hand!!”
[I] KEEP NO WEAPONS IN MY HOUSE. Never have; never will. Okay, so there’s the chef’s knife in the kitchen drawer, but that doesn’t’ count.
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I didn’t even arm myself during the media-hyped “crime wave” of the early seventies when our Euromerican oligarchs neutralized the gains made during the civil rights movement by siphoning as many Afromericans into jail as they possibly could.
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There was one time, though, when I saw an ad for a commando knife and wondered if it might not be a good idea to keep one in my nightstand “just in case.” As soon as that thought crossed my mind, a funny thing happened: my anxiety level rose. That was because just the thought of arming myself brought to mind all of the “possible” situations that might require its use.
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And that’s the problem—sweating possibilities instead of probabilities. Anything is possible. Yes, it is “possible” some madman might break into my house in the dead of night and murder my wife and me. It’s possible, but not probably, which is why I don’t worry about it unless I start obsessing on the possible. (Probability means having some hard data to work with. It is probably I could be wacked in an automobile accident, but it is highly improbable I’ll ever be murdered in my sleep.)
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That was the problem with the knife. As soon as I thought about getting a weapon for security, my anxiety level rose because just having the weapon on the premises shifted my focus from the probable to the possible.
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It’s a closed feedback loop. I consider the possible, feel threatened by it and buy a weapon to alleviate the anxiety it creates. Yet, the very possession of the weapon increases my anxiety and prompts me to think about buying a deadlier weapon. Had I purchased the knife it would have only been a matter of time before I became so anxious that the knife would have become inadequate. In the end I might have ended up with an assault rifle tucked under the bed, while I lay awake nights wondering how I could get my hands on some surplus landmines.
And this explains how America became a security state. The possibility of Communists, criminals, terrorists or (fill in the blank) worries us, so our leaders churn out weapons and start wars to make us feel secure. But we don’t feel secure because we began to obsess on the “possible.” This results in a gaggle of security bureaucrats sitting around table saying “What if…? What if….? What if…”
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What if the terrorists develop an effective shoe bomb? (Have airline passengers take off their shoes.) What if an explosive can be poured into a shampoo bottle? (Limit the amount of shampoo that can be carried onto an airliner.) What if the terrorists develop a workable underwear bomb? (Use your imagination on that one.)
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And, of course, the more secure we try to become, the more anxious we become, which suits our oligarchs just fine because an anxious people are more willing to surrender their freedoms for a false sense of security and, as Ben Franklin noted, they end up with neither.
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As for me, I think I will remain unarmed; it keeps the anxiety level down. And while I’m at it, I think I’ll hold on to my freedoms. Somewhere it is written that they are inalienable. So, no matter what the government does or what the courts decide, I remain a free citizen of a free country. The job is to keep it that way.
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Case Wagenvoord blogs at http://belacaquajones.blogspot.com and welcomes comments at Wagenvoord@msn.com.
RELATED FEATURE:
The problem remains crazy, embittered people — and this country has no shortage of them — getting access to handguns far too easily…
Hey, Handgun Fans: These Gun Victims Were Heavily Armed
By Bill Mann
TV-Radio Critic, www.dcweasels.com
Posted: November 30, 2009
THIS WEEKEND’S TRAGIC MURDER of four Seattle-area police officers has blown away one of the NRA and gun nuts’ major — if ancient and tired — arguments.
A few weeks ago, we asked here why there were few media stories about where — and why — the Fort Hood shooter got his gun.
But the media these days isn’t interested in doing gun-control stories. Flashing police lights and heavily armed officers scurrying around make far better video.
Predictably, after my blog appeared, I was swamped with impassioned — and usually absurd — arguments from gun owners and other pistoleros. People who not only need to get a life, but to start thinking about other people’s lives and personal safety realistically, if that’s even possible.
Sunday, I watched six hours of Seattle TV coverage up here about the tragic killing of four cops in a Tacoma coffee shop.
All were armed and in uniform, and all were wearing flak jackets.
I got scores of angry e-mails after my HuffPost blogs from handgun lovers, but one argument remained central.
“If those soldiers (or Virginia Tech students, yadda yadda yadda) had been armed, the killer would have been stopped cold. There wouldn’t have been a massacre.”
The four Seattle-cops were armed, and it didn’t stop them from being shot.
The “if-only everyone-were-armed” argument was crazy and reckless before this. Now it’s been proven beyond a doubt to be absolutely ridiculous.
Time to retire that one for good, Handgun Nation. Re-staging Tombstone, Ariz., circa 1889 is an irrational, wild fantasy at best.
The problem remains crazy, embittered people — and this country has no shortage of them — getting access to handguns far too easily.
This cycle will keep repeating itself until we finally get serious about gun control — which, along with health care, is truly our biggest life-and-death issue.
I know the politics of this are difficult at best, but a serious, adult dialogue about our national gun sickness has to start at some point.
Otherwise, we’ll probably continue to see one or two of these mass shootings a month.
And having everyone packing heat, as we’ve just seen up here in Seattle, isn’t going to stop it. It’s a dangerous — and ridiculous — idea.