Side story on the recent gun spree

[Surferbeetle]

It seems to me that that Founding Fathers came down pretty forcefully on the side of natural rights. That is the basis upon which our laws and gov are established. Some progressive thinkers don't like that at all but that is the way it is. And just to make sure that everybody was clear on that, the Founders reiterated things in the Bill of Rights.

Agree

Self defense is a responsibility, not a choice. If as a free citizen, you expect somebody else to help you with criminals and thieves, you have to help them help you. You aren't a employer of servants who commands and expects people to come help them out without a concomitant responsibility to try and help yourself. You want help, you better be willing to pitch in.

There is indeed a real and ongoing cost/responsibility that comes with accepting the goodies that a society offers: security, infrastructure, rule of law, etc. This includes flesh and blood individuals as well as 'paper' individuals (corporations).

A petite, 110 pound 55 year old women with a gun, is as formidable an opponent as 3 NFL all pro linebackers. If you take that gun away from her, then she is unable to defend herself against most of the people out there, and especially against groups of people. You have deprived her of her right to self-defense. That is a right conferred upon her by her simple existence. Nobody can legitimately take that away from her.

Free markets and natural rights are interesting to think about and experience in this context.

During my travels in Iraq it was my observation that free markets very much in effect. I was aware of various 'impromptu' bazaars that had a number of items on offer to include long rifles and handguns. Tribal and personal responsibility was not an abstract topic to many, on either side.

It was my observation that 'rights' that we take for granted here in the West were not won/kept there solely through discourse.

As to violent video games and movies, perhaps they are a deep societal response to the bicycle helmet/pads/safety belt/risk averse forces of darkness?

[slapout9]

As to violent video games and movies, perhaps they are a deep societal response to the bicycle helmet/pads/safety belt/risk averse forces of darkness?

Beetle, you might be on to something there!

[carl]

As to violent video games and movies, perhaps they are a deep societal response to the bicycle helmet/pads/safety belt/risk averse forces of darkness?

Beetle, you might be on to something there!

Sort of like Catholic girls once they got out of school in the years gone by? I am being serious. The dynamic would be the same.

[jmm99]

As a normal rule, sheep don't like the sheepdog. The sheepdog looks something like a wolf, and acts something like a wolf. But, the sheepdog is not a predator of prey (the sheep); the sheepdog is a predator of predators (the wolves).

Even knowing that the sheepdog will never intentionally harm a sheep, the sheep still don't like the sheepdog. The mutt reminds them that wolves do exist, do attack sheep and do eat them all up. The best sheeply thing to do is to simply forget about the problem.

So, the mild-mannered grazers plod along in their state of denial until the wolves attack. The sheep then turn to their second operational mode - they stampede. Some are lucky enough to find refuge behind the sheepdog; some are not.

Self-defense and defense of others are not a sheep's forte.

Obvious HT to Dave Grossman for the concept.

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ganulv:

...whether rights are natural or socially constructed, which is a conclusion one needs to come to before having an opinion worth opining as regards legal rights current or proposed. ... that stuff is not all that difficult to muddle.

I'd say election between natural rights, or socially constructed rights (are you saying the latter ~ to positive law), is not the crunch point. That distinction does enter into distinguishing the bases for the various arguments on bearing arms and self-defense. Both sides argue natural rights and positive law rights.

The crunch points as to both issues are:

1. Right vs privilege

2. Duty vs choice

"Duty" ~ "responsibility".

Maybe more on those points later - it gets a bit "weedy".

Regards

Mike

[carl]

It was my observation that 'rights' that we take for granted here in the West were not won/kept there solely through discourse.

That is critical. The chattering elites, the superzips, think that what we have now is the normal course of things. This is how it was and this is how it will always be no matter what is done. Guys like you and Slap have seen the face of the world as it really is and know different. But those people, raised in safe places, surrounded by kind people and never having seen the ferocious side of life, they don't have a clue. That wouldn't be so bad but they don't know they are clueless, assume the rest of us are and away they go.