Q: Why was 2002 an exceptionally good year for the US?
A: Because it seems to be the only year in which there was no school or university shooting.
And now, the worst one in US history.
I love the standard line touted by pro-gun Americans: "It's not the gun stupid...it's the human being".
That's what they also said during the Rwandan genocide. When US officials asked to block the radio frequencies that were spewing vehement propaganda against the Tutsi, higher officials shut them up by sternly saying "Radios don't kill people, people do".
Yes people, it's always the human beings; that's precisely why you keep them away from guns and radios. And please, it's not about "freedom of choice". It's about access to guns and proportionality. Why not let citizens carry mini Sarin cylinders or Anthrax shots then?
What an amazingly and sickeningly warped and inverted acknowledgment of culpability, as well as assertion of freedom.
Labels: gun control
posted by Wavefunction at 10:10 AM
6 Comments:
October 28, 2002: Failing University of Arizona Nursing College student and Gulf War veteran Robert Flores, 40, walks into an instructor's office and fatally shoots her. A few minutes later, armed with five guns, he enters one of his nursing classrooms and kills two more of his instructors before fatally shooting himself.
January 16, 2002: Graduate student Peter Odighizuwa, 42, recently dismissed from Virginia's Appalachian School of Law, returns to campus and kills the dean, a professor and a student before being tackled by students. The attack also wounds three female students.
Found 2 for 2002.
Great! I should have thought there would be...dismal.
Ashutosh,
Even though my response might seem sickening and politically motivated in times of crisis like this but this issue of gun control hits out at the very heart of libertarian edifice. I don't care if blogosphere libertarian ideologues vilify me but this issue of gun control and the principled and 'logical' arguments presented against it by those on the right and the libertarian wing under garb of protection of private property and implementation of the rule of law being the preserve of the government etc. needs to tackled and tackled well.
I will write a detailed response here tomorrow but I congratulate you on raising this issue and especially linking it to the faux 'freedom' argument presented by those advocating free trade wherever there is any demand for anything animate or inanimate on this planet is involved.
More later...
Chetan, your response is not sickening at all. In fact, I join you in doing a critical analysis of the libertarian stance on this issue. I think the basic problem is this; the fundamental libertarian maxim says that one should be free to do whatever he or she wants or engage in any transaction with other persons, provided his actions do not impinge on the freedom of others. The catch is in the second part of the maxim, because there are some freedoms, like owning a gun, which inherently pose a greater risk of posing harm to and impinging on the freedom of others. I suspect that the maxim equalizes the risk of all freedoms and transactions, which is simply not the case. Anyway, more on this after you pen your reply, and looking forward to it.
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