Saturday, February 27th, 2016
Author: Stephan A. Schwartz
Source: The Schwartzreport
Publication Date: 27 February 2016
Link: Guns and Culture
Stephan: My friend Paul Smith with whom I am politically antipodal wrote a comment concerning the story I ran about Texas passing a law permitting older students, faculty and staff to carry guns on college campuses. You can see our exchange in the comments sector.
The argument Paul advances is that it was thought this would protect students. It is the "good guy with a gun" logic carried to its natural conclusion. This is the best way to respond to school shootings. Paul states himself that he is licensed for concealed carry in both Texas and Utah. Why a retired Army officer who teaches Remote Viewing would feel the need a license to carry a concealed weapon in the normal course of his day I do not know? A good guy with a gun?
In any case, as a result of our exchange I have been thinking about guns and the U.S. culture off and on for much of the day, and it has prompted the following essay.
UPDATE: It is Saturday morning, and while I was writing the essay last night there was another massacre: "BELFAIR, Wash. - The Mason County Coroner on Saturday released the names of four of the five people found shot to death at a Belfair home on Friday."
I don’t think anybody except conservatives believes to quote my friend Paul Smith in reference to the new law about guns on campus in Texas “thousands of binge-drinking party animal college students will be emboldened to carry a firearm on campus.” I will speak only for myself: What concerns me is not binge-drinking students, although I guarantee there will be incidents. People will die. Wherever there are guns, gun death goes up. What concerns me is the person who most people think quite ordinary and unremarkable who legally owns guns, and who one day just goes out and kills half a dozen people. And I write this right after the less than a week apart massacres in Kalamazoo, Michigan and Hesston, Kansas.
In our current culture authorizing and encouraging the carrying of weapons onto campuses, is an appallingly bad idea. Colleges are locations where young people explore their place in the world, and disputation and debate are a cherished processes, and faculty are by ancient scholarly tradition admonished to be honest. Weapons and that environment do not mix. From the Greek academies onward weapons have not been permitted on campuses except in certain very constrained ways, like fencing clubs, or shooting […]
I do think it is a mistake to allow students to carry guns, but there is one good reason for Americans to have guns. The second amendment and an armed populace is about protecting ourselves from our own government gone awry as well as foreign invasion. It is totally naïve and stupid to put total trust in any government–(maybe someday after a giant leap in consciousness, but definitely not in these times). Take a look—how many people today have faith and confidence in our government? In the name of terrorism too many individual rights have been taken away via Executive Order and fast tracking egregious bills through Congress. I hate the current gun violence epidemic but do not think taking away guns will change it. And, obviously it would be impossible to confiscate guns in this country without Nazi style tactics. We have to restore sanity to this country first by rescinding Citizens United and getting economic and banking reform to provide middle and lower economic classes an opportunity to thrive and uplift themselves and create a desired future. We need HOPE restored in this country. I don’t see HOPE on the horizon.
Not to mention the effect on education in what amounts to cultural extortion – http://gu.com/p/4h35p/sbl (Guardian article about Texas teachers). Living under this kind of conscious or unconscious oppression is the opposite of liberty and the enemy of prosperity.
You are right on target, Stephan. The founders also knew that the Constitution must be changed over time to prevent things you discussed, and the evidence points to the fact that the Congress and Senate as well as Presidents have not been able to come up with a solution to the obvious problems with this particular part of the Constitution which MUST be changed to save the public from destroying itself. The underlying problems must also be changed to bring peace back to our ever-changing and evolving country.
In reference to your initial remarks, I grew up in South Texas ( 50s ) and had a 22 from the time I was 12. Some people did bring guns to school but only if they were planning to go hunting afterwards. They kept them in their lockers. The only guns that were obvious at school were water pistols.