Musing on the aftermath of VT tragedy

I wasn't sure I was going to post on this. I've been doing a lot of reading of the posts on my flist, and doing a lot of thinking, and finally decided that I was going to post after all.

I am a gun owner. My guns are not at my house: they are at my father's house, with gunlocks on my rifle, in the locked gun cabinet, with the ammunition stored separately, also under lock. I own, currently, a .22 rifle that was given to me for Christmas when I was 14 by my father, and a set of antique dueling pistols from the Civil War. Women's dueling pistols, actually (yup, been in the family for generations. Explains a lot, doesn't it?).

In the aftermath of a tragedy like this, there will once again be calls from both sides of the gun debate. Those supporting gun laws will be calling for a total ban on guns, which of course the NRA will never allow. Those against gun laws will be screaming 2nd Amendment rights. And in the screams and emotions, there will be absolutely no reasonable, rational discourse, so nothing will get done. Until the next tragedy, the next school shooting, the next sniper incident, at which point the cycle will begin again.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

So what is the solution? Is it to truly get rid of all guns, to legislate them out of existance? Is it education? What is the solution?

Honestly, I don't know.

Personally, I don't think simple legislation will work. You can make tighter and tighter gun laws all you want: since criminals don't worry about other laws, then why should that stop them? Will it stop the accidents? Maybe. Will it stop the school shootings? I doubt it - most of them were committed with illegal guns, if I remember correctly.

Is this to say I'm anti-gun-legislation, that I'm one of those "NRA freaks"? No, I'm not. I support laws stating that guns and ammunition should be locked up and sold separately. I don't think anyone needs an M-16 or an AK-47 to go hunting. I support laws stating that there should be waiting periods and that we shouldn't sell to children.

However, I also support laws stating that everyone should know gun safety. How many accidents a year happen because kids are fooling around with Dad's or Mom's gun and it "just went off?" Let me tell you, my father made DAMN sure us kids ALL knew what a gun was. Number 1, it wasn't a toy. Number 2, if you point it at someone, you damn well better know what the consequences are. Number 3, if you aren't prepared to kill someone, don't point the damn gun at them.

Yes, guns are glamorized by American society. You only have to look at the movies, the music, the books to see that. So's organized crime (The Sopranos, anyone? Or Goodfellas?), drugs (Blow?), and any number of other things that really aren't good for our society in general.

So what's the answer? I don't know. Maybe it's time for a world-wide cleansing and starting over. (Damn, that sounds cynical, but it's quarter past 1 in the morning).

Maybe it's time humanity in general started taking responsibility for our own damn actions and started acting like damn adults.

You know, I think I've figured it out

Otherwise known as Why Val doesn't get along with fanatics of any stripe. This is yet another rant, and no, not aimed at anyone in particular, and it may get me unfriended from several people on my flist, but hell, it's my journal and I'll rant if I want to. Right? Right.

I've been thinking here (while waiting for my bathtub to unclog, which is why I'm still awake at 3:30 am EST and posting) about various issues that are bothering folks on my flist, and why I'm very, very loath to get into most of the discussions.

It's because of the fanatics and their zero-sum thinking.

I mean, really, how can you argue with the statement "Fewer guns means fewer deaths from guns"? Or "If there were no US soldiers in Iraq, our boys and girls wouldn't be dying in the desert"? Or "A woman shouldn't have to bow down to archaic societal norms that only seek to shame her into believing that her body is evil"? You can't. Why?

Because they're absolutist statements. It's an all-or-nothing statement. You either agree, or you become the enemy.

The problem with this?

This ain't a zero-sum world.

Life doesn't come at you in black and white. I'm hard-pressed at 3:30 am to come up with any issues that are simply black and white. Even things like drugs aren't black and white. (Cocaine snorted through your nose is bad. Cocaine packed around your eye after surgery is good. Cocaine in a mixture with opiates and other drugs gives comfort and pain relief to the terminally ill.) There has to be some give and take in every situation.

Fanatics, however, don't want that. In my experience, they either can't or won't accept that in order to get most of what they want, they have to give up something. We aren't animals. We're people. Rational, thinking, reasoning people.

Or at least, we're supposed to be.

You can't reason with a fanatic. It's either their way or the highway. And that's sad. Because that clinging to a zero-sum mentality means that they see everything as a battle. "I am right, therefore I must win, because only I am right, and there is no other way!" becomes their battle cry. And so no one wins. Everyone loses, because nobody was able to be a rational adult and say, "Look, here's my point of view. Here's your point of view. We've got some things in common. Let's see how we can combine them to come up with a solution that mostly works for everyone."

And folks wonder why I tend to just take my toys and go home. At least that way, I still have some toys to play with.