If you read that person's pro gun argument, behind what sounds like reason, is
trule irrationality or psychosis. There's a detachment from reality that can't
be reached by reason.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Sunday, September 09, 2018 11:18 AM
To: blind-democracy <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Cc: my blog carl jarvis <carjar82.carls@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Is carrying a gun a civilized act
Here's an interesting post from another list, with my reaction.
Carl Jarvis
******
why the gun is civilization.
Human beings only have two ways to deal with one another: reason and force. If
you want me to do something for you, you have a choice of either convincing me
via argument, or force me to do your bidding under threat of force.
Every human interaction falls into one of those two categories, without
exception.
Reason or force, that’s it.
In a truly moral and civilized society, people exclusively interact through
persuasion. Force has no place as a valid method of social interaction, and the
only thing that removes force from the menu is the personal firearm, as
paradoxical as it may sound to some.
When I carry a gun, you cannot deal with me by force. You have to use reason
and try to persuade me, because I have a way to negate your threat or
employment of force. The gun is the only personal weapon that puts a 100-pound
woman on equal footing with a 220-pound mugger, a 75-year old retiree on equal
footing with a 19-year old gangbanger, and a single gay guy on equal footing
with a carload of drunk guys with baseball bats. The gun removes the disparity
in physical strength, size, or numbers between a potential attacker and a
defender.
There are plenty of people who consider the gun as the source of bad force
equations. These are the people who think that we’d be more civilized if all
guns were removed from society, because a firearm makes it easier for a mugger
to do his job. That, of course, is only true if the mugger’s potential victims
are mostly disarmed either by choice or by legislative fiat–it has no validity
when most of a mugger’s potential marks are armed. People who argue for the
banning of arms ask for automatic rule by the young, the strong, and the many,
and that’s the exact opposite of a civilized society. A mugger, even an armed
one, can only make a successful living in a society where the state has granted
him a force monopoly.
Then there’s the argument that the gun makes confrontations lethal that
otherwise would only result in injury. This argument is fallacious in several
ways.
Without guns involved, confrontations are won by the physically superior party
inflicting overwhelming injury on the loser. People who think that fists, bats,
sticks, or stones don’t constitute lethal force watch too much TV, where people
take beatings and come out of it with a bloody lip at worst. The fact that the
gun makes lethal force easier works solely in favor of the weaker defender, not
the stronger attacker. If both are armed, the field is level.
The gun is the only weapon that’s as lethal in the hands of an octogenarian as
it is in the hands of a weightlifter. It simply wouldn’t work as well as a
force equalizer if it wasn’t both lethal and easily employable.
When I carry a gun, I don’t do so because I am looking for a fight, but because
I’m looking to be left alone. The gun at my side means that I cannot be forced,
only persuaded. I don’t carry it because I’m afraid, but because it enables me
to be unafraid. It doesn’t limit the actions of those who would interact with
me through reason, only the actions of those who would do so by force. It
removes force from the equation…and that’s why carrying a gun is a civilized
act.
***
My reply:
Reason or Force.
Far too long we have followed this logic. A weapon will enable us to force our
opponent to capitulate. And we then call the result, "Civilization".
But Violence does not beget Reason. Violence only begets Violence.
And if we want to call the result, "civilization", we are simply announcing the
end of our Human Race.
The choice should not be between reason and Force. The choice should be
between our current conception of Civilization and the creation of a Superior
Civilization. If we follow the belief that a gun will give us civilization,
then the end result will be the end of the Human Race. A gun can only create a
level playing field if it is the biggest gun on the block. So we must build
bigger guns, more deadly methods of enforcing our "civilization". Guns, by the
way, work well in many situations, but poison works as well in others.
Creation of new weapons that can seek out an opponent without warning, mutant
viruses, super sound waves, all sorts of new, yet to be invented weapons must
be developed to counter the power of that gun. The end result is never
Civilization. The result is always more and bigger violence.
The more difficult road to take is the one that calls for total reconstruction
of that which we call "Civilization". And that is the discussion we need to
turn to.
Cordially,
Carl Jarvis