As I am sure any reader can tell from the infrequent rate of my postings so far, I do not intend for this blog to consist of my personal reactions to current political events. For the most part, I don’t think they would be that interesting. But the tragic incident in Tucson this past weekend is difficult to leave without comment. Rather than spout platitudes about the state of American political discourse that so many others have, instead I will leverage this opportunity to state my general position on the issue of gun violence. It is of course possible that Jared Loughner was in some way inspired to commit these acts by some of the hateful rhetoric that has been thrown out there, but it is completely obvious to me that he was enabled by the laws permitted him to wield a weapon that no private individual (regardless of mental instability) should be able to own.
Simply put, I think private handgun ownership should be illegal (I don’t really care one way or the other about rifles and such.) I believe this position is clearly at odds with the 2nd amendment, and I would like to see the 2nd amendment repealed. It is infuriating to me that we constantly infringe on freedoms in countless ways to fight a terrorist “threat" that has killed over the course of my lifetime barely more Americans than gun violence kills every month. On this issue, I would actually be in favor of the most strict construction of the 2nd amendment: that it bars all attempts by the government to impose restrictions on weapons ownership. I think under this interpretation, the amendment would certainly be quickly repealed, or at least modified to allow much wider regulation than is allowed under current jurisprudence.
It seems like the supporters of gun rights advance two general classes of utilitarian arguments: first, than gun ownership directly prevents more crimes than it causes (e.g. if guns were illegal, only criminals would have guns); and second, that private gun ownership is a shield against government tyranny at some point in the future.
I think the first class of arguments are laughable and rather short-sighted. It may be true that a lot of criminals would still be able to obtain guns in the short term, but at least these would eventually be taken off the street, even if it takes fifty years. After all, how many crimes are committed with a fifty-year old weapon? (Well, obviously more would be if no more recent weapons were available, but still…) Moreover, the fact that only people with criminal intent would have guns may allow us to thwart more crimes before they happen merely by discovering the weapon that the criminal intended to use. I’m not really going to address these arguments in any detail, because they are completely silly to me.
As for the second class, it doesn’t seem to me that gun advocates are looking at what the likely forms of tyranny would actually look like. Once this is considered, private handgun ownership almost certainly exacerbates rather than alleviates the threat of such tyranny. First, I should note that the tyranny feared would likely involve the suspension of many facets of the constitution; I doubt the second amendment would be much of a shield under this scenario. But most importantly, the sort of “tyranny” we tend to see in nations that are ostensible democracies usually results in the subjugation of minorities that are disliked by the majority, not subjugation of majority populations by powerful minorities. Violence tends to favor those with numerical strength, while politics at least gives equal weight to discrete discourses at a certain point in the process. That is, while minorities may be voted down by majorities, they still have a chance to make their case. And in many instances, this principled case is victorious over the course of time. But if the game is just “our guns” versus “your guns”, the more morally powerful case really has no chance. Just look at the Jim Crow South: an armed majority did nothing to resist that tyranny; rather it actively aided in its persistence. And the civil rights movement was ultimately won not by exercise of the 2nd amendment, but exercise of the 1st.
In the case of creeping tyranny in the US, the tyrant will come to power with the support of the majority. The more that majority is armed, the less the principled case for a return to democracy and a restoration of civil and human rights will be heard.
Honestly, I can’t think of a single reform that would be of more immediately benefit to our country than repeal of the 2nd amendments.
I know a lot of gun rights advocates claim that gun owners simply don’t “like” guns (i.e. they don’t understand the enjoyment that people get out of them). At least for me, this is true…I have no desire to ever shoot a gun, and I don’t really like violent movies or TV shows (or at least, those that I like I like despite their violence, or because of the way they handle the consequences of violence). But I will say this: I love poker, and it plays a large role in my life, and I understand that many people also believe poker is a considerable social ill. If there was a referendum that simultaneously outlawed both gun ownership and poker, I would vote for it in a heartbeat.
