Some Questions – and some Answers

In a rare display of reason, Asher Slade (the MGTOW with whom I have had a number of strong disagreements) asked some questions. His post is below:

You can feel free to post what your arguments and positions actually are and how you would while still respecting our consitution you would try to solve the mass shooting issue.Remember all free people have a right to self defense. Mine are clear more gun ownership not less next to no gun free zones protect schools with either willingly armed teachers or security staff . Make fewer soft targets and watch how much the issue self corects. Mentally unwell person tries to shoot a place up a gun owner around them or security put the threat down as fast and as safe as posible . Bad people exist we do not want to create more victims by making it so only criminals will have guns . I think political figures who advocate gun control should have their tax payer funded security removed . They can either pay private while still holding their moral anti gun postion or they can get trained and arm themselves while still trying to be a anti gun right advocate

I dare say I have substantially described my positions before, but for Asher’s benefit (and for any new followers) I will run through them again.

My view is that guns are deadly weapons, and should be treated appropriately. In an ideal world, there would be absolutely no need for them (and many countries around the world have demonstrated this, more on that in a moment). The reality is that guns are deeply engrained on US society, part of the cultural landscape, and enshrined in the Constitution. They are obviously not going anywhere, but the presence of guns leads to numerous mass shootings, which we can all agree are tragic events that are virtually unique to the USA.

The Constitution is the bedrock of US governance. It’s importance cannot be overstated, though I suspect the term ‘constitutional’ has come to be conflated with ‘good’, a risky approach. To treat the Constitution as being almost Biblical in terms of its inerrancy is a dangerous precedent. However, like guns themselves, the Constitution is not going anywhere. It is the lens through which everything else must be filtered, when it comes to US governance.

The right to life was part of the original Declaration of Independence, yet was not a part of the original Constitution. Does this mean that the right to life is secondary (indeed, unconstitutional RE bad), especially in comparison to the 2nd Amendment’s declaration of the right to bear arms? If the Constitution is the highest document of the land, exceeding all others, yet does not enshrine a right to life, what sort of precedent does this set? What sort of moral or political authority places the right to deadly weapons ahead of the right to life?

This is not to say that people should not have the right to defend themselves, and certainly in the 18th Century, the risk to person and property would have been considerable. The newly-formed USA would not have had a defined military, and hence the need for a well-regulated militia. I don’t believe the writers of the Constitution envisioned an unregulated mess of heavily-armed militias that were capable of threatening the very government they were establishing, and I don’t believe they imagined powerful weapons in the hands of poorly or untrained civilians. Despite some claims I have read, I also don’t believe they could have imagined the types of firearms that are easily available to the average American today.

Whilst it may be deemed unconstitutional to look at how other countries have tackled gun violence, it is also a statistical reality that many other developed, first-world nations do not suffer the same rates of gun crime as the USA, and are also safer in general terms. As of 2020, the USA’s overall homicide rate per 100,000 people was 6.4. In Australia, the murder rate for the same year was 0.9, and in Germany it was 0.8. In Switzerland it was 0.5. In Japan it was 0.3. When you look here, you’ll see that in the USA, guns make up a significant percentage of murders.

Guns won’t be the only factor. I have pointed this out, time and time again, and I hope that this time, Asher takes note of this. Whilst Japan has some incredibly strict gun laws, it’s worth noting that guns are widely available in both Germany and Switzerland; they are subject to different forms of gun control, to both each other and the USA.

Would those solutions work in the USA? That’s impossible to say. There does not seem to be much political will to try anything. Doing nothing is certainly and obviously not working.

As far as mental health issues go, the maligning of people with mental health problems is, in my view, deeply unfair. It is also deeply ironic. Asher has in the past opposed mental health checks, and would certainly oppose any sort of federal funding/involvement in them. How would he propose to try and prevent people with mental health issues from buying guns, and what criteria would he deem acceptable for defining a mental health issue?

Can gun violence be reduced, with guns remaining available? Absolutely. Switzerland, Germany, and also the Czech Republic are all examples of this. People in these countries will have mental health issues too, yet they do not go on killing sprees. Food for thought.

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