Gun control and foolish pundits
Left- and right-wingers are coming out of the woodwork, either claiming that Monday’s tragedy at Virginia Tech was caused by too much or too little gun control.
Both arguments are stupid. You can’t consider a broad policy based on one unlikely day.
Would stricter gun control in this country have made a difference? Maybe. Maybe it would have been harder for Cho Seung-hui to get the guns he used. But experience has shown us that people are pretty much able to get whatever illegal stuff they want. Outlaws would still have guns.
On the other side, the argument that it was the banning of guns on campus that allowed this to happen is just as foolish. It’s an incredibly narrow perspective that completely ignores the fact that there are 364 other days of the year.
You can’t say, “having armed students would have been good today, therefore it would be good every day.” You have to weigh the effects of having students armed every day — during stressful finals week, at weekend parties, while arguing over a grade, during a painful breakup.
Yes, it’s possible that an armed student populace would have stopped Monday’s tragedy in its tracks. From that perspective it would have been good had other students been armed and been able to use their weapons appropriately.
That’s only looking at a single, terrible, unlikely day, however. And those students would also come armed other days; they’d be carrying guns all the time.
That would obviously have effects — unknown effects — yet people ignore them. They ignore the all-too-real possibilities of drunken fights ending with gunshots, or professors and TAs threatened with violence, or troubled relationships having violent endings.
People tend to use the tools they’re given.
You can’t compare a known (what happened on 4/16) with an unknown (what having students armed every day would mean). Yet both sides are oh-so-sure they know what it would be like.
Robert Heinlein, I believe, quipped that “an armed society is a polite society,” and it’s a quote that people have used to explain what they think the effects would be. But there’s a problem with that sentiment.
An armed society would be polite out of fear, not out of respect. It’s a very important distinction. Living every day with respect for others is fine. But living in fear of your neighbors, the people on the road, the students in your class, the guy dancing with your girlfriend — that’s not good.
When the Soviets were in charge, the Moscow subways were among the cleanest in the world, because people there knew that Very Bad Things would happen if they were caught defacing it. So yeah, a society living in fear has some advantages.
So the bottom-line debate is this: On one side, hundreds of 18 to 21 year olds walking around campuses armed with guns, and all the danger that entails. On the other side, the potential to prevent a massacre like Monday’s from every happening.
No easy answers, despite what the pundits say.
Jeff St Real says:
Very well said. I don’t think it’s a long stretch to say an armed society might stop an incident such as yesterday’s from escalating, but there would be far more incidents, overall. Then what about the high schools, where so many of these tragedies have happened? I would hope we wouldn’t arm the teenagers, but who? The teachers? The lunch lady? The bus driver?
Take a look at modern day Zimbabwe. That’s the result of the intimidation and fear of an armed society. It ceases to be a society at all.