Post
by BJL » Fri Mar 13, 2009 9:59 am
Well, I posted my response. Hasn't showed up yet. This is what I said.
Violence in any form is despicable. However it is naive to suggest that the root cause for violence is the availability of any tool that can be used to take life. When was the last time someone raised the issue of restricting car ownership because a drunk driver killed an innocent bystander? Or licensed car owners were reprimanded and accosted for owning a car when an accident was caused by their under-aged unlicensed ward?
Will kitchen knives be banned because they can be used as weapons? Will acid used to clean be banned because unscrupulous individuals use it as a weapon?
It is high time we as a society react responsibly and rationally to acts committed by individuals. Its not the gun that commits a crime, it is people. The vast majority of gun crimes are not committed by legal licensed owners, nor are they the ones responsible for the proliferation of illegal arms.
Imagine what would have happened in Mumbai had more civilians been armed. We wouldn't have been such soft targets. When seconds matter, the police are only minutes away.
Let Mr. Sanjay Kaul, President of the People's Action Advocacy Group deprive himself of his right to defend his life. But let him not decide for me, nor anyone else, the actions necessary to protect myself, my family, and my community. Has our society lost all value for human life? Have we given up self-respect for self-esteem? Is it now just about feeling good instead of doing good and standing up for oneself and defending ones self and fighting back? I consider my life, as well as the lives of anyone else under threat to be worth defending. With a gun, with a knife, and with a rock if need be. But no one, absolutely no one is entitled to make that decision for me.
Why does a builder need a gun, Mr Kaul asks. Why do our netas need escorts of automatic weapon toting bodyguards? Clearly because there is an element of risk to life. So then clearly there must be some faction of society from whom they wish to defend themselves. Is a netas life more precious than mine, or my family's? Is he entitled to defend his while we must languish with inadequate police response times in a real emergency? Do events like the terrorist attacks in Mumbai do nothing to show you the urgent need for more rather than less law abiding citizens who are armed? Let us not forget the world we live in, your elitist aspirations to make self-defense impossible for the common man are behind increases in crime. The strong oppress the weak, and you urge us to remain weak.
Unfortunate events like these, when an unqualified, untrained, and unlicensed juvenile commits an act of violence shouldn't be made to reflect poorly on the vast majority of law-abiding citizens who chose to carry a weapon. Neither should you slap stereotypes onto people. Being armed is not equivalent to being a criminal. Do we really want to be a nation where only outlaws are armed?
To end with a quote from two champions of peace.
"Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act of depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest" - Mahatma Gandhi, An Autobiography, p. 446 (Beacon Press paperback edition)
“If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you, it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun.” His Holiness The Dalai Lama (Seattle Times, May 15, 2001)
We carry guns because policemen are too heavy.
Regards,
BJL
“To be both a speaker of words and a doer of deeds”- The Iliad.