Shooting at California’s Saugus High School leaves 2 students dead, suspect in custody, officials say
Let the same old arguments begin. Pro-gun supporters will point out that California already has laws in place akin to what the gun grabbers are pushing for nationwide. They clearly didn’t work today in California so why enact them nationwide? As I observed in a multitude of social media the gun grabbers argument is that the shooter may have obtained the weapon in another state without such stringent gun laws. The pro-gun people will point out that teenagers can’t legally purchase handguns in any state so it’s a moot point. The gun grabbers will say that an adult may have legally purchased the handgun in another state and the minor was able to access it somehow and commit the crime. The pro-gun people will point out that every step of the process no matter how the minor obtained the gun is already covered by an existing gun law and passing further nationwide gun laws won’t prevent what happened today. And on and on and on.
Where does this always ultimately lead to? Total gun confiscation. That’s the only potentially ironclad way to prevent these senseless killings. Of course the criminals will never abide by any such confiscation law so a police state coast to coast shakedown of each and every square foot of America would be required to accomplish this. Even after that you have guns available in other countries that can be smuggled in. You have dirty cops and military who would ensure that some amount of supply would still make it into the public’s hands. You have those who are crafty enough to build their own at home and then create their own black market.
Would America really be willing to go to an even more radical step? All existing weapons and ammunition must be destroyed. This includes law enforcement and the military. If not, how do ever insure total compliance? If you exempt enforcement agencies there will always be a black market. Who are the potential black market customers? Criminals. Yes, the very people all of our laws are passed in order to keep disarmed. If only enforcement agencies are armed, how do you ever prevent a police state? How many Americans are idiotic enough to think that would never happen here?
Even if were somehow successful enough to cleanse the country of guns, you then have to move on to knives or clubs or any type of object that could be used to harm another human. We’re a crafty little organism who always adapts. Now the gun grabbers say this is all just silly conspiracy talk and that something must be done. I agree. However, no half measures will ever work. No amount of laws. No ever more sequentially stringent confiscation measures. Even if your argument is we must do something and reduce violence in even just a small measure, how do you sell that to the future victims and their families? Will they be ok with the idea that at least you tried?
As always, the solution to a problem is best solved by addressing the problem at its source. That does not fit the narrative of the gun grabbers. They will tell you that if you merely remove temptation from someone who has temporarily lost it, we can successfully eliminate or reduce violence. This goes back to my earlier point. If you’re a person considering a violent act against another and you don’t have a gun handy and no access to get one will you just say oh well or will you use whatever will do the job? This would likely reduce events of mass violence. Will you then be that person to address the victims family and say sorry you lost your child to an attack by a baseball bat but at least it was just you and not your neighbor as well? Feel better now? This is what happens when you don’t address a problem at its source. I don’t think you can make the case that mass murderers are copycat criminals who are only driven my media attention and their trait of a tendency toward violence will simply disappear if these stories stop appearing on the nightly news. Sick people are sick. Period.
And I know I’m ignoring the elephant in the room and not even addressing those who wish to disarm the country for devious means. Tyrants and dictators and such. They couldn’t care less about the plight of the victim, only a means to an end. They recognized long ago the benefit in manipulating public opinion by utilizing fear and compassion. Americans interested in protecting themselves are labeled conspiracy nuts. They are being led down the road to mold them into believing that if dangerous weapons are removed from existence, their need for self-protection will be greatly reduced. They may then rely upon law enforcement to protect them. You may again refer to the baseball bat scenario mentioned previously. None of this removes the human aspect in which if someone wants to harm someone else they will use any available means to do so. If the public consensus doesn’t demand a solution based upon the root issue, we will never make any real headway in solving it. This idea that sick people should be allowed to just continue on unaddressed and our best solution is just keep the guns out of their hands in case they snap is psychobabble. Worse yet is the idea that perfectly normal, well balanced people somehow go over to the dark side when a weapon is available. If we just keep the guns away from good people when they stray a bit and have a dark thought they won’t act on it. Or something. I believe that speaks to integrity. Say you’re in a room all alone and your co-worker left his wallet on the table. You can easily snatch the cash and no one will ever know it’s you. What stops you? Integrity. Doing the right thing when no one else will even know. Yet the argument of the left is it is we who are bad by allowing a temptation. If we just remove the temptation. Or is the problem at a deeper level?
The bigger question becomes should we alter the lives of the many because of the few? Isn’t that always the question with big social issues? And doesn’t every big social issue also have the alternative agenda groups that latch on to a movement in one direction or the other for their own purposes? This is why big, over reaching government doesn’t solve problems, it merely shuffles the deck. Their solutions end up pitting groups of people against each other. It just shows the folly of governing hundreds of millions of very different people into one umbrella policy. Unfortunately there are those who take it even further with globalism policies designed as a one size fits all approach. Protecting ourselves from each other can’t be mandated from above. It’s pure individualism vs. collectivism. The rules of collectivism mandate taking away something of value from the collective in the name of protecting the few. There would be no need for a governing body to intervene to institute what the majority supports and is already doing. They exist to take away from the majority. All of our social justice warriors who are so eager for social change are useful idiots that can’t ever see the endgame in this progressive march towards globalism. There is very little room at the top of the globalists pyramid and the vast majority of the useful idiots helping push their agenda seemingly have no idea that they will be a mere peasant one day as well. Gun control is just a small piece of a far bigger puzzle. Today’s school shooting in California won’t be seen for the tragedy it is for those involved but just as another piece of the puzzle.
