Thursday, February 3, 2011

SMOKIN’ THE NRA’S WEED

Just a comment...

A DECADE OR SO BACK, a couple of high school kids in Colorado, because they’d been bullied, entered their high school and began firing. I personally know a counselor who sat with one parent through the ordeal of linking each locked-down student with each student’s parent or guardian. “It will be all right,” the counselor told the mom. “It will be all right.” When all was said and done that day, it wasn’t all right for about a dozen parents. The mom was one of them.

A month ago, a Congresswoman was shot through the head and six of her constituents murdered as she conducted the most democratic of all practices in this republic: conversing with her public.

Then yesterday, a person whom I consider a colleague, although I never had the opportunity to work with him, was gunned down in the office of the Placerville area school where he served as a principal.

In response to these incidents, those who believe that guns are too readily available rally to restrict our access to weaponry. Those who oppose gun controls spout about “our freedoms” and “our second amendment rights.”


THE CHURCH OF THE OPEN ROAD respectfully screams: “Wait a minute!”  To those wishing to disarm the country, you have to be smart enough to realize that in a free society, we can’t outlaw much of anything. That’s why we will never win the war on drugs. That’s why there’ll always be prostitutes in the vicinity of cheap motels. That’s why declaring abortion illegal will be an act of futility. None of these things will go away. Neither will guns.


HOWEVER:  To the South Dakota legislator who writes a bill requiring all citizens over the age of 21 to own a fire arm the Church would suggest: this canard comparing forcible gun ownership to the recent requirement that folks obtain health insurance is simply stupid to the point of being dangerous. Not everybody needs a gun. But everybody gets ill or suffers physical injury from time to time. If you want to repair the health legislation, propose something.

To the southern California Republican who stated that the primary reason for the second amendment is to allow the people to protect themselves from their government, understand that as their elected representative YOU are charged with protecting the people from their government. If you don’t understand that, please step down.

To those who would suggest that if a citizen with a gun in Tucson or in Placerville had been on the scene the outcome might have been much different, I must say I agree. There would have been much more injury and much more death – not less. And when the police arrived, whom might they choose to take out?


THE FULL TEXT OF THE SECOND AMENDMENT begins with the clause: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State…”

The boys in Colorado, the young man in Arizona and the assailant in Placerville have yet to be linked to a well-regulated militia of any sort. So how do we justify their gun ownership?

“Why, to protect myself from the tyranny of my government!” according to the NRA.

Paranoia is “a chronic psychosis characterized by systemized delusions of persecution.” We are told that frequent users of marijuana suffer from such delusions. The “protecting myself from the tyranny of my government” rant is textbook paranoia.

We are blessed with the most stable democracy the world has ever seen whether or not you or I are particularly enamored with whoever happens to hold the highest office. We don’t need protection from our government. But, apparently, Gabby Giffords needed protection from “us.”


IT IS TIME FOR THE AMERICAN PUBLIC TO QUIT SMOKING THE NRA’S WEED and to have an honest national discussion about firearms, their place in our society and the juxtaposition of a national right to bear arms against many innocent individuals’ right to life itself.

6 comments:

  1. DS: hummmmm Your making me think to much. ;)
    It is not the gun that kills, it is the shooter. I use to shoot guns all the time in Sonora, and I never once thought about going and shooting someone and especially not at school. I loved going to s...chool, and I loved my teachers and principals. The people that are doing these horrible things are hurting. They are crying out for help, and they probably have been their entire lives. Jail does not work for people that need help. We waste our money on jail, when we should be pouring it into education! If anything, we should ban violent video games. I have seen the effect of these video games and it is not looking good.

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  2. DS (continues): How can we create a peaceful society? We shouldn't have to worry about the weapons but the minds.

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  3. You're making me think as well. And after a day of teaching and conferences, my brain is tired. Keep writing, so I'll keep thinking.
    P.S. I miss seeing you around the district!

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  4. I cannot count the number of times in my 19-year career as a school principal - that some gun-related school violence took place and I said to my wife, "If that happens on my campus, don't expect me to come home."

    Seems to me that if firearms were not so readily available, I would have had that conversation a few fewer times.

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  5. Your 'comment' is representative of what so many of us feel. I also agree that many people have unidentified mental illnesses that are not being treated which causes them to be delusional. Maybe if we had more accessable health care....and as always, more money in education....CG

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  6. I am writing almost 7 years since the original article was posted and since that time so many more lives have been lost in mass shooting after mass shooting. Our local community college was the scene of one such shooting. I grew up in a family of outdoorsmen and gun enthusiasts. I was a hunter and owned firearms. I have always been a staunch supporter of second amendment rights. Maybe it is all the senseless loss of lives, maybe the fact that I am older and, I would like to think, wiser or the fact that I am raising 3 teenage boys but my opinion has shifted over the years. I am no longer of the rhetoric “They will have to pry it out of my cold dead fingers.” I don’t hunt any more. I have a professional job in an office. I have no actual NEED for a firearm so I don’t have any firearms in my house. I’m not saying that is a sensible solution for everyone but there has to be an honest dialog. An answer needs to be sought. There has to be some middle ground. I am not talking about abolishing the second amendment but it sure would be nice to keep the weapons out of the hands of all these nuts who keep terrorizing our public spaces. I know that my opinion will not be popular with my friends and family but I am fed up with the violence. I don’t want my children to be at risk every time they go to school or church or to the mall. I want to leave a better world for them. We can do better and we should do better. The status quo is not working. It’s time to seek better solutions.

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