When I was a little boy, I was drawn to fire--flames and burning--but not firearms, other than toy guns or squirt guns, because they simply weren't available (we had no guns in our house). As a teenager, guns were regarded as foreign and dangerous objects, and when I did encounter them, I treated them with apprehension and mild disdain and did not fire them even in play.
I'm glad I don't have any infatuation with firearms, but I'm aware
that a number of men do seem to be in love with the things that go bang.
They are drawn to guns like moths to a flame. Some get into a great deal of trouble and bring enormous hardships down upon themselves due to their actions involving firearms.
Human beings have no natural defense against the metal missiles fired by guns, and that is why guns are such a big problem in the world, responsible for so many life-altering injuries and deaths. If there were some defense, such as a natural protective armor or self-regenerating capacity, then we might as a species take a more liberal attitude toward guns and their users. But once a man is shot, he tends to go down and stay down. Many are the gun owners that wish that the person they shot could get up again and be safe and sound. Many are the gun owners that regret pulling that trigger.
In regard
to the unfortunate incident in Florida, I think a self-destructive urge was at play, a death wish closely related to the need to prove oneself. I would imagine that
appointing oneself as the Neighborhood Watch, when nobody was asking or paying for this service, and taking it upon oneself
to go out at night and hunt and confront a young man walking alone in a neighborhood was
motivated by the desire to express machismo. Such an act was only
possible with the addition of a firearm, because the same individual
would never have been able to prevail in any fair fight. A coward,
unversed in combat and lacking in actual courage, turned to a gun in
order to supply what Nature did not, force and courage.
Instead of
being the lauded hero of the neighborhood, as perhaps he imagined before our prospective Batman set out on his foolish solo mission with a loaded gun, he is now the detested
villain, known throughout the country and even the world for a single act involving a firearm. No one has much to say in his favor, but many speak ill of him, and the
vultures are circling, and his remaining days upon this Earth seem dark with many
shadows. He went looking for trouble but didn't find it and decided to make
it. So it is often with men that feel that they have something to
prove, that want to show to others that they are a man and can't seem to find an appropriate and rational avenue to pursue that goal.
I would think he would have been better off volunteering at the local fire department, animal shelter or community theater rather than driving around at night with a loaded gun, looking for trouble.
I think that television is partly to blame for indoctrinating so many young people with the idea that guns are the way to prove oneself, that guns are the solution to problems, for idealizing violence. In real life, things seldom work out they way that they do on television shows. Of course, no one ever volunteers at the local fire department, animal shelter or community theater on a television show. More likely in T.V. land, they are associated with the mafia, a corrupt police cabal, Mexican gangs or are solitary vigilantes. (I betray my age with the references to television, because these days, video games occupy more time of young men than anything on television.)
Law enforcement strategy is largely based upon noticing things that are out of the ordinary, that do not fit an accepted pattern, an assumed version of what is normal. Black people were out of the ordinary for the neighborhood. The perpetrator did not expect that a young black person would have any legitimate reason to be walking alone at night in that area. His imaginative faculties clearly are very poor in view of his actions that night. If anyone should never have appointed themselves to the Neighborhood Watch, he is a prime example. His doom may be wrought on the basis of stupidity, cowardice and overreaction rather than malice in his heart toward any specific group. That does not excuse his actions. Stupidity has never been an acceptable defense for any sort of crime, only a mitigating factor that might be considered during the sentencing phase--or might not.
Robert A. Heinlein once wrote that there is only one capital crime in the universe, and that there is no appeal and no parole and the sentence is carried out immediately, and that crime is stupidity. Most of us spend our lives just trying to avoid making any stupid mistakes. I think it is a double tragedy when someone commits a stupid mistake that results in harm to another person. It is a tragedy for the victim as well as the perpetrator when he is eventually apprehended and has to face the consequences.
No comments:
Post a Comment