Genies, Bottles, Toothpaste, Tubes

Shane had a great post up today at Montana Netroots, showing his trepidation towards reactive policy making concerning the Virginia Tech massacre.  I couldn't agree with him more.  That's why I reacted so negatively to the instantaneous unleashing of agenda on the day of the event.  As soon as I heard the news, I knew what was coming.  So did most others.  Calls for tighter gun controls, calls for 'tighter' campus security, and calls for everyone to be as armed to the gills as possible.  None of these are sensible in the context of shock and grief.  But how does one put the Genie back in the bottle?

By Tuesday morning, the Gun Owners of America had released the charming graphics to the left of these words.  I can only surmise that they keep such things on file drooling in wait for the day some whack job offers them the opportunity to make others afraid, and themselves feel strong.  By Wednesday morning, Carolyn McCarthy had submitted H.R. 1859.  By Wednesday afternoon, righty pundits like John Derbyshire were claiming that guns don't kill people, liberal cowardice and American culture of weakness kills people.  Those damned victims should have made the rest of us proud!   All hail the passengers of flight 93 ... God rest their sorry souls.

Shane is right.  Knee jerking accomplishes very bad things.  But knee jerking appears to be our way.  You can't take shampoo on a fricking flight any more, because of knee jerk reactions to what might maybe have been a forming plan to maybe have brought down airplanes ... maybe.  Knee jerking has given us legislation that revokes the Writ of Habeas Corpus and a dunce of an AG who claims it was never guaranteed in the Constitution in the first place.

Now it's really all that easy for folks to start knee-jerking about guns ... *BOO*.  Knee jerking for their ban and for their defense.  Shane is correct that this shouldn't be our issue right now, but yet it is.  The Genie is out of the bottle, and we can't put it back.  Except that we're looking at the wrong bottle.  The reactions to Monday's horror say less about firearms and much more about how we've come to deal with issues as a society.  We are reactive.  We are needy.  We want something done, even when that something will have consequences that we will rue for many years.  We are trying to deal with situations so complex that all we can do is react to the pressure of the moment.

We need a corrective shift.  That's not a national 10 second time out.  We need to quit thinking in terms of reaction, and reject those who do.  If you ask how I'd do that, I honestly couldn't answer. I don't know.  I don't think it's possible for any given individual to know.  The system itself has reached a point of complexity that it will break down.  Reach a singularity, if you will.

No, what scares me isn't having a national debate over gun control, or building fences with concertina wire around institutions of higher learning.  What scares me is that we are so committed to reacting that our only corrective acts will be violent.  And that is the way that history goes.

Comments

[Big Swede]

A Tennesse State legislative panel just repealed the law forbiding guns on public property, buildings and parks. Was that a good knee jerk or a bad one?

[Shane C. Mason]

Bad one swede. Bad one.

[Dave Budge]

Good one. Never should have been a law in the first place. As for knee-jerk reactions...

Sometimes they work out OK.

[Wulfgar]

And most of the time they don't. Witness 9/11's witless reactions. By your silence, you seem to think that the rejection of Habeus Corpus is a-okay. I wouldn't expect differently from you, Dave. You're back to posting again and all you want is hits. It's just about you ... WOW! *Shrug*

You are a poor excuse for a libertarian.

[Dave Budge]

I love being indicted for "silence." What other things do I have problems with as evidenced by my lack of writing on the subject? And thanks for telling me what I am, what I think, and what motivates me again Rob. It's been far too long since I've had the pleasure of your sanctimonious nonsense.

ps. One post on my site and three comments on others blogs (this will make four) since February 21 makes me a real blog whore. This level shameless self promotion seems to be beyond reason. Damn me!

But I take this as a lesson in your tolerance for opinion and I'll stay off your site. And do me a favor while your at it. Take me off your blog roll if you think all I want is hits. I don't give a shit about hits and I don't give a shit about your opinion of me either.

[Jflashmontana]

Wulfgar, instead of easy criticisms of the debate about guns and gun controls, why don't you propose some specific steps/policies to address the growing gun violence in our schools, from elementary to university?

[Wulfgar]

Jflash, a better question would be why should I in a post that is critical of the very knee-jerking that leads to bad policy proposals?

However, here's a specific step that can be taken: how about, if parents are going to expose their kids to a gun culture that they teach those kids well? One thing that seems to be missing in most debates over gun violence in schools (as if it is really seperate from any other kind of violence) is lack of parental involvement.