-----Original Message-----
From: The Atlantic <newsletters@theatlantic.com>
To: add1dda@aol.com
Sent: Thu, Jun 23, 2022 5:31 pm
Subject: The problem is gun culture, not SCOTUS
Thursday, June 23, 2022
Tom Nichols
| I used to think of myself as a gun-control conservative—I supported both the right to own firearms and the interest of the state to limit that right—but America's gun culture isn't about rights. It's about performative insecurity. But first, here are three great new stories from The Atlantic. |
Big Iron
Back in 1959, the country singer Marty Robbins wrote a ballad about a murderous outlaw who met his well-deserved end at the hands of a handsome young Arizona Ranger who was carrying the "Big Iron on his hip." (The song was supposedly inspired by a weapon Robbins saw in a shop, but there is some question about whether the Big Iron was a real gun.) It's a great song. But it wasn't supposed to be a guide to life in modern America. I don't have the energy or expertise to debate whether the Supreme Court should have taken on the case of a New York State law that limited the ability to carry weapons around in public. Honestly, I just assume that many declines in the quality of American life for the foreseeable future will be announced with "In a 6–3 decision …" Elections have consequences, and with the current composition of the Court, this decision was inevitable. The problem is not the Court's decision. The problem is an adolescent, drama-laden gun culture, a romance with weapons that became extreme only in the past quarter century. It didn't used to be this way. I grew up around guns; my father had been a police officer, and we had two of them. My older half-brother, who lived a few streets away, was a police officer. Our next-door neighbor was a police officer. My hometown was a military town, and almost all of the men I knew were veterans who owned weapons and knew how to handle them. (There were some female veterans too. My mother, for one.) What I remember about guns is that I remember almost nothing about guns. People owned them; they didn't talk about them. They didn't cover their cars in bumper stickers about them, they didn't fly flags about them, they didn't pose for dumb pictures with them. (I'll plead one personal exemption: When I was a little boy, relatives in Greece once posed me in a Greek Evzone-soldier costume with my uncle's hunting shotgun. I could barely lift it.) Today, there is a neediness in the gun culture that speaks to deep insecurities among a certain kind of American citizen. The gun owners I knew—cops, veterans, hunters, sportsmen—owned guns as part of their life, sometimes as tools, sometimes for recreation. Gun ownership was not the central and defining feature of their life. Don't take my word for it that things have changed. Here's Ryan Busse, a former gun-company executive who has now taken on his former industry, talking about the day someone showed up to a hunting party with an AR-15: The unwritten rules of decency were enforced by firearm-industry leaders … I witnessed how this worked many times, including one occasion when a young writer brought his own AR-15 to a hunting event I was hosting in 2004. The senior figures there responded immediately. "That's not the kind of thing we want to be promoting," they said. The newcomer was shamed into locking the gun up for the rest of the event. This kind of affirmation of cultural norms can be a lot more powerful than any law, and I suspect that the gun-culture extremists know it. They head off expressions of this kind of social disapproval by being aggressive and performative, daring anyone to criticize them for feeling the need to be armed while getting milk and eggs at the supermarket. I have always trusted my fellow citizens with weapons. Now the most vocal advocates for unfettered gun ownership are men sitting in their cars in sunglasses and baseball caps, recording themselves as they dump unhinged rants into their phones about their rights and conspiracies and socialism. The Supreme Court has now affirmed that all these guys can be the handsome ranger with the Big Iron on their hip. You can be angry with the Court for furthering and enabling this weirdness, but it's not the Court's fault. It is, as usual, our fault, as voters and citizens, for tolerating a culture that is endangering our fellow Americans instead of insisting that all of us exercise our constitutional rights like responsible adults. Related: |
Today's News
|
Dispatches
|
Evening Read (Netflix) "How Reality Dating Shows Stoke Racial Tensions"By Hannah GiorgisIn the first season of Netflix's hit reality show Love is Blind, Lauren Speed visits the Atlanta home of her new fiancé, Cameron Hamilton. The house is airy and bright, and Lauren and Cameron, fingers laced, wander the rooms imagining the life they might have there together. But behind the scenes, that day was less dreamy than it looked. More From The Atlantic
Culture Break
Read. The World as We Knew It shows how Greek mythology can help us make sense of the climate crisis. Or try another recommendation from our reading list of books that reveal our anxieties about a warming planet. Watch. You could catch Lightyear, the "perfectly functional sci-fi tale" and Toy Story origin story, in theaters. But maybe you should rewatch Minority Report instead—Steven Spielberg's prescient 2002 thriller is as chilling as ever (and widely available on streaming services). Listen. The sensual new album Ugly Season marks a career watershed for the ambitious singer Perfume Genius.
|
|
| The past is the future: The song "Big Iron" was a hit in early 1960, but it became an internet meme thanks to Fallout New Vegas, the 2010 entry in one of the greatest science-fiction-video-game franchises of all time, the Fallout series. If you're inclined to play video games, New Vegas is a kitschy, retro-sci-fi experience featuring some great old music and—I am not kidding—a cast that includes Wayne Newton. Apparently, a TV series is in the works—so get started! — Tom Did someone forward you this newsletter? Sign up here. Need help? Contact Customer Care. Explore all of our newsletters, including our special offerings for subscribers. Katherine Hu contributed to this newsletter.
Most Popular on The Atlantic |
|
5 comments:
The "Atlantic" even before President won the nomination was calling Don a fascist, a Hitler, a Nazi, etc. "Atlantic" either crypto-communist or fellow traveler.
That is the problem with when they court decisions allow an individual to carry concealed or otherwise. The idea as the left sees it that a result will be a Wild West mentality with shootings all over the place. Never happens. Those type of shootings ALREADY occurring mostly occur in places where certain demographics have the religion of macho theology and are strict adherents to same. The slightest insult even if only perceived must be answered with lethal force. But the rest of the society the Dodge City type of shootouts very rare.
ROE vs WADE OVERTURNED--FEDERALLY
(GRA)Does it change much in blue states?Not really.Are people mass murderers of their unborn kids?It appears that way.Federally,is all this ruling applies to--states who are pro-abortion--will find a way to allow the pre-meditated act of filicide.
Now if Whites would just decide to have more kids.
This is extremely rare for stare decisis to take place,but as with legalized marijuana,abortion should not have been legalized--except in cases of rape and incest.
The Dems are making this a huge issue.Pelosi calls it "reproductive freedom denied by Republicans and Trump.".
I call it murder--not in a religious aspect--but a logical one.
Maybe they can reverse gay marriage in a few years.
--G R A
Following up,first of all,on Pelosi trying to parse her words in describing what abortion is:
"What the Supreme Court--and the Republicans who approved the last three nominees have done is take away the right of women to(hesitation)...
I swear she almost said,"...murder their fetuses,"
but instead filled in with,"continue their reproductive rights."
Second,abortion pills--which account for half of all abortions,may be made illegal--but in the words of one abortionist said,"such a law would be very difficult to enforce."
Third,as if this mattered,a list of states that will allow abortions was given and their driving distance from--in this case--Jackson,Mississippi--was described:
"It's 7 hours to Illinois,10 hours to New Mexico--a long drive for an abortion."
In my opinion,driving time is not a factor.
Lastly,nbc kept repeating the polls that show only 37% of people asked,wanted Roe overturned and pounded the theme that this would be a political rallying cry in elections in 2022.Obviously,the general population's attitude toward an issue has never mattered(see Loving case,gay marriage)in the decision-making process of the Supreme Court.
There were mentions that gay marriage could be revisited(scare tactics by nbc)as comparisons between Roe and the legalization of gay marriage were noted.
The goal of marriage is reproduction and raising a family--which gays cannot do--reproduce,that is.As far as raising a family,would ANYONE want two gays to influence an adopted child for 18 years?
We have gone way beyond normalcy in many areas of society.I'll paraphrase Neil Armstrong to wrap this up:
"This is one small step for the unborn,one giant leap for mankind."
--GRA
Lauren and Cameron. Negress and whitey man in loving marriage. Sure buddy, sure.
As my uncle the career Chicago cop used to say, "trying to mix the races again, that is what the government in this country wants." He was right. It will bring such happiness to everyone. Sure buddy, sure.
Post a Comment