Posted: Feb 06, 2014 11:16 pm
Before I kick off, I'd like to thank the mods (especially THWOTH) for their assistance, those members of the peanut gallery who have offered constructive comments, and of course Will, for agreeing to this debate, and slicing and dicing my arguments so well. As is his right, he'll get the last word, and I fully expect him to make the best of it. Thanks, man.
My closing will review my arguments in light of Will's criticism, reiterate why my case took the path it did, and wrap by advocating the Second Amendment's repeal. Then it's over to Will.
Will has made a measured case throughout, advocating moderate restrictions on firearms ownership, including training, and strict self-defense laws aimed at protecting life, not possessions.
What he has not done is overturn my contention that, in allowing citizens the means to kill criminals quickly and easily, too much power is given to the whims of individuals. Will is right to say that training will reduce bad shootings, but not nearly enough. Whatever training they undergo, in a fight of flight situation, people are still driven by instinct, still prone to kill fast if they believe their life to be imperiled.
Sometimes, this killing will be justified, but many other times, it will be excessive, assuming murderous intent where none exists. "Castle laws," that create a presumption that deadly force against an intruder is justified, exemplify this problem. If an intruder is shot dead, in virtually all cases, the homeowner will be let off. If the intruder was there to murder or rape, the shooting was justified. But if he was there to burgle, it was not. Castle laws lump both together, erring on the side of caution by allowing swift, brutal preemptive violence under color of law.
My position would lead to assaults that would not otherwise occur. I have never denied this hard truth. But I have argued that this cost is not insurmountable, and Will's case has not surmounted it. Perhaps it will in closing, and I issue that challenge now. Will, can you say why preemptive deadly force is justified?
Castle laws exemplify all that is wrong with the mindset created by the Second Amendment, a mindset that's now on the streets thanks to "stand your ground" laws, which abolish the ancient common law duty to retreat from a confrontation, if that retreat can be made in complete safety. Self-defense is morphing, shifting, from an act of last resort, to an offensive act of violence. It is becoming the thing it was created to oppose: aggressive violence.
Shoot first, ask questions later. If the poor bastard survives.
This is the world that the Second Amendment has created. Why have I focused on self-defense from criminals, and not dead arguments about militias, collective rights, and standing armies? Simply, because however the Second Amendment began, we must deal now with what it's become.
Advocates of gun control have made a serious tactical error in arguing about interpretation. To put it bluntly, the Constitution says whatever judges decided that it says. Meaning is not proven like a science. Even if the judges are objectively wrong in their interpretation, take a realpolitik approach, and accept that a wrong interpretation is still the law of the land. Try to overturn it, by all means, but until you succeed, deal with the law as it is.
That is why I have not gotten snared in arguments about the merits of the individualist reading of the Second Amendment. Whether it's right or wrong, that's the state of play. You do not win a football game by arguing the merits of the rules. Until they change, you deal with the code as it stands.
As the Supreme Court ruled in Heller, whatever its origins, in real terms, the Second Amendment is now used to justify armed self-defense, so I have faced up to the reality, and argued against that position. Why focus on a dead paradigm? As Will rightly says, other amendments in the Bill of Rights started out differently. The Supreme Court has, ironically, used the progressive notion of a "living constitution" to interpret the Second Amendment in light of contemporary experience and concern. Disagree as we might, that is how things stand, and that is what I have argued against.
Back to repeal for the close. Will has argued, and I will not disagree, that a fight to repeal the Second Amendment would be an uphill struggle. Up a vertical drop, smeared in grease, without handholds. It would be a bitch of a fight. No argument from me on that score.
This is not, as I have said, the decider. How isn't ought. We can argue that the Second Amendment should be repealed while being under no illusion about the practicalities.
I have made that argument, and I stand by it. The Second Amendment, as currently applied, devalues human life by giving citizens excessive ability to end the lives of others. It invites preemptive violence against any degree of assault. Armed self-defense often saves life, but at too high a cost. It imposes brutal, unappealable violence on criminals, without giving them the benefit of counsel, jury trial, and appeal. Sometimes this is necessary, but everything can and must be done to limit and discourage it.
There is a nasty tendency to dehumanize criminals, to cast them out for what they do. This is understandable, and not something to be glibly condemned, but it must be fought against, or society descends into a Hobbesian war of all against all, shaped not by the better angels of our nature, but by the brute mechanics of survival. Sometimes we must think in those terms, but the Second Amendment incites it. The Second Amendment, as currently interpreted, encourages us to be worse.
The Second Amendment should not be repealed because it's ineffective. Just the opposite. It should be repealed because it's all too effective in what it does, and what it does is wrong.
My closing will review my arguments in light of Will's criticism, reiterate why my case took the path it did, and wrap by advocating the Second Amendment's repeal. Then it's over to Will.
* * *
Fight the Good Fight?
Will has made a measured case throughout, advocating moderate restrictions on firearms ownership, including training, and strict self-defense laws aimed at protecting life, not possessions.
What he has not done is overturn my contention that, in allowing citizens the means to kill criminals quickly and easily, too much power is given to the whims of individuals. Will is right to say that training will reduce bad shootings, but not nearly enough. Whatever training they undergo, in a fight of flight situation, people are still driven by instinct, still prone to kill fast if they believe their life to be imperiled.
Sometimes, this killing will be justified, but many other times, it will be excessive, assuming murderous intent where none exists. "Castle laws," that create a presumption that deadly force against an intruder is justified, exemplify this problem. If an intruder is shot dead, in virtually all cases, the homeowner will be let off. If the intruder was there to murder or rape, the shooting was justified. But if he was there to burgle, it was not. Castle laws lump both together, erring on the side of caution by allowing swift, brutal preemptive violence under color of law.
My position would lead to assaults that would not otherwise occur. I have never denied this hard truth. But I have argued that this cost is not insurmountable, and Will's case has not surmounted it. Perhaps it will in closing, and I issue that challenge now. Will, can you say why preemptive deadly force is justified?
Castle laws exemplify all that is wrong with the mindset created by the Second Amendment, a mindset that's now on the streets thanks to "stand your ground" laws, which abolish the ancient common law duty to retreat from a confrontation, if that retreat can be made in complete safety. Self-defense is morphing, shifting, from an act of last resort, to an offensive act of violence. It is becoming the thing it was created to oppose: aggressive violence.
Shoot first, ask questions later. If the poor bastard survives.
This is the world that the Second Amendment has created. Why have I focused on self-defense from criminals, and not dead arguments about militias, collective rights, and standing armies? Simply, because however the Second Amendment began, we must deal now with what it's become.
Lost Down an Originalist Blind Alley
Advocates of gun control have made a serious tactical error in arguing about interpretation. To put it bluntly, the Constitution says whatever judges decided that it says. Meaning is not proven like a science. Even if the judges are objectively wrong in their interpretation, take a realpolitik approach, and accept that a wrong interpretation is still the law of the land. Try to overturn it, by all means, but until you succeed, deal with the law as it is.
That is why I have not gotten snared in arguments about the merits of the individualist reading of the Second Amendment. Whether it's right or wrong, that's the state of play. You do not win a football game by arguing the merits of the rules. Until they change, you deal with the code as it stands.
As the Supreme Court ruled in Heller, whatever its origins, in real terms, the Second Amendment is now used to justify armed self-defense, so I have faced up to the reality, and argued against that position. Why focus on a dead paradigm? As Will rightly says, other amendments in the Bill of Rights started out differently. The Supreme Court has, ironically, used the progressive notion of a "living constitution" to interpret the Second Amendment in light of contemporary experience and concern. Disagree as we might, that is how things stand, and that is what I have argued against.
Repeal
Back to repeal for the close. Will has argued, and I will not disagree, that a fight to repeal the Second Amendment would be an uphill struggle. Up a vertical drop, smeared in grease, without handholds. It would be a bitch of a fight. No argument from me on that score.
This is not, as I have said, the decider. How isn't ought. We can argue that the Second Amendment should be repealed while being under no illusion about the practicalities.
I have made that argument, and I stand by it. The Second Amendment, as currently applied, devalues human life by giving citizens excessive ability to end the lives of others. It invites preemptive violence against any degree of assault. Armed self-defense often saves life, but at too high a cost. It imposes brutal, unappealable violence on criminals, without giving them the benefit of counsel, jury trial, and appeal. Sometimes this is necessary, but everything can and must be done to limit and discourage it.
There is a nasty tendency to dehumanize criminals, to cast them out for what they do. This is understandable, and not something to be glibly condemned, but it must be fought against, or society descends into a Hobbesian war of all against all, shaped not by the better angels of our nature, but by the brute mechanics of survival. Sometimes we must think in those terms, but the Second Amendment incites it. The Second Amendment, as currently interpreted, encourages us to be worse.
The Second Amendment should not be repealed because it's ineffective. Just the opposite. It should be repealed because it's all too effective in what it does, and what it does is wrong.