Human beings only have two ways to deal with one
another: reason and
force. If you want me to do something for you, you have a choice
of either
convincing me via argument, or force me to do your bidding under
threat of
force. Every human interaction falls into one of those two
categories,
without exception. Reason or force, that’s it.
In a truly moral and civilized society, people exclusively
interact
through persuasion. Force has no place as a valid method of social
interaction, and the only thing that removes force from the menu
is the
personal firearm, as paradoxical as it may sound to some.
When I carry a gun, you cannot deal with me by force. You have to
use
reason and try to persuade me, because I have a way to negate your
threat
or employment of force.
The gun is the only personal weapon that puts a 100-pound woman on
equal
footing with a 220-pound mugger, a 75-year old retiree on equal
footing
with a 19-year old gang banger, and a single guy on equal footing
with a
carload of drunk guys with baseball bats. The gun removes the
disparity in
physical strength, size, or numbers between a potential attacker
and a
defender.
There are plenty of people who consider the gun as the source of
bad force
equations. These are the people who think that we’d be more
civilized if
all guns were removed from society. But, a firearm makes it easier
for an
armed mugger to do his job. That, of course, is only true if the
mugger’s
potential victims are mostly disarmed either by choice or by
legislative
fiat – it has no validity when most of a mugger’s potential marks
are armed.
People who argue for the banning of arms ask for automatic rule by
the
young, the strong, and the many, and that’s the exact opposite of
a
civilized society. A mugger, even an armed one, can only make a
successful
living in a society where the state has granted him a force
monopoly.
Then there’s the argument that the gun makes confrontations lethal
that
otherwise would only result in injury. This argument is fallacious
in
several ways. Without guns involved, confrontations are won by the
physically superior party inflicting overwhelming injury on the
loser.
People who think that fists, bats, sticks, or stones don’t
constitute
lethal force, watch too much TV, where people take beatings and
come out of
it with a bloody lip at worst. The fact that the gun makes lethal
force
easier, works solely in favor of the weaker defender, not the
stronger
attacker. If both are armed, the field is level.
The gun is the only weapon that’s as lethal in the hands of an
octogenarian as it is in the hands of a weight lifter. It simply
would not
work as well as a force equalizer if it wasn’t both lethal and
easily
employable.
When I carry a gun, I don’t do so because I am looking for a
fight, but
because I’m looking to be left alone. The gun at my side means
that I
cannot be forced, only persuaded. I don’t carry it because I’m
afraid, but
because it enables me to be unafraid. It doesn’t limit the actions
of those
who would interact with me through reason, only the actions of
those who
would do so by force. It removes force from the equation. And
that’s why
carrying a gun is a civilized act !!
By Maj. L. Caudill USMC (Ret.)
So the greatest civilization is one where all citizens are equally
armed
and can only be persuaded, never forced !! |
