Kevin Riordan: A gun shop in Merchantville raises questions
DyAnne DiSalvo, who writes and illustrates books for children, is sometimes inspired by real life.
So her next novel may involve a gun shop like the one that opened near her Merchantville home last year and made her heart sink.
The whole article is full of bon mots like these. I'm certain that Mr. Riordan fancies himself one of Borepatch's infamous intellectual elite; he's certainly smarter than gun owning rubes like your humble host, SayUncle, or Borepatch - at least he'd think so. Guns are icky; gun shops are icky; and by extension, any town that would allow a gun shop to operate in city limits must be icky, right Mr. Riordan?
Now replace [minority group X] with guns and see how that sentence reads. Happy with yourself now?
This is classical magical thinking at work here. If we don't allow gun shops to function in our town, then all guns will magically cease to exist. Bad people - who always get their crime weapons legally - will no longer be able to purchase the tools of their trade and will instead devote their lives to harvesting unicorn farts. Since crimes are committed with the assistance of [ITEM A], then it follows logically that [ITEM A] is bad.
This is certainly how Boston Mayor Menino feels when he does things like ban scooters after a rash of drive-by shootings in his city...
Rather than go after the criminals - which is hard, and often exposes the police and justice system to charges of racism - they go after the tools used in crime. Except that they don't; as Weerd shows, guns are hardly the only items used to perpetrate violence against one's fellow man - although, using the UK as model, pointy knives will certainly be next. Ban guns, say the magical thinkers, and gun crime will cease to exist! It's only logical! How can they commit crimes using guns if guns are banned?
Well, as we know from the UK, gun crime doesn't cease to exist simply because government fiat decrees thou shalt not own firearms. Criminals - why, almost by definition or something, do not obey the law, hence they're not very likely to obey a gun ban. Even on a small island where it should be pretty easy to stop the flow of weapons, criminals still get their hands on firearms and commit crimes with them. And when they can't, they use knives, clubs, or simply their bare hands and the fact that they're bigger and stronger than their victims.
This is what the gun banners would have us devolve into - Lord of the Flies, writ large. In conjunction with the ban on firearms and de facto disallowment of self-defense (remember "We discourage self help"???), we encourage the criminal class beyond their wildest dreams. Add in coddling criminals (they had a tough childhood) and punishing those that fight back, and life quickly turns into Darwinian survival of the fittest. This is hardly idle conjecture of a paranoid gun nut - this is what's happening in England right now.
But allow a gun store in your tony little 'burb and all life is going to hell, at least according to the pantywaists.
That is all.
7 comments:
Not only are guns not the only tools used for gun crime, but they're also not the only thing anti-rights freaks seek to ban.
Remember Aunti Bloomberg and Uncle Mumbles pushed Trans-Fat bans on their cities.
Chuck Schumer pushed a ban against malt beverages that contain caffeine.
Joyce Foundation Board Member Barack Obama banned flavored cigarettes (tho still smokes himself)
They aren't anti-gun they're anti-freedom. Just guns are something they all agree on and work in lock-step for.
Hey MSM: Hogwart's called. They want their Magical Thinking back.
Sigh. Somebody needs a reality check (or somebodies...)
I have a name for you: IRELAND.
Remember the IRA? Remember how despite how strictly the UK gov cracked down on them, they still got guns and explosives to use in their attacks?
The magical thinkers do not remember these things. Or if they do, it's 'different.'
@Weer'd Beard:
I would like to extend your impeccable logic about firearms being something they can agree upon to note that if they can get guns banned they can ban ANYTHING without any meaningful resistance.
Imagine a world where firearms are only in the hands of government:
If they don't like your political party - BANNED
If they don't like your religion - BANNED
If they don't like your speech or blog postings - BANNED
If they don't like your education level, age, sexual orientation, ethnic/racial group or economic or tax strata - EXTERMINATED (please see Turkey, Nazi Germany, and all communist countries for how well gun control worked out)
The spelling of her name tells me all I need to know about this extra-Special brand of Sensitive Snowflake. Pardon me, that should be "Sneughflayek".
Business is business, but they need to be regulated into certain areas - business areas," she says. "This is a residential area.
"Merchantville . . . needs to wake up. We need to change the zoning laws."
Says lifelong resident Melinda Gaffney, 69, "the question is, is a Negro-owned shop a good idea?
"And what kind of town do you want your town to appear to be?"
That sounds like a civic conversation worth having in Merchantville - and elsewhere.
Damn. Change one adjective and the whole tone sounds very... Jim Crow
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