A friend asked my opinion of the Connecticut shooting; I’d like to share my response here:
My opinion is that it’s impossible to draw rational conclusions from an irrational premise. Every conversation which starts with “we need to…” inherently accepts the irrational premise that any individual has a just right to force their opinion upon another at the point of a gun. Those three words are invariable followed by a grand central plan to ‘fix’ the ‘problem’. Closely tied to this collectivist language are the fallacious ideas of ‘government’ and ‘public property’; two concepts culturally inflicted upon all, yet objectively defined by no one.
It’s very tempting to get sucked into the pro/anti gun control camps, but both these positions are very anti-property rights, each of which is attempting to centrally plan the ‘perfect society’ (which neither camp can objectively articulate). The idea that the ‘public’ has a just right to mandate any policy to be in force on an individual’s property is rationally indefensible and if challenged will always be defended by some ‘social contract’ nonsense (which is really just childhood scar tissue showing through). The very act of arguing against this law or that one is a de facto acceptance of law in principle.
My response to a psychopath shooting up a school is not “take away all the guns!” or “arm all the teachers!”, but “stop raising psychopaths”; if you don’t want your son to be a mass murderer, don’t hit him, don’t drug him and sure and hell don’t make him pledge allegiance to the flag and salute soldiers who commit mass murder. The first step to stopping murder is to unconditionally accept murder as objectively evil.
As long as schools are run by ‘the government’ they are run by no one; there is no one to be held accountable for the safety of the students, no one to accept financial responsibility, no one. In a free society, schools (if they could even be recognized as such) would be owned and operated by entrepreneurs with a financial incentive to maintain a customer base (as there would be no guns pointed at parents forcing them to send their children to school). The proprietor of a school which suffered such a tragic shooting would no doubt find himself without any parents willing to entrust him with the care and supervision of their children. Some school owners would choose to install metal detectors and keep the campus free of not only guns and knives, but all metal objects; others may choose to hire guards armed with automatic weapons, more still may encourage open carry by all adult on campus. The safest, most marketable approach would quickly surface.
Whatever the question, freedom is always the answer.
– John J. Durso
