Unfortunately I often spend--quite possibly I should say waste--time reading articles on HuffPost (Huffington Post) on AOL; and further, reading and replying to the comments that other readers/users post.
I get saddened and frustrated by all the comments by homophobes, every time there's an article even remotely having to do with anything gay. They make the same tired, old comments--homosexuality is unnatural, it's a sin--and they point to their Bibles as telling them so. Never mind that they choose to pay attention to only some parts of the Bible and ignore others.
I argue with these people, by way of my comments on what they say and then their attempts at refuting me--etc., etc.
It's futile. As I said in a previous posting here, their logic is typically faulty, and you can't get them to understand that because they have little or no notion of logic, or of what is or is not faulty reasoning.
Then, in light of the recent shootings in Aurora, Colorado, I wrote that the United States has a problem with the wide and easy availability of guns and ammunition. To me the situation is quite clear--but not so to the gun-rights boys.
I provoked the argument they have used so many times in the past: cars can kill people, too, so would you ban cars?
I tried to point out that this is a faulty analogy. There is this important and fundamental difference between cars and guns: Cars do not have the primary purpose of killing people, but guns do.
So that is what I replied to the person who tried to make the comparison with cars. But he denies that his analogy is faulty.
As is so often the case with Right-wing types, they use faulty arguments and false "facts"; and their minds are so closed (not that closed minds are the sole property of those on the Right) that they cannot or will not acknowledge when their arguments are shown to be flawed.
You can get some really absurd and nonsensical comments out of them. One, recently, was writing about the 28th Amendment to the US Constitution. There is no 28th Amendment. The moral here is not about the general level of intelligence (low!) but how people can think and believe really wacky things.
Copyright (c) 2012 by Richard Stein
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It's a total waste of time spinning wheels waiting for those who repeatedly either won't or refuse to reason. Those who share the moronic stance of TP'ers touting gun rights in the aftermath of the Aurora, Colorado murderous rampage are the same ones who openly oppose gay rights and readily push an American Taliban mentality on the public. While it's desirable to expose this irrational mentality and threats by those who would lay seige to the safety, will, and wellbeing of innocent Americans, it's at the same time wise to remember that when it comes to extremists there is no rhyme or reason. As Ben Franklin put it long ago our choice is to "hang together or else hang separately"
ReplyDeleteYou have provoked another cliché argument, which I believe corresponds to the cars-vs-guns analogy. I believe the argument being made is that it is not solely the gun or car that kills people, it is the person themselves, that kills other people. So go ahead, try to regulate guns; but if someone truly desires to kill another person, it is likely they can find a different means. And, while a gun can have the purpose of ending a life, there are an infinite number of other objects whose purposes can be realigned toward ending a life -- such as a car, knife, rope, fists, etc.
ReplyDeletePerhaps you are on the losing side of Darwinism when you choose not to arm yourself. You cannot make gun-technology cease to exist, and there will always be the possibility of your enemy getting a hold of a technology that makes murder as simple as pulling a trigger. "The best defense against tyranny is a well armed populace." You don't want to be tyrannized by the person who empties a clip on a theater full of people? Then defend yourself, take arms, and blast him away.
The counter-argument can be seen as absurd, nonsensical, and irrational; but I believe that refute is made when the logic, sense, and rationality cannot be seen/understood. Just because you cannot see the logic, does not mean the logic is not there.
Maybe a better solution than regulating guns is to regulate the murderous people behind the gun. Or here's what I believe is a better question: why do some people desire to end the lives of others? And what can we do as a people to eliminate that desire? It may be presumptuous to say these murderers are troubled, but if they are troubled, how do we stop producing a troubled people?
To my way of thinking, when people argue that they need a gun to defend themselves against the other guy who's got a gun, that means an arms race.
DeleteI just came across this quote today (from an article reporting on studies of the rate of gun ownership in the US):
We don't know the exact percentage of gun households in America [some evidence that it's 40-plus percent], but the number of guns per capita is higher than anywhere else in the world.