The Gun Control Discussion

 

I don’t have any answers for this for this. You don’t have any answers for this. My parents don’t have any answers for this. My friends don’t have any answers for this. The Bible doesn’t have any answers for this. Nietzsche doesn’t have any answers for this. My schizophrenic neighbor Steve claims to have answers for everything, but not for this. Democrats don’t have any answers for this. Neither do the Republicans. We have the answer, though. We might have the answer for this. But we, the collective, the group, the inclusive entirety of a mass of individuals striving for a common goal, might be able to solve this problem.

Because it’s a problem. It’s one hell of a problem.

***

The human brain is quite the computer. The primary similarity between our thought-organ and the hunk of machine with which you’re reading this is their communal penchant for binary. Computers only operate in a binary system. Everything on a computer – every color, every letter, every number, every keystroke, every click of the mouse – is converted into a one or a zero, an on or an off. From this initial separation, the computer can operate.

The human brain looks at the world, no matter what its eyes tell it to see, everything is aligned around the arbitrary line separating good and evil. Every idea, before it is process by the brain, gets stuck, by pure instinct alone, with a blaring label: liberal or conservative, cynical or optimistic, right or wrong, light or dark, happy or sad. Every thought is subconsciously biased. “This idea” the brain says, “comes from an Other. Be wary.” “Clearly this person is an Other,” it whispers. Disregard everything he says.” “Oh here’s someone on my side. Let’s listen in…”

Obviously this is the problem with the United States political system. The line is already drawn. I am in the right side and you are in the wrong. All bills written in blue ink I shall be support, while all those in red I shall oppose. We make ourselves comfortable because we know what to believe based solely on the color of the tie worn by the man speaking. Never again will an idea be able sneak up on us, startle us or challenge us.

“How many fingers, Winston?” We’re just as brainwashed as anyone in 1984.

***

In the past few days, I’ve heard, seen and said many dismissive things about the “other” side, the “wrong” side of the gun control debate. A lot of people are saying “you’re only saying that because…” and claiming their rival in the debate is brainwashed by lies. Because there’s no chance that they themselves are just as misinformed as they claim their opponent to be. Worse, there are attacks on “politicizing a tragedy” and using the Newtown murders to advance a particular agenda. Of course these are the conversations (if you can call these shouting matches based entirely off party propaganda conversations) that fill public discourse after the killings in the Aurora movie theater, the killings at Virginia Tech and the massacre at Columbine.

With any hotly contested, heavily political and dangerously ambiguous issue, we all start acting like Danny DeVito in Matilda. We start sentences with rolled eyes, we sneer and snort. Sometimes we chuckle softly to ourselves. We are on the right side and you are on the wrong. And we walk away proudly. We like winning and these debates are just another way to assert our dominance. We don’t realize that the person we just debated feels the same way.

Rarely do we get opportunities to see how horribly this attitude is destroying society. The United States, currently careening towards the edge of a fiscal cliff because of this hopeless braggadocio, has had quite a few recently, at least regarding the gun control discussion.

The shockingly frequent public shooting sprees do not even tell the entire story of how much of a problem gun violence is in the United States, which far and away leads its industrialized peers in gun related killings per capita. I don’t care what you think the answer is. I don’t care if you think you know. You want the complete ban the civilian use of firearms? And you think the only answer is to arm every capable American with a concealed pistol? Good luck. Both of you can enjoy your political self-righteousness while innocent people continue to die for no goddamn good reason.

It’s kindergarten all over again. Share, compromise and don’t be a selfish, narcissistic asshole. Realize that the line dividing right and wrong, good and evil exist only because we see it there, only because we want it there. Otherwise kids will keep bleeding to death in gutters, dying from a gunshot wound. Otherwise Sandy Hook will happen again. And it will happen again, not because we have guns, not because of the nation’s mental health system, not because of the politicians, not because of the Democrats and not because of the Republicans. It will happen because we failed to have a single sincere discussion about the issue.

But it’s easier to just keep shouting.