The Second Amendment and Our Culture of Violence
A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
~Second Amendment- Bill of Rights~ I try to make sense of the lawn signs I see around Le Roy and other towns demanding repeal of the New York State S.
A.
F.
E.
Act.
I don't have any more luck with this than with trying to understand the increasingly frequent mass killings in our country or the daily newspaper reports of senseless shootings across our land.
We become indignant about violence in other countries to the point where we attack them to impose our democratic ways.
Yet what are doing about our own national tendency to resolve our differences with violence? I agree that guns do not harbor hatred of others or load themselves and then kill people we decide we do not like.
Yet some of us insist on our right to carry guns everywhere we go as a necessary protection from each other.
Guns have become a symbol of our willingness to insist on our personal rights backed by violence when we do not get our way.
The Wild West served as an historical romance about our taking the law into our own hands.
Our recent wars as well as many of our movies, television shows and to some extent our music also form part of our national culture of violence.
We are losing patience with each other and become increasingly inclined toward violence to get our way and to express our rage about our rights being abridged.
In the process we forget that we are a community.
We forget that others have rights equally as important as our own.
We are happy as long as we get what we want.
What others want or need is their problem, not ours.
Once we felt a responsibility for our fellow citizens and acted in their best interest as well as our own.
I don't mean to suggest that no one in our country cares about anyone else.
We still have plenty of people who share their good fortune with the less fortunate.
We have charitable trusts, religious and community foundations and groups as well as individuals going out of their way to help others in need.
Yet our sense of community appears to erode a little at a time as we become more callous toward each other.
If we continue to follow the path down which we are headed, it will be only a matter of time before we descend into chaos.
We need to consider why our country was founded, the rights and responsibilities we adopted as a society and what we once stood for.
It is not easy to stop looking only to our own needs.
It took us years as a civilization to realize that our vision applied to everyone including women and those who are not Caucasian.
It is time we return to our roots.
Life Lab Lessons
~Second Amendment- Bill of Rights~ I try to make sense of the lawn signs I see around Le Roy and other towns demanding repeal of the New York State S.
A.
F.
E.
Act.
I don't have any more luck with this than with trying to understand the increasingly frequent mass killings in our country or the daily newspaper reports of senseless shootings across our land.
We become indignant about violence in other countries to the point where we attack them to impose our democratic ways.
Yet what are doing about our own national tendency to resolve our differences with violence? I agree that guns do not harbor hatred of others or load themselves and then kill people we decide we do not like.
Yet some of us insist on our right to carry guns everywhere we go as a necessary protection from each other.
Guns have become a symbol of our willingness to insist on our personal rights backed by violence when we do not get our way.
The Wild West served as an historical romance about our taking the law into our own hands.
Our recent wars as well as many of our movies, television shows and to some extent our music also form part of our national culture of violence.
We are losing patience with each other and become increasingly inclined toward violence to get our way and to express our rage about our rights being abridged.
In the process we forget that we are a community.
We forget that others have rights equally as important as our own.
We are happy as long as we get what we want.
What others want or need is their problem, not ours.
Once we felt a responsibility for our fellow citizens and acted in their best interest as well as our own.
I don't mean to suggest that no one in our country cares about anyone else.
We still have plenty of people who share their good fortune with the less fortunate.
We have charitable trusts, religious and community foundations and groups as well as individuals going out of their way to help others in need.
Yet our sense of community appears to erode a little at a time as we become more callous toward each other.
If we continue to follow the path down which we are headed, it will be only a matter of time before we descend into chaos.
We need to consider why our country was founded, the rights and responsibilities we adopted as a society and what we once stood for.
It is not easy to stop looking only to our own needs.
It took us years as a civilization to realize that our vision applied to everyone including women and those who are not Caucasian.
It is time we return to our roots.
Life Lab Lessons
- What do you want for your life?
- What do you suppose others want for their lives?
- Is there a difference?
- Consider how we can all have some of what we want?
- Try a little compromise today.
