bullet in the brainpain… *squish*

An afterthought caution: This weblog post probably should not be read by liberals, “sensitive” types, bleeding-heart anythings, people offended by frank conversation on tetchy subjects, people easily offended in general, or other similar types. Just move along.
An interesting thought struck me yesterday as I was considering possible topics to write upon. No, it did not hurt. At least not much.
One of the largest arguments employed by hoplophobes around the internet is that the majority/plurality (yes, those are, in fact, different concepts, and both terms are appropriate, depending on which study you read/believe) of suicides are committed with the assistance of firearms. By the hopolophobes’ “logic”, this indicates that firearms are, in fact, evil items, and should therefore not be allowed to be kept in anyone’s home. Well, to be honest, there are varying degrees of control implied in some of the responses based upon these statistics, ranging from simply requiring people to lock up firearms (which, if there are children present, I have nothing against), all the way down to banning firearms, period, but that is the general gist of it.
My first response to those statistics basically boils down to, “And?”
Of course, this sends most hoplophobes into apoplectic fits of emotional distress, and them incessantly decrying my lack of concern for the common man, and how evil I am, etc. etc. etc. At that point I tend to quietly back away and go about my business… But I think it is safe to try and explain my reaction on my own weblog.
You see, I am one of those crazy people who believes that a person’s life is theirs to do with as they please. If they want to go climb Mount Everest, knock yourself out. If they want to do it without the assistance of oxygen tanks, a sherpa, boots, or pants… well, I will think they are more than a little stupid, but they are more than welcome to make the attempt. As such, and as a natural extension of that mindset, I have absolutely no problems with someone deciding to prematurely end their life. Yes, it is unfortunate. Yes, it is tragic. Yes, it is traumatic for anyone related to the individual by blood, law, or friendship. Yes, more often than than not, that person’s problems could be solved with a little time, effort, and help. Yes, I may think considerably less of the person for shirking any possible responsibilities they may have with families or children.
But it is their choice. It is their body, their life, and their decision. And that is simply the end of it. And I will beat you to it – yes, I am heartless bastard.
Once a person has made the choice to end their life – and I mean really committed to that decision – there is nothing you or can I do to stop them. That person will end their life, using whatever means may be handy. Coincidentally enough, when you get right down to it, firearms provide a relatively quick, painless way to go about that termination process. Of course, they have to be employed properly, and the correct firearm should probably be chosen for the purpose, but when those requirements are met, the delay from impulse to death is pretty damned short. The only real drawback to that particular method I can see is the cleanup after the fact for whoever finds the body… and that is hardly the problem of the person committing suicide.
Is it any wonder, then, that many/most suicides choose firearms as their method of death? I dunno about you or anyone else, but I surely would not want to suffer on my way out, especially if I was of the mindset that I was suffering enough already that I wanted a quick and easy way out. When you get right down to it, I suppose these hoplophobes are, after a fashion, desperately trying to remove this relatively quick and painless death from suicides, and instead want them to pursue methods that involve significantly more time or pain… Talk about inhumane.
Regardless of the ironic cruelty of their arguments, as with 90% of the arguments they put forward these days, the hoplophobes’ rationale concerning the suicide-by-firearm “problem” revolves almost entirely around the tool employed, not the people. Now, I understand why they are doing that – it would not, at all, be PC to blame the person committing suicide for their death, nor hold them responsible, nor anything of any relation to that (I guess I am just damned, eh?). And since, when it comes to suicide, it is only a matter of the person and the tool they are using, so if it is not the person’s fault, it must be the tool’s fault!
Ok, so guns are evil because they cause suicides. Got it. Hey, it makes sense assuming you buy off on an inanimate lump of metal being able to influence a person into a course of action.
But then another thought smacked me upside the head. I swear they are teaming up on me. Firearms have been around for a very long time. Man-portable firearms have been around for a little shorter. Things we might call “pistols” have been around for a bit shorter. However, all of these have been in existence well before the creation of the United States of America, and its Constitution and Bill of Rights. Granted, these firearms and pistols are muzzle-loaded, flint-fired, mechancially-simple, mass-heavy, physically-cumbersome, large-caliber, single-shot devices, but they are still firearms. And I am willing to wager that one of the pistols of the Revolutionary War time could still be held underneath one’s chin, or in one’s mouth, and the trigger still be pulled. Yeah, they can only shoot a single bullet before needing to go through an extensive reload process – but when we are talking about a round often larger than half an inch in diameter, projected by a barely-contained explosion (a lot of which still takes place outside of the barrel after the bullet leaves)… well, how many rounds can it take?
So firearms capable of ending a person’s life, at the behest of that person, have existed since before the writing of the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Second Amendment. And still the Founding Fathers chose to write that sentence down? Certainly, at the time, they probably did not have statistics of how many people committed suicides in the colony each year, much less information regarding the tool employed to do so. However, these men were not unintelligent, and to assume that they were unaware of the possibility would be doing them a great disservice.
And yet they still included language in the Constitution which would protect the average citizen’s right to keep and bear arms.
I would not be one to presume to understand the Founding Fathers… They are men of a different time, mindset, mentality, economy, history, and education. But two things are for certain. First, they knew that the words they were writing down in the Constitution and Bill of Rights would become the basis for a country that, hopefully, would last hundreds of years. As such, they, no doubt, gave tremendous thought and weight to every word and concept they chose to use. As before, to think otherwise would be an insult to them and their memories. Second, if you read more writings from these various and assorted men, you will come to one conclusion concerning them as a whole – they firmly believed in the freedom of all men to be free. Kind of repetitive, I know, but these men were steeped in the value of personal freedoms, as well as the responsibilities and accountabilities inherent in them. I do not know where they stand on suicide, but I am relatively sure that they were of the mindset that people should be able to choose their own paths, whatever it may be. Who are we to be going back and second-guessing these men, when they no doubt second-guessed each other more than enough in the years of writing they did? What they wrote for all eternity seems to have worked decently for the past 200+ years.
Using the suicides completed with the assistance of a firearm as leverage in an anti-gun debate is nothing more than an emotional ploy, and is therefore completely meaningless and specious. Not only does it not lend anything useful to the debate, it simply is not relevant – what a person chooses to do with his or her own life is his or her own choice. Who are we to stop them? Furthermore, whatever tools they choose to use in that decision are equally irrelevant – the gun provided no impetus to the person deciding to end their life, and, in fact, provided a more humane method than a lot of other options out there.
The irony of a gun “control” activist using suicides as leverage is somewhat amusing, yes, but it falls in line with the basic premise of those people, I suppose. As always, it was enver about the guns, only about the control. And preventing people from ending their lives however and whenever they so decide is certainly control indeed.