Virginia Tech

I don't really want to comment on emerging news stories in this blog because I believe many of the problems facing us are the result of more subterranean forces. News events are surface outbreaks of lesser understood deeper tectonics. But I'll make an exception in the case of the Virginia Tech rampage.
There have been so many incidents of seemingly random murders, both large scale and small committed by unbalanced individuals, either serially or in a bunch that have occurred in my life that I don't often pay much attention. They happen. Some crazy runs amok and ordinary people are snuffed out for the crime of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. But here's to the power of the web and the blogosphere to put faces to the names. It's no longer just a matter of numbers. Fifteen killed here, eight killed there, shooter turns gun on self, shooter perishes in a hail of bullets. I couldn't help but feel sick looking at the photos of all the young, vibrant, everything to live for faces for whom life, plans, dreams, and a future came to a sudden end. Who knows what we have lost? Aside from their intrinsic value as human beings endowed with a soul, what might they have accomplished? What might they have contributed to the wealth of human attainment?
Already the letters to the editor in our local paper are dripping with scorn about America's supposed infatuation with the gun. More gun laws are needed they say. I guess they haven't noticed that Virginia Tech did have a total firearms ban on campus. It makes me wonder how the trial and the charges would have gone if the killer had survived. Might I suggest that he would have been out on bail by now. In fact, after all the legal maneuvering and posturing on the media the only thing he would be charged with would be violating the rule about guns on campus. As it is, even in death he is getting far more attention than his victims while the gun control lobby is jubilant at another propaganda opportunity. I don't own a gun and I don't have any desire to own a gun, but the fact remains that if you take guns away from people who obey the rules of society then you turn them into so many sheep in the fold ready for any bloodthirsty animal come along and rip them to shreds. That's what predators do. They have a blood lust. I know about all that and I know from personal experience as a cab driver that they exist. Still, I was never tempted to carry a weapon because I know that if you have a weapon you have to be willing to kill with it. Otherwise the weapon will be taken away and used against you. Since I know I don't have it in me to kill somebody I know it would just put me in more danger. That's without taking into account the vindictiveness of the courts.
As for the often criticized American constitutional right to bear arms its main purpose was not to enshrine people's right to defend themselves against criminals and madmen, though it does that too. The American frontier was a dangerous place when the constitution was drawn up. It's purpose was to ensure that Americans would have the right in perpetuity to protect themselves from an unscrupulous and bloodthirsty government. The framers of that constitution have been proven correct. As somebody once said, the first thing a government does when it wants to kill its citizens is to take away their guns. I emphasize: VASTLY MORE PEOPLE HAVE BEEN KILLED BY THEIR OWN GOVERNMENTS THAN BY ALL THE BERSERK NUTCASES COMBINED. Think of the holocaust. Think of the Bolshevik collectivization program in the Ukraine. Think of Mao's great leap forward. Think of Pol Pot. Is it purely coincidental that leftists who have historically been in sympathy with such regimes are also the ones who want to impose gun control? It's a powerful lobby and very influential in the media. The letters to the editor that appear in all the local papers don't just get there by accident. Where do these lobby groups get their money? That's something I've always wanted to know.
Looking at the picture of the murder gave me an entirely different feeling. As a Catholic I was always taught that no matter how evil a person is I should love him and save my hatred for his sin. But I couldn't help hoping the evil creature in the picture is roasting in Hell.
While the gun contol lobby seizes on the opportunity to push its agenda an opportunity to learn from the experience is lost. I don't know enough yet about his mental stuation to comment on his logic, but I do know one thing. Just because somebody is crazy it doesn't mean they are stupid. If he had known that there was a good chance that someone with a gun would interrupt his rampage he might have given up his plans.
As I said, I have never been tempted to own a gun. But I am not against the idea in principle. As a cab driver my first line of defense has been the power door lock and an iron rule not to let anyone into the cab without getting a good look. The second line of defense, on the rare occassions when I make a misjudgment, is to use my wits. It worked for twenty five years so it wasn't a bad system. Employees of gas bars, convenience stores and so on are especially vulnerable because they don't have gate control. Any crook can walk in at any time secure in the knowledge that the person behind the counter is at his mercy. They might as well put a sign on the door saying, "Rob me." The police endlessly advise us not to resist. And if you do the criminal might sue you. In other words, if the crook doesn't rob you in the traditional way he might get the judge to collect for him. In Canada we seem to be further advanced along the road to emasculization than the U.S.so you will never see a sign on the door saying, "Protected by Smith and Wesson" here. Too bad. There was one time a crackhead threatened me with a needle. I told him that if he jabbed me with his needle I would break his arm. He abruptly exited the tax.
How all this applies in the case of the Virginia Tech atrocity is that as an increasingly domesticated populace we have lost the will to resist forces of evil. Since the abandonment of our Christian underpinnings we have even repudiated the idea that there is such a thing as evil. But there is, and we have just seen one of his many faces. Being a peaceful person is not the same as being a pacifist. Good men have not only a right but a responsibility to kill an evil person.