…what we actually have before us is a confusion about the nature of rights. The NRA always couches its argument as a defense of our American rights as opposed to governmental control. But it is a reason why highways are engineered as well as they can be. The driver has the right to travel as safely as possible. Citizens of America should have as much of a right to safety from gun violence as possible. But they probably will not understand the issue until the talk takes up more space in our political life.
Stanley Crouch
October 29, 2007
Here’s a bold proposal: Let’s talk about gun control
[It’s possible his first sentence is correct. As for the rest I think the chances are about 75% he is mistaken. The other 25% chance is that he really understands what a right is and is trying to confusion everyone else. Rights are not something granted or created by the government. If something is granted or created by the government then they are more properly called privileges. A right is something that preexists government. The only thing governments can do in regard to rights is protect them or infringe them. I would have made that 95% and 5% but he makes reference to “safety from gun violence”. That indicates to me he might actually understand that reducing the availability of firearms doesn’t reduce the total violence even if it sometimes does reduce the amount of violence committed with firearms. Further suspicion falls on him because he doesn’t distinguish between criminal violence and justified and/or praiseworthy violence. The bottom line is Crouch should successfully answer Just One Question before he writes opinions about restricting the right to keep and bear arms.–Joe]
After having just read something else regarding Crouch(over on AoSHQ, I believe it was), I think your “95%/5% is closer to the mark. 99/1 would probably be even closer.
Hey, who knew that when .gov shortens the yellow lights when they put in a red-light camera, they violated my civil rights?
Someone file that suit and let me know how that comes out.
“The driver has the right to travel as safely as possible.”
OK then, widen all lanes and separate all oncoming traffic with a truck-proof barrier, etc., etc..
What he misses of course is that there is no such thing as a right that places any obligation on anyone else other than that of non interference. You don’t have a “right” to free healthcare, education, food, shoes, housing, pornography, etc., unless someone, making an individual choice, decides to give it to you. You do have the right to be left alone– the only thing it requires from anyone else is non-interference. How many Americans can grasp that? Forget Europeans, how many Americans? And yet that is our American heritage.
(Just for a little experiment, try stating that in a public school classroom and see how long it takes to piss off the teachers and administration to the point where they will hate you for the rest of their lives. Ask me how I came to that suggestion.)
Before any conversation about rights can take place, there must first be a mutual understanding of the word’s meaning. Therein lies a major problem, and once again I find it necessary to point out that people on the Left (Socialists) have been systematically corrupting the language for decades. We now speak of a “right” to someone else’s property, and a “right” to be “free” of other people we hate (gun owners, smokers, fast food establishments, Wal Mart, suburbanites, people who drive large vehicles, conservative radio talk show hosts, military recruiters on campus, et al). What filthy, stinking gibberish!