WILLING TO SELL OUR SOULS FOR A MAYBE

In the movie musical, “1776,” about the signing of the Declaration of Independence, there is an exchange between John Dickenson, delegate from Pennsylvania and John Hancock, of Massachusetts, President of the Congress.

In that exchange, John Hancock tells John Dickinson, "Fortunately there are not enough men of property in America to dictate policy," and Dickinson replies, "Perhaps not. But don't forget that most men without property would rather protect the possibility of becoming rich, than face the reality of being poor."

I think that the vast majority of American behavior today can be explained that way.

Americans see ownership and possession and even citizenship as a zero-sum game.  In order for me to succeed, there must be others who fail.  This pervades into every aspect of our social interactions today.

Americans once perceived the collective and cooperative.  We saw it in family, in community and neighborhoods, in state and national concerns and considerations.  It was a natural and a comfortable perspective.  The concept of sharing permitted us to act in a non-zero-sum manner.  We could look to the collaborative betterment of our various societies, whether they be local or broad.

We saw our part in our various constituent communities in the second person plural or the third person.  We… Us… Ours…  You…

We now see ourselves in the first person singular.  I… Me… Mine…

And in that shift in perspective, we have lost our American and our most decent human identity.

Consider one very simple example.  At one time in our history, if a child misbehaved in school, that child would also face sanction at home.  The larger part of that sanction would have arisen from an acknowledgement of social contract morality.  Children behave at school and contribute and participate with order, so that ALL children can participate and learn.

Today, that concept of social contract seems outdated and instead of home sanctions imposed on the misbehaving child, the response would be something like, “How dare that school suggest that I haven’t done an adequate job at parenting?”

Americans no longer figuratively hold the door for our friends and neighbors.  And we certainly don’t hold the door for total strangers.

And we no longer pretend to be Christian in anything other than name.

And we choose to win, or to retain our chance to win, rather than to cooperate, collaborate or share.

We feather our own nest and assume that it’s OK for us to succeed, while assuming that someone else must fail if we do.

And it will be our undoing.  If it hasn’t already set that course of events in motion.

“…don't forget that most men without property would rather protect the possibility of becoming rich, than face the reality of being poor."

As we look after ourselves, we lose the strength, dignity, and decency of a powerful people.

A NEW GUN OWNERSHIP TAP DANCE

TAP DANCING IN RESPONSE TO THE GUN PROLIFERATION PROBLEM IN OUR COUNTRY TODAY AND TO THE STRANGLEHOLD THAT THE NRA HAS ON CONGRESS:

Predictably, in the aftermath of a shooting like that in Newtown, the gun ownership advocates are decrying that it’s too soon to discuss gun control legislation. The gun control advocates are decrying what they perceive as foot dragging and asking if not now, then when?

One big difference that I have noticed in the aftermath discourse this time that hasn’t been as prevalent as before is the discussion for the need for a second prong to prevention; that of mental health care or screening.

Sad to say, however, there are two problems with this.

One, it’s as if no one has noticed before that those who perpetrate such horrific violence are likely mentally ill.  Why hasn’t this issue been raised to the fever pitch previously that it has this time?  Why are we glib about comprehensive health care coverage until that lack is made salient by such a tragedy?

Well, I fear I know the answer, and it's the second of the two problems.  It’s that the gun ‘rights’ advocates are throwing us a red herring:  "We refuse to discuss slowing the insane proliferation of guns, unless you can offer some solution to how we deal with the mental health issues of mass murderers."  The NRAers have grasped firmly this next logical manifestation of ‘guns don’t kill people, people kill people’ and have turned it into ‘we won’t discuss the ungodly number and use of guns in this country, until you can adequately predict who has the potential to be a mass murderer.’

They are willing to dig in their heels at gun control and now – after the national outrage over the deaths of so many children – have developed a new delaying tactic: you must be able to predict who is going to be the next person to flip out and commit such a heinous act?

Well I can.  It’s going to be the one who CAN.  Whatever else you may be able to say about the next shooter of such tragic proportions: they will be a shooter.  The fact that we hand every Tom, Dick and Harry the means to use easily available automatic weapons on school children speaks to a baseline similarity across all of the shooters.  Yeah.  Of course.  They are shooters.

We can tap dance around another rationalization, justification and delaying tactic for meaningful examination of gun regulation and control.  And it’s not just timing that the NRA proponents will invoke this time.  It's not just, 'wait a respectful amount of time before you talk about gun control.'  It’s a blink-first showdown and the right has recently demonstrated that they are quite good at manhandling and bullying the country on these showdowns.

This one will be simply: unless and until you can cure mental illness and/or predict who will become a violent mass murderer, we’ll use that as an excuse for not agreeing to discuss reasonable gun control.

Perhaps in time for the next school mass killing, they’ll have come up with an excuse as clever and as distracting as this tap dance.