More Gun Deaths in the Tragic Commons

            Another high profile shooting in the Tragic Commons occurred this week.  This time, the victims were two highly attractive people, one, a television news reporter and the other, her cameraman.  They showed up for work like any other day, and only one person knew that they would not survive it.  That person was a disgruntled former co-worker who took their lives and his own.  We’ll never know whether the victims were special objects of his hate or merely convenient surrogates who could easily be killed before a live television audience.

            These shootings followed the low profile gun death of 17-year old Jajuan McRae in Prince George’s County last Friday.  The alleged shooter is also 17.

            There can be no doubt that these deaths are the direct result of an American culture of violence enabled by the ready availability of weapons designed specifically to kill or maim human beings.  There can be no argument that reporter Alison Parker, cameraman Adam Ward and 17 year old Jajuan McRae would be alive had the gunmen been armed, instead, with hammers, knives or a baseball bats.

            What’s that you say? “Guns don’t kill people.  People kill people.  Guns are like hammers or knives or baseball bats.  They can be used for good or ill like any other tool.”

            Spare me. 

            People with guns are more likely to kill other people than people with hammers or knives or baseball bats.  People using guns can more easily kill people standing more than an arm’s length away than people using hammers, knives or baseball bats.  Guns make it easier to kill more people quickly than wielders of hammers, knives or baseball bats.  And it’s easier to stop someone who is wielding a hammer, a knife or a baseball bat than it is to stop a person who is wielding a gun.

            We have prudently regulated the use of other “tools” as their potential to kill or maim expands.  We require extensive training and insurance, for example, before we allow anyone to drive a car.  For good reason, you can’t just buy explosives at the local hardware store.  And only physicians can give you access to certain potentially harmful medications.

            And yet, in the Tragic Commons, guns are a special exception.  Despite their ability to kill or maim when used as they were designed to be used, you don’t need training or insurance to buy a gun or to own one.  You apparently also don’t need to prove you’re sane.

            Does this make any sense?

            Yes, I know that the Constitution gives citizens the right to keep and bear arms.  Yes, I know that the right to bear arms is as constitutionally sacred as the freedom of speech, the freedoms of assembly and conscience, the right to confront witnesses, and the right not to be forced to incriminate oneself.

            But, should it be?

            That a practice is venerable and even constitutionally protected is a consideration worthy of respect and even deference when devising public policy.   But deference and respect must yield when the practice is inimical to the Commons. Slavery, after all, was once a venerable and constitutionally protected practice.

            I do not see why, in our constitutional system, gun ownership should be given any special consideration. We need a constitutionally enshrined freedom of speech, of assembly and conscience to enable our democracy to work.  We need constitutionally protected rights for the criminally accused to prevent policing from descending into barbarism (to a greater extent than it already has). We have rightly chosen to take matters like these out of the hands of political majorities to protect those who cannot protect themselves through democratic processes. 

            The same is not true of gun ownership. States have no right to call up a local militia to oppose the will of the federal government.  We disposed of that argument at Appomattox Court House when General Robert E. Lee surrendered Confederate forces to Union General Ulysses S. Grant.  A state militia that depends on private gun ownership is laughable.

            And it should be manifest that despite the carnage, gun rights enthusiasts have been successful in stifling even the most basic and common sense gun regulations through ordinary democratic processes.  But even if they hadn't been successful, it’s not at all clear why their preferred policies ought to prevail over the wishes of popular majorities that might prefer other policies. You can’t always get what you want in a democracy, and there isn’t a reason anyone should always get what they want.

            The people blocking sensible gun regulations are members of a fearful and selfish little group, backed by an industry determined to protect its profits at all costs.  They resent the imposition of any inconvenience on access to their deadly toys.  They imagine threats to themselves, their homes and their families against which conventional law enforcement cannot protect them (though conventional law enforcement does a fine job in protecting almost everyone else). They overestimate the power guns will give them against adversaries and underestimate the probabilities that their weapons will be stolen or used against them or against their loved ones.  They refuse to see that their fetish with these tools of death results in unacceptable levels of avoidable bloodshed.

            An attitude of selfish individualism is what makes the Commons tragic.  People pursue their own interests unless we structure the environment in such a way that no one has any incentive to ignore what is best for the Commons.  Making it much harder for anyone to acquire and own an instrument of death would go a long way in insuring the tranquility of our community.  We must do a better job of keeping guns out of the hands of people who would use them for ill.  A good start would be to reduce the number of guns available by making them much more difficult to get.