Контент 18+ (лексика, описания)
If you want to know why something is what it is -- or what it has become --, go back to its roots. Find the source, then do the math. It doesn't always work: sometimes cancers accumulate in seemingly healthy bodies, and often weeds amid immaculate gardens grow. But usually, the rule holds true.
So there are many tough countries besides the USA. But only the USA, as I have tried to show in previous blogs, has had this crazy problem with guns. As I have said previously, I am NOT talking about acts of terrorism, which can happen anywhere. I am speaking of repeated attempts at a kind of miniature genocide directed in general at the human race, and in particular at previous peer groups with which the mass murderer gradually became disaffected and, in effect, was ex-communicated from -- at least in his own mind.
There have been too many examples of this to enumerate here. But you can check the record and compare the death toll in America with that of other nations during the same time span.. The numbers are staggering, even paralyzing -- as when you compare the loss of life sustained by the Soviet Union during World War II compared to that of other countries. Totally off the charts.
In my opinion, there are two overwhelming factors at work here (with the Americans). The first deals with historical antecedents and the second with the alienating aspects of modern society.
Ok. Who were the first white settlers in America? They came from three sources: adventurous explorers, transported prisoners, and, a bit later, religious fanatics. They entered a country filled with strange people and dense, seemingly impassable terrain. These adventurers and explorers were not meek or kind men. In fact, they proved to be predators and, in many cases, murderers. They had been sent by their European governments to find rubies and emeralds and other riches. Great rewards awaited them if they returned with their arms and treasure chests filled with gold. On the other hand, iron chains, prisons, and even beheadings lay in store if they didn't. Get the picture?
They came to conquer. Then we have the 'transportees.' These were English criminals who were offered reprieve from public hanging by agreeing to be sent away from England forever -- and where better than the Americas?. So the next wave of arrivals to places like Massachusetts and Virginia were thieves, madmen, hooligans, and social misfits. England was simply cleansing itself of people it had decided were not clear-cut candidates for death but just for deportation. It was an alternative, if you can try to understand the reasoning of that Age. Their great-great-great grandchildren are the present day Americans.
Finally, the religious extremists, who in their day were variously known as Puritans, Calvinists, Quakers, etc. Even in a country saturated with idiotic and violent religious notions (so-called 'Protestants' and 'Catholics' taking turns mutilating, burning, and hanging each other), these sects were considered beyond the pale by Queen and King, and so they too were booted the fuck out of England and sent packing to the New World.
So there you have it.
On top of that, once these fine specimens of England's unceremoniously dismissed 'polite society' decided to form a marching unit and commit genocide on the Indians (excuse me, Native Americans), they also had to combat the natural exigencies of building towns amid the glowing roots of burning timber and deal with the lack of law, the absence of order, and the total anarchy that comes from pitching a tent or building a log cabin in the middle of nowhere. Then, amid the slow, ponderous crawl across mountain and prairie of wagon trains -- whole families just pushing Westward (maybe there is something beautiful in that), the wild mania of the Gold Rush -- the dreams conceived, sometimes realized, often smashed -- but always clung to by tough, hard people -- people for whom a loaded gun was a way of life -- now you have the baby-birth of gun mentalility. And when I observe history that way, I find myself to be no enemy of That Gun. Then It was a tool, a necessity for life. A killer-weapon, yes, when and if it had to be, but NOT something designed to offer casual and instant relief of common, everyday frustrations.
Those rough migrants and cowpokes of the American plains had no need of psychiatrists. They were way, way low on Maslow's Hierarchy. They did not know of or have to deal with either the wonderful goodies or the nerve-wracking bedlams of modern society. If you look at photographs taken of whole families back then, they look as sullen as the contemporary rock musicians on the posters I referred to earlier. But they had reasons. And they really were ready to kill; it wasn't an act to sell concert tickets. But not at random. Not people having a picnic or swimming naked in a river. Or at a nightclub or mall or concert.
The United States Constitution was finalized and published in 1789. It contained a so-called Second Amendment which guaranteed American citizens the right to "bear arms" (have guns). The reasoning behind this was sound: there was no permanent or trustworthy agent of law enforcement in place. The boom towns that grew up in the American West were as lawless as the Russia of the 1990s. There was no standing army. Sheriffs and Marshals were often helpless against bank robbers, horse thieves, and cattle rustlers. There were no supermarkets. No welfare, no hospitals to speak of. And the Native Americans were by now furious and ready to fight to the death against these honkey rascals; unfortunately, they were being outgunned completely -- bows and arrows and tomahawks being no match for the high-tech artillery of the day, which the American cavalries possessed. So the white people needed their 'shootin irons', by god. That was life in what later became known as The Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.
The problem is that we now find ourselves living in 2017. The multitude of Americans who basically support unlimited access to guns of all description, inevitably cite The Second Amendment as their justification. The Constitution guarantees it, and they, being patriotic Americans, are determined to defend the Constitution.
The idiotic absurdity of this position can be burst wide open instantly. Ok, let's all sit down together and try to imagine what will be Good Law in Russia (or America), for example, in the year 2228. That is the same distance of time. Please.....tell me what the laws should be THEN!!!
Of course you cannot. It is impossible. And neither could the law-makers of 1789 POSSIBLY foresee the mass culture, urbanization, level of immigration, and the mega cities of today. So to use the "Wisdom of the Founding Fathers" -- as the NRA jackasses love to say -- as a justification for modern day gun mania, is about as reasonable as trying to calculate what speed limits we should set on the transportation systems of 2228. Did the 'Founding Fathers' need to put up signs along their highways saying that no one could go faster than 80 miles per hour?.
Hell no. They didn't have highways and they didn't have cars.
They rode horses, and so there were no goddamn signs. Hello????
Unfortunately cowboy mentality prevails even when most of the cowboys have ridden off into the sunset. And Americans, who are mostly sensible unless they are talking about Guns and God, are convinced that assembling an arsenal of military weapons and housing them in the guest room of their houses while living in a city of 20 million people of all ethnic groups and huddled closely together in frequent disharmony-- is a perfectly normal thing to do.
Think about it. Take a walk around your own neighborhood and ask yourself how many of the people you see you would trust with a machine gun. OK, Russia is no playground. And, the longer I live here, the more I hear and know about the truly evil history that has gone down here.
But before you decide to move to America, think about the fact that you could be executed by a complete stranger while you are attending a country music concert overflowing with people who almost unanimously SUPPORT the right to have guns unlimited even as they are being shot down in cold blood. Talk about irony !! And the next day, after 'Las Vegas' Americans rushed out to buy even MORE guns. Definitely, the answer !!!!
Wipe your hand across your face and laugh.
===Eric Richard Leroy===
