Wednesday, July 08, 2015

Bodycount


 The recent outbreak of violent attacks in America have generated tremendous amounts of internet discussion - most of it completely useless and irrational, appealing only to the primitive reptilian part of the human brain.  For a more rational, intelligent and civilized discusiion, here are a few points to consider:

I: The Confederate Battle Flag

First, this talk of "banning" a flag is pointless, misleading and obscures the real problems.  No such thing has happened.  What individual citizens do is very different from what the State should be doing.  No one arguing for freedom should be proposing that an individual should not own a Nazi flag.  But, if a state capital was displaying a Nazi  flag, or an ISIS one, I would hope everyone would call for its removal.  While these flags may not have a historical connection to the Southern States, that only highlights a larger problem.    Regardless of any racists connotations to the Confederate Battle Flag, which are not only recorded as a part of its inception but have certainly taken on those meanings in the Post-Civil War and Post-Civil Rights movement era, its represents a defunct government - one that lost a war against The United States of America.  For any state to fly it is a challenge to US Federal authority amounting to treason.  It's time the South got over losing the war.  For those suggesting that this move is simply a distraction from the real problem - they are absolutely right.  However, look at how this happened.  It was a Republican governor and legislature that enacted this removal.  It was not a liberal attack on the right-wing.  But it was a distraction from talking about gun violence - a preemptive move by the right to preserve their monolithic grip on the second amendment.

Second, as for any perceived continual revolt against the Confederacy, it is important to make a distinction.  There is a difference between history and ideology.  While history is locked into an objective realm, ideology continues as a subjective possibility, a "live option."  This is what separates the Battle Flag from Civil War monuments.  Memorials such as Stone Mountain  (while perhaps best not maintained by taxpayer funding)  point only to the past.  But a flag, as an ideological symbol, continues to evolve in meaning and stands for something now.  For an individual to adopt such a symbol and ideology is the price of living in a free country, but once again, it is not the place of the State to adopt, promote, and support such ideologies.  That is dangerous, unethical, and an ultimate restriction of freedom.  Groups such a the Sons of Confederate Veterans make no sense in the twenty-first century.  They may have had a place for a generation or two, but are now so far removed from history that they only perpetuate ideology.  Would we find German organizations of Sons of the Third Reich acceptable?  If not, then we should take time to reevaluate. As for symbols of ideology, flags work as symbols because their meaning is dynamic  - they represent something else and that something can develop on its own.  To suggest The Confederate Battle Flag is similar to the Egyptian pyramids is beyond stupid.  The pyramids are not symbols in themselves.  They are full objective structures with a fixed meaning.  Ignoring the fact they were built by trade laborers not slaves, they are not used by a State to symbolize slavery and further its promotion.  They couldn't be because they don't exist as something which can only represent something else - a signifier .  But flags are nothing in themselves, their meaning is only constituted by their use in context of ideology.


II. American Gun Violence

Any attempted talk to make an attempt at talk about gun violence is immediately shot down as unconstitutional.  For those that say there can be no restriction on gun ownership:  The history of American law shows that there can indeed be limits that are not unconstitutional.  Ignoring the fact (as usual) that it states a "well regulated militia", if there were no cases for limitation, then felons and mentally ill people would have to be given the freedom to purchase weapons.  Furthermore, why do we not have personally owned nuclear weapons, attack helicopters, etc ? (I'm not being flippant, there is a valid question - where does the line get drawn).  At the least we would have fully automatic weapons.  But these limitations have been continually upheld.  Just as there are constitutional limits to the first amendment, Hate speech, inciting a riot, slander, yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, etc.  I don't see why a national registry, limitations on high capacity magazines and high-power assault -style weapons would be an infringement, as long as a right is retained for the fundamental ownership of firearms for hunting, self-defense, sport (whatever that is beside practicing killing), etc.  I defer to Newsweek for further discussion.

The idea that society should bear no responsibility for events such as the Charleston shooting shows a myopic view of how people and society work.  This notion, while perhaps internally correct, lacks application in an external world.  Of course, no one is arguing against the responsibility of the moral agent, as apparent from the fact that only the agent is the one prosecuted for the crime.  However:

1. People are a product of society,  increasingly in the world of the de-centered self.  One does not become a homicidal violent racist in a vacuum.  One may be mentally deranged or have sociopathic tendencies on their own, but to find a target for their violent impulses often comes from a larger social message.  It comes from a shared ideology.  One that is propagated through media (not mainstream) that promotes fear and xenophobia, and supports the means such acts to be carried out.  Certainly those that expound such ideas have some responsibility for the psychopathic environment rather than the actual crime.

2.  We live in civilized states through a social contract in order to protect each other and promote good for all individuals in the group.  Failing to do something to actively prevent harm to innocent members of society is a moral violation, just as the individual's act are.

3.  The idea that society is not to blame is not one that the right adheres to in any event other than guns.  They are quick to attack morally deficient fields of media, music, video-games, and to blame a lewd and obscene entertainment industry.  Furthermore, they attack society as "degenerate"when it supports positive and personally natural behavior that they disagree with.

4.  When such events are caused by a Muslim, the entire cultural is immediately blamed.  They are all the same and a particular actor is merely the executor of that culture.  However, when those of a White and/or Christian culture act in a terroristic manner, they are quickly blamed as individuals before any of the previous methods can be launched against that background.

So, while a restricted notion of responsibility may have some legal and ethical truths, it is morally, socially, and practically deficient.  For society to protect the rights of the individual over the rights of the many to have security,  is a morally deficiency.  The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.  While preemptively enforcing legal principles against an individual in areas such as thought crime would certainly be an overstep into liberty rights,  proactively preventing irreversible harm to another individual is far more understandable and necessary. Worst of all, following this reasoning leads to no practical solution.  If this is your response, you're part of the problem, because nothing can be done to prevent these tragedies, it only allows for a reaction.  Rather society needs to actively deal with the problems of society.  This is another example of why libertarianism is a scam.  The only conceivable response to this view of personal responsibility would be to have everyone in the church armed.  At best one person would have lost their life while the others could engage return fire.  And one innocent loss is still too many for an advanced society.  While it is impossible to prevent all such events in a free society, proactive steps in the restriction of the means for carrying out such effective attacks can be made and ultimately reduce the devastation caused.

The divide found in American opinion is interestingly analyzed in this discussion of the separate American countries which comprise the United States.  And here is another discussion on gun control, now slightly out of date, but since nothing has changed, still just as relevant.