An Armed Society is a Politically Dangerous Society

“An armed society is a polite society,” says the NRA propaganda line.

This is incredibly and preposterously wrong. It also immature and against the better nature of man’s evolution.

Without reading the rest of the book, I can’t have full sense of the context. However, this does not sound like a fully civilized society. Nor does the quoted individual have the most positive outlook on society.

What I hear is a person who holds a killing tool vouching for his or her own survival and asserting his or her power over the unarmed, the weak, and the stupid.

But our society is not the Wild, Wild West nor is it an unlawful free-for-all. Although we are not as collective as Eastern societies, there is a sense of society in America. There is a sense of laws, where people have come together and created guidelines for the betterment of society. That evolution — from the individual to the collective — is one of the big advancements in our evolution. A level of trust and faith is essential in this advancement of social construction.

Holding a killing tool for survival means the owner does not trust the society in which he or she is part of. Either they fear their possessions being taken or they don’t trust the collective law-making of others.

Either for protection or to impose will, the gun is a representation of power.

Even worse is when gun owners use their firearms as a political symbol, openly displaying lack of faith in the process of diplomacy. There is no way negotiations can be fair if one side is more armed than the other. The side with more guns can always resort to violence and oppression. There is no incentive to keep negotiating.

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