"It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds." Samuel Adams

Monday, November 22, 2021

A safe world for all of us


Actress Reese Witherspoon tweeted: “No one should be able to purchase a semi-automatic weapon, cross state lines and kill 2 people, wound another and go free. In what world is this safe ... for any of us?” Another way of saying this would be: No one should be able to defend himself from three men who are chasing him, pointing a gun at him, kicking him, and hitting him with a skateboard. 

“In what world is this safe…for any of us?” she rhetorically asks. The answer is: in a world where you are not chasing a teenage boy with a rifle, pointing a handgun at him, kicking him, and hitting him with a skateboard in a three-against-one melee. 

A more pertinent question would be: In what world is anyone safe who is on a movie set with Alec Baldwin, who clearly pointed a gun toward two people and squeezed the trigger? He may have thought it wasn’t loaded, but he should have known that you never point even an unloaded gun at another human being. And if you are ignorant enough to do so, you never ever squeeze the trigger. 

In the Kenosha case, three violent thugs were shot because they were attempting to harm a teenage boy. In the movie set case, one young wife and mother is dead and the director is wounded because they just happened to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time in proximity to the wrong person. So Ms. Witherspoon, I ask you: Which situation would in point of fact be more dangerous for any of us? 


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