I originally wrote this a few weeks ago for the Palm Beach Post as an Opinion Piece. The paper published others of mine before, but they chose not to in this case. Perhaps it is because of the ennui of thoughts and prayers on the subject.
Therefore I publish it here as the dreaded date of July 1 approaches, when Florida House Bill (HB) 543 goes into effect. This was advocated by the Republican majority and Governor DeSantis, further expanding the 2nd amendment to allow permit-less carry of weapons in Florida.
It will lead to more gun deaths in the state. I’ve expressed my views on the subject of gun control numerous times in this space and consider this a summation and further expansion.
The very preamble to the Constitution states it was to “insure domestic tranquility.” The proliferation of modern weaponry instead has facilitated a form of domestic dread.
Whose Freedom is it Anyway?
Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1941 State of the Union address articulated four fundamental human rights that should be universally protected.
Freedom of Speech
Freedom of Worship
Freedom from Want
Freedom from Fear
In 1943 Norman Rockwell immortalized those Freedoms in paintings which were reproduced in “The Saturday Evening Post.” We saw the originals when visiting the New York Historical Museum in 2018
The painting “Freedom from Fear” depicts two children safely sleeping in their beds as their parents look on, the wife tucking them in, and the husband holding a newspaper which partially reveals a headline about the Blitz Bombings in London.
That primary freedom we all want for ourselves and especially for our children, and our grandchildren, has mutated into the “freedom” to own and even carry military style weapons. We now have two “competing” freedoms and a culture that celebrates weapons.
In Texas the sound of gunfire, just for the “fun” is so pervasive it is accepted as the norm in rural areas. The recent Texas Mall shooting was the 199th Mass shooting of this year in the United States. Next month it will be lawful to carry a concealed weapon in Florida, without a permit and without training. Expect more gun violence here.
This is not the first time that we’ve had “freedoms” square off against one another.
At one time smoking was the accepted norm. It was part of our culture, as firmly entrenched as guns are today. It took decades to remove the Marlboro Man from the popular American Mind. The tobacco industry’s relentless ads subliminally communicated tough American independence. Science proved that the ubiquity of 2nd hand smoke has a detrimental impact on non-smokers. Living in a smoke free environment transcends the freedom of smokers to deny that fundamental right. Laws were finally changed.
Similarly, we have a gun culture representing so called American independence. Some of our elected representatives even “celebrate” that “freedom” with social network pictures of themselves posing with weapons of war, even with their young children. This form of indoctrination is not much different than the wide-spread smoking advertising which permeated the media of the past. We genuflected to the tobacco industry as we now do to the NRA.
The time has come for our representatives to recognize that their constituents’ freedom to live in relative safety transcends the rights of gun owners to embrace AR-15s and to legislate against the deadly mixture of “stand your ground” and “permit-less carry” laws. Recently we’ve seen anecdotal evidence of the consequences of the former, innocent people being shot because they mistakenly rang a doorbell or drove into the wrong driveway. The gun owner simply felt “threatened.”
Furthermore, “permit-less carry” puts impossible demands on our police who now may have to go into a public place where a shot has been fired and suddenly scores of untrained citizens are there with their guns drawn.
The widespread carrying of guns simply leads to more deadly gun consequences. The United States has more guns than citizens; it also has an exponentially higher rate of gun deaths and accidents. It is a statistical inevitability.
One of the standard arguments against doing anything, even by those who agree that something must be done, is that there are so many weapons “out there” it is hopeless. In the early 1980s we also thought that regulating smoking was hopeless. It took years, but a civilized solution finally prevailed.
It has to start somewhere, sometime. We need to change the gun culture; our representatives have to either agree or be voted out. Weapons of war need to be outlawed.
As in New Zealand, Congress needs to provide meaningful dollars for an amnesty period for turning in such weapons of war, paying fair market price for them. After that period, anyone who is discovered with one (no door-to-door seizures, another fabricated action gun-mongers caution) would be subject to legal recourse.
Weapons would have to be registered, just like motor vehicles (the unregulated use of which would make them even be more dangerous). As with automobiles, those with more than a certain number would be considered a dealer and subjected to another level of registration and scrutiny.
“Stand your ground” “permit-less carry” laws must be changed. The freedom to live in relative safety must prevail over the freedom to own (and carry) military style weapons
