Washington Post writer Jen Zamzow actually attempts to provide a balanced point of view, but misses two big thing (I’m using the NJ.com reprint)
Why we can’t agree on gun control. Hint: Because you don’t want to listen
In the wake of yet another mass shooting — this time claiming the lives of at least 12 people in Thousand Oaks, California – it’s painfully obvious that the United States has a problem with gun violence. In our current political environment, it’s also obvious that little can be done about it.
Sixty-one percent of Americans favor stricter gun laws, according to a recent Gallup poll, but this statistic hides a strong partisan divide: Eighty-seven percent of Democrats support tougher gun laws, while only 31 percent of Republicans do. How can we solve the gun violence problem when Republicans and Democrats can’t seem to come together on anything these days, let alone on an issue as politically divided as gun control?
If we want to overcome the political divide on guns, we first need to understand why we have it. The cause of partisan conflict is generally not a lack of evidence or an inability to understand it. In fact, for contentious issues, having a greater understanding of the information can actually increase belief polarization, leading people with opposing views to end up even further apart.
Jen dives into all sorts of things, like psychology, the way our brains are wired, party affiliation, and more. This is the same type of stuff they attempt to trot out for why we won’t Do Something about ‘climate change.’ That said, they first big thing she’s missing is that she’s approaching this from a position of “we must have gun control.” That right there will get pushback.
Anyone serious about building consensus on gun policy needs to be slower to judge and quicker to listen to those who disagree. I understand why gun-safety advocates might not want to listen to those who are skeptical of gun-safety laws. People are being killed in their places of worship and kids gunned down at school; this kind of crisis can make people feel they don’t have time for dialogue.
However, listening to those who are resistant to gun-control laws is more than just a sign of respect. Understanding what motivates people can help us come up with better solutions that are more likely to stick.
See? It’s assumed that we have to have gun control, so, the gun grabbers should listen more to find out something something garble garble.
Which is issue two. Those of us who are “resistant” have listened. We know what these “gun-safety advocates” want. The disarming of law abiding citizens. Again, California has every bit of law in place that the gun grabbers have pushed, and more, yet, there are still shootings.
The “gun-safety advocates” want more and more laws, right up to the Australian solution (banning and confiscation), yet, the existing laws aren’t being fully enforced. We saw this with the failure to implement California’s red flag law with the latest mass killer.
We know what the gun grabbers “gun-safety advocates” want: to make it harder and harder for law abiding citizens to engage in their 2nd Amendment Right, while at the same time the GSAs want to go easier and easier on criminals. I’ve listened to the GSAs: I don’t need to listen to more to know what they want.
This is from the comments at NJ.com
TEACH: It’s assumed that we have to have gun control,
She assumed we have a gun violence problem. Do you disagree?
We have a Democrat problem in which the Demos let the cutthroats run wild.
We have a mental illness problem in that the Left closed down the mental hospitals where most of the cutthroats belong.
I agree formwiz 100%. Also, why is it that when people DO the right thing and notify the authorities, the mental health professionals, these people DO NOTHING? Why is that? It’s almost as if they WANT the mayhem to continue until the sheep beg the government to take away the 2nd Amendment.
The next time there’s a DWI in your town, you have to turn in all of your cars, OK??
Because you’re only responsible with a car, until you’re not! Right?
And we’ve seen that these things can be used to kill.
Don’t give me the BS line that “Guns are only designed to kill people.” If so, then why are my local cops carrying guns? Are they going to just start killing people? Or are these guns sometimes used for protection? Or to eliminate a threat?
You’re just angry and jealous that some people want freedom.
If a guy is crazy, would you take away his right to self-defense even if he’s committed no crime? The right’s gripe about mental health seems to be they want to institutionalize (imprison) people who have not committed a crime.
Do you disagree with Teach’s gun control plan from an earlier post? Tighten up background checks etc?
If that was the case then the nignorant angry little black fella from st louis would have had his guns taken away a long time ago.
Just sayin’.
We used to do that to people who were clearly a danger to themselves and other people. They proved, by their actions and behavior that they couldn’t be trusted to be among those of us in normal society.
Liberals felt that this was unfair and had the hospitals closed. Thus creating the homeless problem.
They also created, along with Big Pharma, the idea that you could just medicate the evil thoughts away because, well, chemicals. They were wrong. Deadly wrong.
I’m not giving up my rights to placate the insane. Neither should you. Neither should anyone.
Ask instead: Why DID FL authorities not handle the Parkland shooter BEFORE? Was it because their Nationally Recognized no-school-to-prison-pipeline perfect record might be jeopardized if that one person, who clearly needed psychiatric intervention in an institutionalized setting, got it? They obviously were willing to risk the certain death and violence. Why? So people like “Jethro” would want to have everyone’s right to defend themselves taken away?
You need our guns, because of the totalitarian plans they have in mind can’t work if people can fight back.
Well, she’s right about one thing: when the proposed ‘solution’ to a problem is to infringe upon the rights of people who have committed no crime, then yeah, I do stop listening to them, and start fighting them!
Many on the left would deny being socialists, but they all seem united in one aspect of socialism, that the government must control the actions and liberties of individuals for the greater good of society. Sorry, but that’s bovine feces.
Government should have the power to punish violations of other people’s rights, but not to restrict the rights of those who have done nothing wrong. Government should exist to guarantee individual liberty, not force compliance with the edicts of others.
The reasonable gun control is obvious.
1. Take guns away from blacks, hispanics, Democratic voters and immigrants.
2. Democrats should be believed that they know their own constituency better than we do. Republicans are also correct in how they see other Republicans. The error is democrats thinking everyone is like the people they know. Same error for Republicans thinking everyone is sane and rational enough to have self-defense.
3. Democrats are violent and crazy and irrational. So we should believe them when they say they should not have access to guns.
4. Republicans are indeed law abiding and rational so we should believe them that they are not a threat.
5. Give everyone what they want. Democrats get total disarmament. Republicans get total relieve from existing gun laws. Everyone wins.
6. Apply all of the above to police, military and security guards too.