07-07-2016, 02:04 PM
(07-07-2016, 10:24 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: The gun culture is a culture. Gun control activism is simply concern for public safety; not a culture. But oh well, back to the topic....
A minor quibble? I can sympathize that the gun prohibition movement is more a concern for the public good than a culture in and of itself. However, gun prohibition is part of a larger culture where people (generally with urban life experience) are sincerely working for the public good as they see the public good. During the New Deal through Great Society era, this work for the common good culture was stronger. Folks were very willing to bear burdens, pay prices, meet hardships, etc... If something was wrong, one fixed it. If something big was wrong, only the government was big enough for a real fix.
That aspect of the American culture has faded but not vanished. Still, there is a definite set of opposing values which have grown quite strong. If one buys into the Reagan memes, the government is so inefficient and corrupt that all attempts to achieve the public good though government action are presumed to be doomed to failure. The proper action is to cut taxes and allow the private sector to address problems. These ideas might go all the way down to allowing the private sector to shoot their own bad guys.
At a high abstract level, this conflict of values might be a basic broad brush outline of the domestic Red / Blue conflict. The gun policy discussion is just a small portion of a much larger conflict of cultures.
That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.