Yesterday the posting ended in this way:
A burglar gets into a house to steal.
The house owner wakes up, grabs his gun and kills the intruder.
Now the house and gun owner lives knowing he has killed a man.
How will that feel?
The posting received several comments.
One of them anonymous: the person commenting decided not to make himself or herself known.
Not the most courageous attitude possible.
The comment was this:
"It would feel great. Besides, the intruder was there to torture, rape and murder your family. And take your DVD."
Imagine a burglar gets into a house to steal.
The house owner wakes up, grabs his gun and kills the intruder.
The question then is: how does the house owner know that the intention of the burglar was to also torture, rape and murder the whole family?
It is too late to ask this to the burglar: he is already killed.
Therefore, it is a presumption of the house owner.
A presumption that is come up with to justify the act of killing.
What if the burglar had no intention whatsoever to do anything else but robbing the family of their DVD-player?
Then someone was killed for the wrong reasons.
Leaving one dead.
But also having among us a killer.
The fundamental question is whether we want to live in a society where each individual is allowed to be a judge.
Whether we want a society where decisions about life and death, about respecting laws and punishment, are left exclusively to the judicial powers or not.
If a society allows simple citizens to also be part of the judicial system, a kind of wild west is tolerated.
To posses weapons and the use of them is then a result.
A man returns home late at night.
His brother wakes up of the noise and believes it is a burglar.
He grabs his gun, goes downstairs, sees a shadow moving around in the living room and shoots the intruder.
His own brother.
.
5 comments:
In your first example, I would say that the intruder took his chance by breaking into my home. If someone breaks into my home, I don't care why they are there. If their intentions were noble, they might have knocked and asked permission to enter. Otherwise, I have to assume that they mean to harm me or my family and take suitable action. I HOPE I am never faced with this scenario, but I'm prepared to kill a man if I feel my family is in danger. My family is more important to me than this uninvited intruder.
BUT, I will say you are correct in your second scenario. A person who chooses to own and use a weapon must fully understand the ramifications of using that weapon. One of the first laws of gun safety is to always know your target and what lies beyond it. If you can't properly identify your target, then your target likely is not a threat to you, and you MUST NOT fire at it. Accident or not, I think prison time (or worse) is necessary for killing an innocent person. An uninvited intruder that entered my home by breaking in is not an innocent person.
Michael,
The Arkansas Architect here. You will obviously get many reactions to this topic. Let me give you a real life happening, personally. We moved from Arkansas, in the late 70's to Dallas Texas. In the 70's, in Arkansas, we never locked doors when going to the grocery store, church, etc. let our children play anywere in the neighborhood and never were concerned about their safety. Not really expecting to be a victim, we tried the same after moving to Dallas. "Mistake". My wife and children were in bed by 11:00 p.m.. I was lying on the floor in the living room just in my undershorts watching TV. Windows unlocked. I heard a scraping noise and turned to see a young punk in a black cap and black shirt hoisting himself through the opened window after taking off the external screen. At the time I only thought of this "punk" invading my privacy and being bigger than he was I was so pissed that I raced out the front door, down the street,after him, fully ready to "convince" him with my fist that he should never invade again. It did not dawn on me that he could have shot me, stabbed me or been a little more tougher than me. Important to him, he definetly could run faster tham me. I went back to the house, still totally pissed, and then realized that I was still in my undershorts running about the street. I'm glad it was dark and late. Now, after discussing this with my younger brother (who is an avid gun collector, and shooter)he said "I would have shot his ass!" After calling the cops, and going to the local police station, giving an artist a profile on the thug, he was later caught by the police. But, only after he got a little braver after my incident. He went into a neighborhood home a "cut" a lady (in the middle of the afternoon). He became braver in his endeavor to steal jewelry, guns and anything valuable to support his Drug Habit. For 6 months, I woke at night at every slight noise. It is unreal what your sub-concious will have you doing in a situation such as this. I did not own a pistol. But I did keep a "straight" claw hammer handy so I could sink the claws into an intruder and literally bring him to his knees. Now, I own a pistol, and "sleep like a baby". The police told me to "shoot to kill" or the intruder would come back and kill you if you only injured him. Now, I still have emotions like you (thinking of the repercussions of killing someone). My old Daddy once said, "Every job has it's risks". He was a contractor - framer and busted his back falling from scaffolding, etc. (One of the risks of the job). He said, the risk of the intruder (or burgular) is that he could be "6 feet under", Dead, Killed, (or possibly live with a dis-abling injury). "One of the Risks of the Trade". It is sad, but I feel that the need of Drugs will drive a sane person to do insane things. Soooooooooo it goes. "Bucle up for Safety"!!!
MELackey has precisely stated one of the very few well thought out posts that have ever appeared in this BLOG.
Something I wouldn't do, is post my location and state that I am not willing to shoot if you enter my property.
I have read some of your blog posts. You seem intelligent, thoughtful.
Here is what I see...
There is an unstated assumption here - that to kill a human being is "bad".
Is it?
Where does this idea come from? Why do people accept it uncritically? Rational people should examine the underlying assumptions upon which they make their judgments rather than accepting an idea on blind faith.
I will sign this Anonymous. Is that a cowardly act? Or is the assumption of cowardice simply another unexamined assumption?
Post a Comment