“Weapons can never give us total safety, because they will never give us peace.”

“Weapons can never give us total safety, because they will never give us peace.”

  • t3rmit3@beehaw.org
    0·
    9 months ago

    By this framing, there can never be safety, because there are always going to be violent bigots.

    Safety is about a state of mind, as they say in the article, but it has to be informed by physical reality on some level, and that will necessarily have to include the ability to not be physically victimized by bigots.

    I also have a lot of issues with their choice to give a first-time shooter a machinegun (in the article they both call it a machinegun and semiautomatic, which is contradictory, but they make it sound like it had a 3-round burst, which if true would make it a machinegun, not semiautomatic), because that’s like putting a first-time driver in a supercar; it’s dangerous and non-representative of 99.9% of cars and driving. Of course you would walk away frightened/intimidated by it.

    As pointed out by another commenter, they were handling a semiauto AR-15, not a machinegun as they stated.

      • millie@beehaw.orgEnglish
        0·
        9 months ago

        Those are some nice platitudes, and having rights is important, but the government isn’t going to protect you if someone is trying to murder you for being trans. You’re going to have to live through that situation before you can do anything else. That might mean using violence to defend yourself, it might not, but when you’re especially likely to be a target of violence it’s better to be prepared for that outcome.

        That preparation could be a weapon, it could be a plan, it could be anonymity or a fortified home. But whatever it is, if you have something to go on when that moment comes you’ll be a lot better off than trying to think on your feet.

          • millie@beehaw.orgEnglish
            0·
            9 months ago

            The rule of law is largely a fucking joke that serves the powerful and protects the status quo. There may be times when it serves a purpose that’s actually positive, but it’s not going to protect you in the face of a dangerous reality.

            If you think the law can bodily protect you, go wander into traffic in a crosswalk without looking. The law should prevent any vehicles from hitting you, no?

            The fact that murdering trans women is generally illegal isn’t sufficient to protect us when someone tries to kill us. We have to be ready for that ourselves.