Ethics from the Barrel of a Gun

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Thu, 16 Oct 2008 10:13:35 GMT  <== RKBA ==> 

Eric S. Raymond - an oldie but goody. [codrea]

The first and most important of these lessons is this: it all comes down to you.

No one's finger is on the trigger but your own. All the talk-talk in your head, all the emotions in your heart, all the experiences of your past -- these things may inform your choice, but they can't move your finger. All the socialization and rationalization and justification in the world, all the approval or disapproval of your neighbors -- none of these things can pull the trigger either. They can change how you feel about the choice, but only you can actually make the choice. Only you. Only here. Only now. Fire, or not?

A second is this: never count on being able to undo your choices.

If you shoot someone through the heart, dead is dead. You can't take it back. There are no do-overs. Real choice is like that; you make it, you live with it -- or die with it.

A third lesson is this: the universe doesn't care about motives.

If your gun has an accidental discharge while pointed an unsafe direction, the bullet will kill just as dead as if you had been aiming the shot. "I didn't mean to" may persuade others that you are less likely to repeat a behavior, but it won't bring a corpse back to life.

These are hard lessons, but necessary ones. Stated, in print, they may seem trivial or obvious. But ethical maturity consists, in significant part, of knowing these things -- not merely at the level of intellect but at the level of emotion, experience and reflex. And nothing teaches these things like repeated confrontation with life-or-death choices in grave knowledge of the consequences of failure.

This psychological insight both illuminates and is reinforced by one central fact of U.S. history that is usually considered purely political, and even (wrongly) thought to be of interest only to Americans.

The Founding Fathers of the United States believed, and wrote, that the bearing of arms was essential to the character and dignity of a free people. For this reason, they wrote a Second Amendment in the Bill Of Rights which reads "the right to bear arms shall not be infringed".

Add comment Edit post Add post