Blog #127--Gun Popularity Masks Fear

My family bought its first television set in 1950. For the next 10-15 years, I watched innumerable shows with western themes. There were plenty of popular cowboy movies as well. I saw Roy Rogers and his entire entourage put on a live show. I also attended a performance by Cisco Kid and his sidekick Pancho. Other western stars I enjoyed included Gene Autry, Hopalong Cassidy, Gabby Hayes and Andy Devine.

I was heavily motivated to become a cowboy when I grew up. I had a Hopalong Cassidy night light and a Roy Rogers lunch box and thermos. I had an entire cowboy outfit, including a hat, scarf, vest, chaps, boots and spurs. I had a holster with two fake-ivory-handle cap pistols. I cheered the men in their white hats on shows like “Gunsmoke,” “The Lone Ranger,” “The Rifleman” and “Have Gun, Will Travel.”

“Gunsmoke” was probably the most popular of all the shows. I remember hearing its stories on radio before watching every television episode with my family. The star of the show was Marshall Matt Dillon, played by James Arness. A large man with a strong, consistent sense of justice, Dillon was popular for keeping the peace in the town of Dodge City, Kansas. Wanting to eliminate the crimes common at the time, Dillon enforced a law stating all people entering town had to give up their weapons while there.

Because so many people loved the show, and because it repeatedly reinforced the reasons for the no-gun requirement, a majority of the audience likely agreed with the law. I bet if we were to ask older members of the National Rifle Association, at least some would say they agreed with it at the time. Of course, most now demand to possess limitless weapons, including concealed handguns. In other words, their perspective is now the exact opposite of the “Gunsmoke” law. I wonder if they are aware of their opinion reversal.

I am not going to argue against gun ownership. After all, my father’s family hunted and fished to survive. They had little money, so self-survival demanded great effort and occasional sacrifice. They even went after opossums after dark since that is when they are active. I certainly didn’t enjoy the taste of opossum, but taste was irrelevant compared with survival needs.

My parents were divorced when I was six. My father gave me a bow with arrows, bee bee gun and rifle as Christmas presents over the years, but he wasn’t there to teach me how to use or care for them. Plus, I loved Nature and found it difficult to harm any living creature. When I discovered I had some Cherokee blood, the negative treatment of Native Americans in many of the western movies and TV shows turned me off to being a cowboy and ended my interaction with guns and other weapons.

I understand the value of shotguns and rifles for hunting food for survival and have no objection to people owning and using them for this purpose. And I realize there are dangers in the world that may require some people to defend themselves and their families. Unfortunately, those who stand to profit financially and those who fear government takeover of their rights as individuals have used fear-inducing tactics to encourage more gun ownership. But do we really need machine guns and assault weapons? Do we really think we can defend ourselves successfully against a government that possesses nuclear and other highly classified weapons that can wipe out anyone it wants?

Our real enemy is not those who walk in the shadows and may or may not do us harm. It is fear. Public pronouncements of evildoers, real or imagined, ready to kill us make many of us rush to our local gun shops to protect ourselves from possible harm. Some religious leaders add to the fear by preaching eternal damnation for those who have sinned while alive. Since all of us make mistakes, none of us can guarantee eternal bliss upon our passing. All we have for sure is our present lives, so we seek to extend them every second possible. We speculate that having more guns will somehow protect us better.

Guns can be beneficial for self-protection. But it is also true that any increase in weapons possession guarantees an increased number of accidental shootings. Like two flames getting bigger as they move closer to one another, two people are more likely to be incensed toward each other if they both possess a mixture of fear to put them on edge and weapons to give them a false sense of security. This volatility exacerbates tensions and reduces peaceful interactions.

Guns will always be around, and they have usefulness for those who are trained in their proper usage. We go through cycles of regulation and deregulation, but unintended injuries and deaths are always possible. Some of those can’t be prevented.

But many problems that occur during cycles of deregulation can be reduced by letting go of fear. If we trust that we live forever, perhaps we can let go of our biggest fear. And if we start thinking for ourselves instead of falling for any scare tactic or attractive sales pitch that comes along, we can self-regulate our behavior, preventing many of the problems that presently exist with unlimited gun ownership. A self-confident person with no fear of death needs no weapons.

Matt Dillon wouldn’t be able to collect all weapons in a big city environment, but the idea that civilized people should be able to live together without killing each other is a noble one. If we could put our heads together and seek solutions that represent a compromise between extremes, perhaps reasonable solutions can be found. This is especially true if we stop letting fear and fear-mongers dominate our lives.

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