Here’s a news clip about “dozens” of people attending an “anti-violence” rally in some city somewhere – I wasn’t paying that much attention. Note the lady in the Obama hat…
Readers will immediately recognize that “self defense is not an option” is not a new philosophical stance. There have always been small numbers of religious people who disavow violence of any type, even in self defense.
I don’t understand that belief, but I have no problem accepting their privilege to believe it, and to practice it. By all means, remain unarmed and helpless if that’s what lifts your skirt. And if you really, truly don’t want me bringing violence to your defense, I’ll try to restrain myself.
The difference between those people and people like the lady above is that the religious folks I’ve met mostly aren’t trying to impose anything on me. When they say, “Self defense is not an option,” they mean it’s not an option for them. They don’t expect their views to have any effect on my actions, because their conscience is not my conscience. I respect that. I don’t agree, but they don’t need me to agree.
Obama-Hat Lady isn’t preaching that. She’s pushing a law that would make self defense “not an option” for anybody – unless they break the law, in which case they’ll have reason to be more afraid of the government than of freelance aggressors. How does adding another layer of aggressors help anybody? I doubt she thinks about it in those terms. I doubt she thinks about it at all.
My offspring says she will not defend herself against an aggressor as it is bad karma to hurt someone. I tell her if she plugs the badguy, he won’t hurt other innocent people who may not share her belief. No effect. She got rather emotional when I told her I carry and that I was willing to risk geting bad karma in order to save her. At least she refrains from pushing her belief on others. Sigh.
When William Penn became a Quaker, he asked George Fox , the founder, whether he should stop wearing his sword.
Fox, despite his own frequently demonstrated belief in offering the other cheek, advised him to “wear it as long as you are able”
When Fox met Penn without a sword, he asked “William, where is your sword?”
a position is only moral if you arrive at it freely – if it is coerced it cannot be moral.
A friend of mine objected to me carrying because, well, she didn’t have an articulated reason, merely a snort of derision and rolling of the eyes. I was hurt by that more than if she had offered a reasoned objection. I replied I would make sure to not come to her aid using my gun if she were in need. I lied. I’m a better friend than she thinks… OTOH, if she HAD offered a reasoned objection, I would have a real quandry. I dislike this philosophizing before the coffee kicks in.
“I doubt she thinks…at all.”
Fixed it for you.
Unarmed is not helpless. It is all about lifting the skirts. In Myanmar, Burma, Nigeria, Liberia, and countless other places throughout history, women have used anasyrma as concerted non-violent action to stop wars and bloodshed. Rather than the sexist misogynistic trope, lifting skirts is all about proving how unarmed is the opposite of helpless. It is not about the helpless damsel in distress needing assistance from the manly man with the big bad gun. The vagina is power. It is not something belittling.