Guns & Drugs – The American Dilemma

America is at war with itself, and it has always been. Ever since the kill-joy Puritans left England in a huff because not everyone there would agree to their desire to forbid all music and dancing, and their subsequent attempt to make the exciting New World the dullest place on earth, Americans have been at war with each other over the concept of freedom. We Americans love freedom. But it's usually our own selfish personal freedom, and we're remarkably ungenerous in wanting to afford freedom to our fellow Americans.

Right now two old wars have flared up. The war over the right to have guns and the right to have drugs. Engaged in these wars are people of extremes, as well as more moderate people, sensible people of good will who are trying to make some sort of sense out of highly complicated issues with no easy answers.

On the extreme sides in the gun debate we have people who believe that all weapons, no matter how lethal, machine guns, napalm, portable atomic bombs should be readily available and sold in your local 7 Eleven – to the other extreme, those who believe that guns along with sharp knives, sticks, skateboards and the running with scissors should be forbidden. Stuck in the middle are those who believe that having a small pistol at home to protect oneself from home invaders is not only a good idea but a human right. People living in rural areas, where it might take police a half hour or an hour to arrive, especially feel this way. One woman I heard interviewed commented, “Why do we call the police? Because they come with guns. So why not just cut out the middle man and have one yourself? Why depend on others to do your dirty work for you?”

Those in America who do not get a firm and happy erection at the sight of a gun, tend to explain their support for gun ownership from purely practical reasons. Guns, simply, are tools. And perhaps that famous practitioner of all things American, capitalistic and freedom-loving, Al Capone said it best: “You can get further with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone.” He was simply pointing out that in any dead-locked situation a gun is a tie-breaker. Might always makes right.

Another reason for the popularity of guns in America is the idea that they are the executors of the ultimate justice. Hollywood did not originate the idea of guns as judgment day, but it certainly has packaged and sold it to the whole world. And the same people all around the world who scornfully decry the primitive and vulgar aspects of American culture none-the-less love the exploits of John Wayne and Bruce Willis, Clint Eastwood and Arnold Swartzeneggar. America's commercialization of violence has been and continues to be a resounding success, as sadly proven by the fact that arms and Hollywood action movies are America's two biggest export successes.

The idea of guns as justice in these movies is best illustrated by the fact that in every movie the villain must be killed by the hero. It is not enough to be captured or even badly wounded before being taken away to jail to spend many decades locked in a cage. No, audiences demand to see the villain die, and to suffer as much as possible as he dies. Trial by jury and incarceration please no audiences. An eye for an eye is still demanded by the descendants of puritan America (..and don't Danish viewers prefer it, too?)

The debate over drug possession is perhaps less heated in America but none-the-less quite extreme at times. On one hand we have the puritans who want to keep all so-called narcotics illegal – and a few of them even long for the days when alcohol, too was prohibited. At the other extreme there are those who would like to see pot, coke, L.S.D. and heroin sold at every gas station and McDonalds. For these people freedom to choose is everything, and any possibly unfortunate effects of widely available drugs, even on our children, is of negligible or no real importance, they say. The advocates of free pot, for example point out that not one person has ever been reliably reported to have died from pot smoking – from subsequent car accidents, yes – but not directly from pot smoking, while countless millions have died from tobacco and alcohol. They also point out that insane areas of America, like Texas, once gleefully handed out 10-year prison sentences for the possession of just one joint! How, the free pot advocates ask, could pot possibly be as dangerous as such a crazy and cruel legal system? Opponents of pot usage, however, usually make the point that experimenting with pot will all too often lead to the experimentation with more addictive and debilitating drugs.

Predictably the debate over guns and drugs all too often lines up with a Right Wing-Left Wing chasm. A majority, but not all, of the most rabid gun freedom advocates, tend to vote Republican, often voicing fear of - and contempt for - the government. “We need guns,” they often say, “to protect us from a tyrannical Washington” as if automatic rifles of even the largest caliber will successfully fend off a Pentagon armed with drones, tanks and tactical nuclear weapons!

On the free pot side its advocates usually vote Democratic, favoring a strong central government that tells us how to keep water and food pure, but otherwise stays the hell away from our bodies. New York's mayor Bloomberg's advocacy of stricter gun controls is appreciated by those on the Left, but his efforts to forbid public sale of large container sugary sodas has had a more mixed reception from freedom loving Lefties. His intentions are good, we Lefties agree, but his methods seem silly and ineffectual.

Which is how the defenders of gun possession would describe gun opponents' suggested solutions – silly and ineffectual. Just as the opponents of the war on drugs in America point out that despite billions spent on the decades-old war on drugs you can still buy them on nearly any street corner at ever cheaper prices, the advocates of gun ownership could, if they wanted, point out a war on guns would be equally ineffectual. Why continue a hopeless battle, they could well argue.. but they generally don't. For the gun-loving portion of the Right Wing in America is still bound by the puritanical dictates of fundamental religion, in which sex and pleasure, pornography and the intoxicants brought to our shores by dark-skinned people – as opposed to brewers and distillers from white Europe – continue to be a taboo. So they never equate gun freedom with drug freedom.

Only a tiny minority in America, often calling themselves Libertarians, favor both the legalizing of all drugs as well as the continued legalizing of most guns. Perhaps the reason, however, that Libertarians remain so few in number, is the fact that in order to be consistent in their proclaimed desire of freedom from government nanny state dictates, they are forced to say, “Yes we want private roads only, private schools only, private fire departments, private police forces. All taxes and government organization is oppressive!”

Thankfully such extreme independent thinking doesn't go well in America, as most Americans know quite well that to live under such a truly dog eat dog scheme would require great effort and constant alertness – something few Americans are prepared for at length, our laziness fortunately in this case inclines us to prefer as little effort as possible.

While there is no need for a debate about guns in Denmark (knives do pop up from time to time, as well they should) Denmark has a continuing debate about the legalization of hash. Proponents correctly point out the considerable added tax income to the nation and the inconvenience to drug dealers who would be forced to switch to other products and markets. The opponents of the legalization of hash fear that it would become even more readily available to children and young people.

Not so.. I claim! If we were to restrict the sale of hash to pharmacies I am sure the use of hash by young people would fall dramatically. Why? The most disgusting place in any city for most young people is a pharmacy with its slow moving collection of wrinkled and diseased relics clinging on weakly to their pathetic lives. Pharmacies, to the young appear to be God's waiting room. (Perhaps if we restricted the sale of rap music to pharmacies we might do away with that pestilence, too?)

As far as drugs are concerned, and especially hash, Denmark should continue its efforts for progressively building a sensible society. In the past Danes were sensible enough to control guns and to free sex from religious and government taboos. Now is surely the time to do the same for the consumption of drugs less harmful than tobacco and alcohol!

But what about America and guns? Can anything sensible and effective ever be done? (News flash: Danish police recently charged eight Danish men with the illegal import of 158 weapons – everything from pistols to machine guns, proving that Americans aren't the only potentially dangerous gun-loving idiots.)

The comedian Chris Rock had a solution for so-called drive by shootings, in which gang members would randomly shoot at anyone on the street in their rivals' neighborhoods. “Make bullets cost 100 dollars each,” Rock suggested. “Then no one would waste them that way.”

Rock was making a point, however humorously. In a country that already has 300 million guns in private hands, what can America possibly do in the future to exercise an effective control over guns and their usage? The professionally cynical like the National Riflemens' Association (..and their cowardly and paid-for congressmen in Washington) make this exact point. Nothing at this stage can be done. As long as any guns exists they will be traded or even stolen, as was apparently the case in Newtown, Connecticut where the killer stole his mother's legally owned guns.

Some have suggested that future guns all have a chip so that the weapon is programmed only to be fired by the registered owner, and perhaps only at certain places. Perhaps future guns can be programmed to only be fired on one's own property? But that still leaves 300 million that will continue to be lethal for hundreds of years. Ban bullets and bullet bootleggers will quickly begin production to meet the illegal demand. The same goes for clips for rifles and pistols that hold more than 10 rounds. Such clips can be mass produced in anyone's garage.

Those of us who can see no effective way of making a dent in the number or types of guns easily available in America, have to resort to other ideas. Better mental health checks in schools, a more watchful eye for early mental health problems. A much greater focus on effective anti-bullying education in primary schools.

The only problem with this approach is that America is a profoundly juvenile society. The things that make us the entertainers of the world, the clowns, the rock and rollers, the Youtube providers, the teenage maniacs, the fun-lovers, also make us kings of teen angst, spoiled resentment and bad behavior. To always tell the difference between a teenage Bob Dylan and a teenage Charles Manson is never easy. Would a teenage Andy Warhol have behaved much differently in school than a Jeffrey Dahlmer who cooked and ate dozens of young boys? Is it ever possible to differentiate the altruistic rebels from the mean-spirited and destructive Hitlers-to-be?

One gun advocate claims that mass murder didn't occur in the years before the spread of drugs. He points out that many of these killers had been on long term medication, and suggested that these medicines prescribed by medical “experts” are to be blamed – not guns, of course. But no one, except for perhaps yours truly, blames the male sex, despite the fact that women make up a tiny percentage of murderers, drug or sex addicts. It is men and not women who abuse freedom!

Bob Dylan once famously sang, “To live outside the law you must be honest.” Many have speculated as to what he meant by that exactly. Was he saying that if one doesn't want society making the rules then one must make one's own and stick strictly by them or else be equally lost?

The writer, Hunter S. Thompson seemed to live by such rules. He was perhaps the first modern Libertarian, an equal lover of guns - the more lethal the better – and vast quantities of drugs and alcohol. And when he had had enough of all of them he ended his life by blowing off his head with one of his favorite guns.

Others beside Dylan have written songs about freedom. Kris Kristofferson wrote, “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.”

But perhaps the 1980's Techno-pop Devo said it best when describing the times in which we all continue to live - “Freedom of choice is what you have. Freedom FROM choice is what you want.”

In previous Danish essays I've pointed out that many problems have no palatable solutions. In one I humorously(?) suggested that all men be chemically castrated ..just a little.. to dampen our violent tendencies. Perhaps America's gun problem could be solved if everyone there is issued a pistol at birth right there in the hospital and then given an education later as a lawyer. An equal playing field for everyone!

How many of us truly want to live in a world of absolute freedom? Most of us don't really want it for ourselves. And we certainly don't want it for the other guy.. he's crazy!

A World Turned Upside Down

Mitt Romney is not alone.

In a world of increasing Internet addiction, the only exercise most of us get these days is from flip-flopping. 

Lately an unexpected  change in attitudes and beliefs has been thrust upon us, as many of us so-called liberal/progressives currently find ourselves in the strange position of having to defend the American government against the bitter onslaught of Right Wing forces determined to cripple or castrate Washington's ability to monitor and regulate certain types of behavior. The last four years we on the Left have grown increasingly tired of having to explain to older family members or the rural residents of Know-nothing Arkansas that we lefties are not in favor of big government. We want instead good government.

But all our protestations fall on deaf ears. The Right hates the government because the Right enjoys hating the government. As we, too, not so long ago once did.

Many of us lefties, currently intoxicated by the re-election of a smart, decent, level-headed black man to the Oval Office, have forgotten our decades of fear and contempt for, and opposition to a great deal of what the American government has done to Americans and to the citizens of dozens of other countries.

We lefties all too easily seem to forget the American government's liberal use of napalm and Agent Orange on helpless villagers in southeast Asia, resulting in massive cases of birth defects and continued genetic destruction, as well as relative bagatelles such as our wiretapping and attempted blackmail of Martin Luther King and thousands of other citizens. America's long and shameful support of Right Wing death squads in Central and South America, too is well known, all in the name of cheaper bananas, tin and coffee!

The list of American governmental mischief seems endless. Check out a little known episode in American history called Operation Northwoods, a hideous plot devised by the Pentagon in the early 1960's and presented to a horrified John Fitzgerald Kennedy by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. These noble warriors actually suggested that American government agents bomb and kill American citizens on American soil in order to blame Castro for the attacks and thereby justify an invasion of Cuba!

The American government has not suddenly become benign and trustworthy simply because a good-hearted man is now at the helm. The Right is right to distrust the government. But unfortunately what they seem to prefer is a government who will gleefully persecute those the Right loathes – gays, minorities, liberals.. and do it cheaply.

We on the Left, instead want a government that behaves decently. Is that really too much to ask? 

The Right says yes. That our sappy sentiments are just more naive wishful thinking. Government's true mandate, they tell us, is to spy, punish and prohibit the activities of certain groups of people, while leaving other types of people free to buy, sell and manipulate in peace.

Perhaps we of the Left should listen to one endlessly repeated Right Wing mantra – Guns don't kill people. People kill people.

In this case Government doesn't hurt Americans. Right Wing governments hurt Americans... and everybody else.

..but perhaps there is some reason for hope? Perhaps, in the current (naive?) spirit of outreach and compromise, in exchange for the Right Wing's acquiescence to slightly higher taxes on the very rich and an effort to mitigate the worst effects of climate change, we liberals can agree to ban marriage between humans and goats? 

Why not, when such a ban seems so important to these moralists?

The Blessed Closet

If I were gay I would not march in parades. Instead, in an act of reflecting a truer expression of pride, I believe I would march quickly and resolutely back into the closet. And I would slam the door behind me.


We have entered an era, fostered and nurtured by the great racial and sexual liberation movements of the 1960's, when gay people are now no longer non-existent or hounded, murdered and tortured as they were in previous generations and centuries.


Instead gay people are now tolerated. No, more than that. Instead of being objects of societal revulsion and scornful contempt, they have now become a source of entertainment and good-natured contempt.


Hollywood and the gods of television now present gay people to us as one-dimensional objects of good fun, the peripheral figure, the silly clown in nearly every sit-com cast since the early 1990's. Gay people, Hollywood assures us, are flighty, hyperactive, non-reflective – and as non-athletic Hollywood writers constantly assure us that all straight American men are obsessed by sports, these same straight writers hammer home again and again that all gay men are obsessed by Broadway musicals. And Hollywood producers, in their effort to make sure that these stereotypes are sufficiently hammered home, more often than not, cast straight men in the role of gay men, as if gay men cannot somehow give a convincing enough portrayal of these quirky and laughable creatures, and deliver today's equivalent of Al Jolson in black face.


Hollywood producers and writers haven't gotten where they are by being stupid. They occasionally, as a matter of politically correct necessity, feature a gay figure showing some back-bone, standing up for himself against prejudice.. for about 15 seconds, before lapsing back into mindless obsession with fashion or some other cliched frivolity.


And when Hollywood decides to milk homosexuality for drama, the love between men must be offered to us with as much macho angst as possible as in Brokeback Mountain. No simpering limp-wristed figures here mincing around the campfire. For how could straight audiences be expected to sympathize with forbidden love if the lovers are made to seem silly and pathetic? Hollywood moves us from one extreme to the other, from the prancing fairy to the repressed Republican without ever showing a hint that gay men and women are anything but flamboyant or castrated cartoons.


Minorities have all been through the wringer, Jews, blacks and now gays have all made the transition from the hated and the persecuted to the comical and contemptible. Hooray for progress. I suppose it's better to be poked fun at than poked with spears and other sharp objects.


But it would be heartening to detect some sign that we are approaching the end of a hopefully transitional phase. But sadly I see no sign that Hollywood and society in general are growing tired of portraying gay men as anything but ludicrous objects of condescension.


The closet may have been a confining and claustrophobic place, but at least it was safe and free from  Hollywood's “tolerant” help-mates.