What If There Is No Solution?
Former Texas Rep. and current Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke is frustrated by the lack of solutions being advanced to combat gun violence. After the Saturday shooting in Odessa, Texas, O’Rourke told a crowd, “This is not an act of God. This is not some natural disaster. This is a human-caused problem with a human solution, and, if you’re willing, we can be the humans who are going to do something about this.” It is not a new sentiment from Beto, but is he right in saying there is a human solution to this problem?
In a sense, he isn’t necessarily wrong. God is not some morbid puppeteer who leads some of His creation murder other portions of His creation. It’s also not a due to a natural disaster. No scientific explanation can explain why somebody would commit an act of mass murder in the same way that science can explain a hurricane. The so-called New Atheists are wrong that the physical world is all there is and that all of reality can explained by science, for science can not explain matters of truth and justice.
It is clearly a human problem, in that Beto is definitely correct, but is there a human solution? Beto’s first problem is that by human solution, he really means government solution. His solution is to pass a list of gun control measures including confiscation of “of every assault weapon in America,” although he is not intellectually honest enough to say “confiscation,” instead preferring the dishonest term “mandatory buyback.” Since the government wasn’t the original seller, the government is not “buying back” anything. Turning millions of law-abiding Americans into criminals just so gun control advocates can feel better about themselves is not the sensible position is portrayed as by politicians and their fans in the media.
Still, the Second Amendment will always be in the way of people like Beto. It may upset many, but rights are written down in the Constitution to remind us that they supposed to be immune to the passions of the moment. So, if gun control, or at least sweeping reforms, are doomed, it would suggest that there is no government solution.
This is a presents a problem for liberal America. If there is a problem, their first retort is “What should we do about it?” and by “we” they mean “government.” Barney Frank’s ominous statement that “government is simply the word for those things we choose to do together” comes to mind to describe such a statement, but obviously we do many things together without the government and if the government where to stick its nose, we would tell it to get out. Politicians like to control things and this suggests that there are some things that they cannot control. This bothers politicians because it reduces their relevance.
There have been many suggestions as to why mass shootings at least seam to be on the rise that do not focus on guns. Isolation that leads to loneliness, lack of community, decline in religion, racism and other ideological factors, and mental health are usually at the top of the list and they are not mutually exclusive from one another. These are all compelling and entire articles can be devoted to each one individually, but the important thing is that no matter how much politicians talk about them, they cannot solve them.
None of this is to say that a revival of religion or Robert Putnam’s bowling leagues are going to eliminate mass shootings, but having an identity and associations that go beyond the political is the first part of that human solution that Beto talks about.
Unfortunately, Beto means something different by human solution. He means legislative solution which even if it were to somehow get signed into law and upheld by the courts, cannot change the hearts of man.
