Try to make the world a better place

(My Eastern New Mexico News column for October 11, 2017)

People are always wanting to know the meaning of life. There is probably more than one, but a very good one is: Make your world a little better every day.

You don't have to think big. Start where you are, doing what you can. Begin with easy stuff, but push yourself beyond the edge of your comfort zone.

If you are hurting an innocent person, stop hurting them. Instead of staying silent while someone else is hurting an innocent person, get up, speak out, and don't let it continue. If you see someone being bullied, stand up for them. Even if the bully has power, or if the law is on his side. Especially if the bully is the law.

Confront the bullies with kindness at first, if possible. Don't make them feel bad unless they refuse to stop. If they won't stop, they need to feel bad. Otherwise they are lying to themselves.

If you see some litter, pick it up. If someone is kicking and stomping a toad, rescue it.

If you see someone on a path you believe will hurt them, warn them. If they won't listen, respect their choice. Yes, it's hard to do, but it's right.

Don't mistake errors in judgment for wrongdoing, nor moral shortcomings for crimes. Don't seek to punish people for mistakes. Justice is about honest restitution, not punishment.

Be good, be kind, have worthwhile principles and stick to them. Realize that "good" and "kind" aren't necessarily the same thing. Not all who are kind are good, and sometimes being good means you can't be kind. It's better to be good than to be kind. If your principles get in the way of being good, you need better principles.

After you get practice improving your personal sphere, you have a foundation from which you can spread out into the world, if you want.

If you do choose to expand your influence beyond your home turf, keep in mind C. S. Lewis' warning: “Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” That would be the opposite of making the world a better place.

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Guns, criminals, and the mentally deranged

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"We must find a way to keep weapons out of the hands of criminals and the mentally deranged." ~ Lying cowardly loser

Who do you mean by "we", since I'll have no part in such a scheme? How do you propose "we" do what you suggest? Who do you give the imaginary power to carry this out? A gang of proven unethical criminals called "government"? Yeah, that always goes well. 

Who gets to define "criminal" and "mentally deranged"? Or even "weapons"? I know-- those same proven, unethical criminals of "government", right?

How would you implement this plan without violating some number of innocent people? Or do they even matter to you? Are they just "collateral damage" to be ignored and discarded for your Big Idea? That does seem to be the standard practice of your favored vile gang.

Are you personally willing to go door to door stealing guns from people and murdering those who resist? Or would you continue to be a sniveling coward and send other vile parasites to die on your behalf?

Do you take personal responsibility for those killed when denied (or fatally delayed while awaiting your approval) a weapon they needed for self defense? Because if you support this kind of thing, I will hold you personally accountable. Each and every time some innocent person is murdered in one of your "gun free zones", or even in a place where the "laws" and policies make it even slightly less likely that good people there will be adequately armed, I hold YOU responsible if you support anti-gun "laws" and policies. Yes, YOU. You are on the side of the murderers who need unarmed victims and slaughter zones to keep them trapped.

Yes, I grant that anti-gun "laws" may save some lives. They will also cost some lives, and this you carefully ignore. What makes you the god who gets to decide to roll the dice and let randomness choose who lives and who dies at the hands of your "laws"? What made you so cowardly that you either refuse to contribute to the defense of those around you, or fear those who do step up?

No one has the right (or the "authority") to make up rules banning or "regulating" weapons. Not you, not a president, not the BATFEces gang, not judges, not "community activists", not congressvermin, not cops, not mayors or governors. No one. That right doesn't exist and can't be created.

And, I even break away from some of my co-travelers in that I know rights can never be lost-- not even if you are a criminal or are mentally deranged. No one has a right to forbid you to own and to carry weapons, but they do have the right to shoot anyone who chooses to archate. That's just reality, and if it doesn't suit you, you are free to leave the realm of reality in hopes of a more suitable afterlife.

This "plan" will go nowhere, because it is both wrong and impossible. You are free to yap about it and pretend it's an option. You are probably able to make up "laws" and murder people who break them. I will not comply, not will I expect anyone else to comply. I will not report anyone I suspect of violating your made-up rules. I assume everyone is always armed, anyway, so why would I act otherwise? I will never cooperate in taking weapons from anyone who isn't archating, and then only when it is defense.

You are a disgusting coward for believing this plan of yours is an answer or a solution, rather than an escalation of the foundational problem. You are also an idiot for not seeming to realize that other nasty cowards and control freaks have made the same suggestion throughout the mists of time. There will always be lying cowardly losers like you, wanting to be "pragmatic" in violating others. You are nothing new. Get lost, worm.

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