Bigger Man Than I

John Green, who had just lost his nine-year-old daughter; "in a free society we’re going to be subjected to people like this; I prefer this to the alternative."


I don't think I could have made that statement, if it were me, less than 24 hours after my loss.


All in all, the shooting is a drop in the bucket compared to "the alternative".  It takes centuries for the criminal use of firearms by individual actors to catch up with "the alternative".  Centuries.  Centuries with the caveat that governments will not do any non-war killing while mere murderers catch up.  Suggested Reading.


Even war kills fewer people than "the alternative".  It takes decades of total war to catch up.  Total war, like World War Two not like what we are doing in Afghanistan.


I am a gun owner, I am OK with a goal of zero gun deaths.  It's an unattainable ideal.  The genie is well and truly out of the bottle.


I am not OK with being punished for the actions of others.


Liberty and freedom have warts.  There are some unpleasant and unpalatable side effects.  They are, on the whole, far more bearable than totalitarianism.  I'd rather have warts than lesions!