The Wisdom of Insecurity
The poet Gary Snyder once wrote to a Zen Master that he felt justified in keeping a .22 rifle by his bed in case some goon broke into his home and threatened to kill his wife and kids. His family, he argued, had a right to survival. And defense of that right justified taking life. The Zen Master wrote back: “If you must keep a loaded gun by your bed, perhaps survival is a bit overrated.”
What he meant is that life in and by itself is not the sole purpose of life; once human life is divorced from certain qualities and virtues, it becomes so inhuman that it is no longer sacred and self-sanctifying.
In our time, the Human Condition has become the Inhuman Condition.
That is why the Supreme Court's decision to strike down the Washington D.C. gun ban is such a terrible ruling in favor of the growing rule of violence. The right to bear arms only makes sense in a context of preserving civil liberty and liberties.
I think of what that Zen master wrote every time headlines about the rise in gun violence in nearby Philadelphia tempts me to consider arming myself in defense of my family. I think that such an idea of security is surrender to fear and the anger this helplessness nourishes. So the right to bear—and, presumably, use—arms is not as great a measure of freedom for me as the right to privacy and free speech. It’s one of a basket of privileges that only have meaning when taken together. The right to bear arms should be inseparable from the right to vote. Liberty is defined in our Constitution as an ensemble of equal rights.
The Bill of Rights is a bouquet of liberties, an assemblage which only has fragrance and meaning in the sum of its parts, its entirety, and not any individual right divorced from the others.
Yet in a country where one in 100 men are serving in prison, the right to gun ownership has become the pivotal defining right for many Americans of their freedom. So we tolerate or deny terrible erosion of our rights to free speech and privacy then compensate with an exaggerated, animalistic emphasis on self-protection. Consequently, the right to bear arms has lost all connection with its original late 18th century meaning and context.
We have become, I fear, a nation governed by its insecurity—with no one to remind it, as that Zen master reminded poet Gary Snyder, that the right to self-defense is an expression of fear not courage when divorced from all other rights, especially those which defend a freedom based on caring and kindness and not alienation and self-centredness. The right to bear arms becomes a wrong when it is divorced from the founding aspirations of this country. What kind of freedom or security can be affirmed by gun ownership when all other sacred individual franchises are taken away? Fewer guns and more freedoms are what is needed for less troubled sleep.
What he meant is that life in and by itself is not the sole purpose of life; once human life is divorced from certain qualities and virtues, it becomes so inhuman that it is no longer sacred and self-sanctifying.
In our time, the Human Condition has become the Inhuman Condition.
That is why the Supreme Court's decision to strike down the Washington D.C. gun ban is such a terrible ruling in favor of the growing rule of violence. The right to bear arms only makes sense in a context of preserving civil liberty and liberties.
I think of what that Zen master wrote every time headlines about the rise in gun violence in nearby Philadelphia tempts me to consider arming myself in defense of my family. I think that such an idea of security is surrender to fear and the anger this helplessness nourishes. So the right to bear—and, presumably, use—arms is not as great a measure of freedom for me as the right to privacy and free speech. It’s one of a basket of privileges that only have meaning when taken together. The right to bear arms should be inseparable from the right to vote. Liberty is defined in our Constitution as an ensemble of equal rights.
The Bill of Rights is a bouquet of liberties, an assemblage which only has fragrance and meaning in the sum of its parts, its entirety, and not any individual right divorced from the others.
Yet in a country where one in 100 men are serving in prison, the right to gun ownership has become the pivotal defining right for many Americans of their freedom. So we tolerate or deny terrible erosion of our rights to free speech and privacy then compensate with an exaggerated, animalistic emphasis on self-protection. Consequently, the right to bear arms has lost all connection with its original late 18th century meaning and context.
We have become, I fear, a nation governed by its insecurity—with no one to remind it, as that Zen master reminded poet Gary Snyder, that the right to self-defense is an expression of fear not courage when divorced from all other rights, especially those which defend a freedom based on caring and kindness and not alienation and self-centredness. The right to bear arms becomes a wrong when it is divorced from the founding aspirations of this country. What kind of freedom or security can be affirmed by gun ownership when all other sacred individual franchises are taken away? Fewer guns and more freedoms are what is needed for less troubled sleep.
posted by David Federman @ 3:41 PM
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