The difference between conservatives and liberals is this:
liberals care about everybody, conservatives care about anybody. Economically, liberals want to make everybody’s
life equally prosperous. Conservatives
recognize that in capitalism there will always be winners and losers, and thus
it is impossible to make everybody a winner, but it is possible to make anybody the winner. According to conservatives, somebody is going
to be a loser in the capitalist system, but it doesn’t have to be you. Any person can work harder or smarter than
their competition and become the billionaire.
This opportunity for ANYBODY rather than opportunity for EVERYBODY
mentality is based on the premise that the most intelligent and/or diligent persons
will succeed.
Self-Defense. What
does any of that economic theorizing have to do with self-defense? Well, it’s defense of the SELF, the individual, ME! This is the same concept, but applied to
personal protection instead of personal wealth.
Liberals want cops and soldiers and firefighters to protect everybody, so that they don’t have to do
it individually. Conservatives recognize
limited resources and they realize that government probably can protect anybody it wanted to, but not
everybody. They do a fairly good job protecting
the President (since 1963), but they can’t protect everybody the same way.
Liberalism extends from the universal healthcare and equality of outcome
economics into the realm of personal protection with the same idea: government
should protect EVERYBODY.
They’re right, of course.
When I was in the military, I felt deeply ashamed for what happened on
September 11th, 2001; the national security apparatus of the United
States failed to protect Every American as it was supposed to. They’re right that the government should be able to protect everybody, but
it can’t. This means, mathematically, that
some bodies are going to be left
unprotected by the government some of the time—realistically most of the time. Just as equality of outcomes is not possible
for economics, it is also not possible for government protection. This is a fact liberals do not want to
admit. They do not want to accept
personal responsibility for their own safety, because they (not unreasonably)
believe that the government SHOULD
protect them. They should not have to be
responsible for their own protection, because protection is the basic function
of government. To them, it is an
entitlement just like education or universal health care; it’s protection of
the public from dangerous actors.
Despite what conservatives like me say about liberals, this
position is not bleeding-heart or emotion-driven political rhetoric. It is—in fact—very conservative from one
perspective: what are we paying the cops and soldiers and firefighters for if
they cannot protect us? That’s a pretty
logical libertarian argument, actually.
Classical libertarians would argue that the only legitimate purpose of
the government was in fact protection.
So the belief is neither bleeding-heart emotionality, nor political
unreasonableness. The government’s
fundamental job is indeed to protect its citizenry.
But, while logical, reasonable and rational, the belief that
government should protect everybody equally, is nonetheless naïve, because it, like
Marx, Engle and Bernie Sanders, are detached from reality. Yes, the government should be able to protect EVERYBODY. But, even if you believe it can (which is both
legally and mathematically impossible), the fact is government doesn’t. A wise psychologist once said: Don’t “should”
all over yourself. If the world worked
the way it SHOULD, then no innocent
people would ever be victimized by predators.
But every year about 1.2 million innocent Americans are the victims of
violent crime perpetrated by predators the local, state and federal governments
were unable to stop. That is reality.
The difference between what the governments should do and what they actually do is
about 16,000 murders, about 130,000 rapes, over 300,000 robberies, and over 800,000
aggravated assaults every year in America.
Between 1.1 and 1.3 million violent crimes occur in the United States
every year, even though the government should
protect us. Now, that’s only about
.38% of the population facing violent crime in any given year; so an argument
could be made that the government is doing fairly well at protecting the other
99.6% of the Every Bodies. Some other liberals make that
argument. But, again, as a conservative, I don’t
look at everybody; I look at the ANYBODY. I don’t even look at the 1.2 million
victims. I look at the one victim. SELF-Defense
is about the one victim, who can be ANYONE protecting himself from becoming
one of the 1.2 million.
"Why do you need a gun?"
Statistically, I probably don’t.
The probabilities are in my favor that I will never again have to pull
the trigger on another human being: less than .4% of the population of the
United States is a victim of violent crime every year. So, the odds are with me, with you, with
EVERYBODY that he or she will not be a victim.
Liberals look at the 325 million of everybody. As a conservative, I look at the individuals;
I look at the ANYbodies, whether that is in economics, education, health care
policy OR personal protection. Not everybody can be protected, which is
okay, because not everybody is going
to be a victim. In fact, only a tiny percentage of everybody is going to be a
victim of violent crime this year, so the odds are against any particular
person being a victim. This is the insanity
of liberalism, Marxism and ends justifying the means slaughter of millions, by
the way. To hell with the individual being raped, murdered or assaulted; "statistically, the crime rate is really actually pretty low." Some leftists don't care about the individuals that make up the society, they just care about the "society as a whole," aka the EVERYBODY. The problem with that statistical thinking is that an individual SOMEBODY is
going to be a victim. In fact, 1.1-1.3
million SOMEBODIES are going to be victims of violent crime this year. Each one is SOMEBODY else’s child, parent,
sibling, spouse or loved-one. For them, the violent crime rate is not .38 percent, it is 100 percent.
As a conservative, I am an individualist. As an individualist, that is how I look at violent crime, from the perspective of the individual victim or potential victim. The FBI says we have a violent crime rate of about 382.9 per 100,000 people. But the 382.9 PEOPLE do not care about the rest of the 100,000. To the victim of violent crime, the violent
crime rate is 100% because violence is
interpersonal, not statistical. Liberals
ask, “With a .38% violent crime rate, why do you need a gun?” I carry a gun because that .38% represents 1.2
million INDIVIDUALS who are victimized by predators every year in this country,
despite the best efforts of local, state and federal governments to protect
each one of them. I recognize Reality; the
government is unable to protect everybody, and therefore ANYBODY can be the
victim of violent crime—if they rely on the government to protect them. I no longer expect the government to protect
me. I do it myself. Even if statistically, and demographically,
the odds of me having to defend myself from violent crime are incredibly
remote, I still am prepared to protect myself because the government isn’t
there, won’t be there and Constitutionally couldn’t prevent violent crime from
happening even if they were there.
Thanks,
Soule
Easy6Training
PS: Besides which, I don’t have to explain why I need a
gun. Our second guaranteed freedom—immediately
after the right to think, speak, write, pray, and express ourselves however the
hell we want to—is the right to defend all the other freedoms if somebody tries
to take them away. Exercising this
freedom requires no further justification than does attending a particular
church, mosque or synagogue, protesting a politician, or writing this
blog. I do all of those however the hell
I want to, because the Bill of Rights says I can, and that second freedom prevents anybody from stopping me;)
