Between the period at the end of the Sengaku Era (the age of continuous civil wars in Japan) and the years 1876-77 which is marked by the Satsuma Rebellion (the historical basis for the movie Last Samurai) was the period where the Samurai class alone was permitted to wear two swords, long and short called Daisho. During this period the Samurai were permitted sole power by virtue of their armed status. Even as Japan moved into the 1800s and a police force was established they were not allowed to harm a Samurai in the process of arrest. Many techniques and special Samurai catching weapons and techniques were invented just for this purpose.
Life in ancient Japan during this period must have been very interesting for the peasantry. It was not unheard of for Samurai to test their newly forged swords out on live peasants. Lop a head off here or there to see just how sharp my new blade is. In fact the kanji for Nin, or ninja, is composed of the character for the sword over the character of the heart. In other words, my enemy holds a sword over my heart, but I shall subtly persevere.
There is a similar struggle here in the United States because, as we all must realize, history is based on human function and therefore events are doomed to occur again and again in different cultures and lands.
In our Bill of Rights to the Constitution of the United States the second amendment states A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. No other amendment has sparked as heated a battle in this country. There is a faction of our citizenry that considers this amendment as being archaic or out-dated. Some say that our forefathers could not have foreseen the conditions of violence and crime present in our country and therefore this amendment should be changed, or even abolished. Its interesting that from another perspective this very amendment provides for the defense against a possible tyrannical army or government, which was its original intent. One must wonder, what is so scary about the second amendment and the right to have guns? The answer is as old as mankind itself. The answer is fear.
Human beings have been responding to fear from before a time when we were still crawling from the depths of the deep oceans, from before humans were even recognizable as such. Gang violence, personal violent crime, corruption in our police departments are just a few examples of what there is to fear. Human beings are even frightened of intimacy.
People respond to fear in two fundamental ways. The first is to seek to empower themselves. In terms of violence some methods of self-empowerment include martial arts or self-defense training, handgun training with or without legal concealed carry license, or the training and carry of a variety of other small weapons intended to aid in defending oneself. Many who begin training in a combative martial art find that their mindset changes and with confidence comes their removal from the predator/prey cycle. Even becoming aware of where one can safely travel and which areas are best avoided could be said to be a form of self-empowerment.
The other approach is to UNempower those who are perceived as the enemy. Honest citizens have attempted this unempowerment time and time again through the passing of laws. Gun violence is blamed on guns. Take away guns and you get rid of gun violence. The flaw with this is that the only individuals who are affected by gun control laws are law-abiding citizens. Criminals dont follow the law. In every country in the world where gun ownership is strictly controlled criminals still have guns. Worse, throughout history renegade rebel armies and tyrannical leaders have terrorized citizens who were not allowed to own guns. An armed citizenry alone is capable of defending itself. Even if the police were free from evil and corrupt membership, and no police department is, there will never be enough police to ensure the personal protection of each citizen. In fact it is not the responsibility of the police to protect the individual. The job of the police is to investigate crime and arrest the criminal.
Many people follow a path of peace. Many also view themselves as free from fear. Many believe that to deny fear is to be free from fear. There may in fact be some truth to this from a Buddhist perspective. However I would propose that the act of voting to remove freedoms from fellow citizens is in fact a form of passive-aggressive violence.
Freedom and liberty, guaranteed by our own Constitution, must include the right to live life in accordance to our own individual perspective and experience, including our own individual response to fear. In fact in counties and states in American where legal concealed firearm carry is permitted by non-felonious citizens violent crime rates plummet. There is nothing criminals fear more than an armed citizen. Proponents fear that an armed citizenry would result in a wild wild West of gun fighting on our streets. In fact there are few American citizens who understand the letter of the law better than the gun owner. And after all, it IS the wild wild West on our streets already and its getting worse, not better.
Should every citizen carry a concealed firearm? Of course not. Carrying a concealed gun is a tremendous responsibility. It limits the clothes one wears; the manner in which one moves, how one must behave and where one can travel. Using a gun in self-defense is perilous. There is no legal provision for threatening someone with a gun. Simply put, one must be in a situation where there is no other course of action and the attacker threatens deadly force before a citizen can draw his firearm and shoot to kill.
In the end the question is not whether or not concealed carry is the answer to crime. The question is whether or not citizens decide to uphold both the letter and spirit of the Constitution and defend our basic freedom to respond to fear in our own individual and law-abiding manner. Law-abiding gun-owning citizens are not the enemy. The reality is that the average peace-loving gun-opposing citizen cant SEE who the enemy really is or recognize the enemy until a gun is pointed at them. Citizens fighting citizens over rights that should be guaranteed is what is really happening here.
In the end we as citizens, and certainly we as Buddhists should not be fooled into trading our basic freedoms for the illusion of safety. We need to look beyond the fear and examine the reality the history and the statistics of crime and gun ownership - before we go to the polls and vote away those rights that allow us to become empowered. For one group to tell another group how they can or cannot respond to the world around them IS violence, violence of a kind that is more difficult to recognize, and that is a fearful thing indeed.
If the NRA has its way we could all own assualt rifles and automatic weapons. Any peace-loving citizen should find that image truly frightening and yet, the police have them, the criminals have them, the terrorists certainly have them. Why are we safer when the only members of society that can't own these guns are the individual law-abiding citizen who seek self-protection from criminals and criminal Governments?
To quote our forefather Thomas Paine;
The peaceable part of mankind will be continually overrun by the vile and abandoned while they neglect the means of self-defense. The supposed quietude of a good man allures the ruffian; while on the other hand, arms like laws discourage and keep the invader and the plundered in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property. The balance of power is the scale of peace. The same balance would be preserved were all the world destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived of the use of them the weak will become prey to the strong.
Rev. Greg, Shidoshi
Comments
The Second Amendment states, A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed. Please note the qualification that is mentioned with the right to bear Arms. Also keep in mind that historically our nation had an army made of militias. And why did the framers include the words well regulated?
In modern times we have standing volunteer Army with weapons which range from knives to ICBMs and every barracks has an armory under lock and key. So our Militia is still ensuring the security of a free state.
I do not believe that the Bill of Rights guarantees or ensures that an individual has any right to possess or bear arms. I believe an individual is granted by law, be it local, regional, state or federal the PRIVILEDGE to bear arms. Now with that privilege should come a heavy responsibility that is not given away as easily as it is. It is easier to become a gun owner than it is to get a drivers license.
Now having said the above I am not one of those people who think that guns should be outlawed completely. I do believe that they need to be strictly regulated. And living in the South I do think we need to remove them from the hands of people who have no business operating machinery much less having a gun. It should be up to the local citizens to decide whether guns should be allowed or not (in my area, the county passed a resolution that every residence should have a gun).
Does the increase in gun ownership decrease violent crime? I have lived in many places, some of which were listed in the FBIs top ten most violent cities and I have never owned a gun and never needed one. I once heard somewhere, possibly from a comedian, that since everyone now days has a gun the criminals arent nice anymore. They dont talk to you while they take your things, now they just shoot first and then take your things. So are our streets safer because of guns or is there just more potential for violence?
From a Buddhist point of view think that the above mentioned items are just symptoms of a deeper problem in our society. It is our collective ichinen and our karma as a nation that have brought us to this point. Guns arent a solution or even really the problem (samurai didnt have guns), people are. What we really need to do is work on the people problem so the gun problem is obsolete.
I know what youer going to say . . . but we live in the real world. Well, if President Ikeda had that attitude, then Nichirens Buddhism would never have spread as far as it has . . . think about it.
I understand the part of "a well-regulated militia" Gary, however the Militia was intended to be made up of armed citizens. This is a poorly understood historical backgroud of the 2ndA. Also, you must realize that our volunteer army does not exist to protect US against a potential tyranical leader or another rebel faction of our own armed forces. It exists to follow the direction of the President.
Nearly all the founding fathers wrote on the right and need for self-defense in the early history of our Country.
What is important, I believe, is that the right to defend one's self is a fundamental human right, and as I stated we should all have the right, living in a "free" society, to respond to fear in accordance to our own karma and life-experience, of course keeping within the spirit and letter of the law.
And by the way, for us Californians, the incident with the Black Panthers scared us poor white folks so badly that California abolished it's right to form a militia. This is an example of "trading our basic rights for the illusion of freedom". It's a poor trade.
I basically agree with your opinion on the Buddhist view of the roots of violence. However "more guns" does not mean more violence. There is no statistical connection between legal gun ownership and violent crime. You seem to suggest that perhaps if we defended ourselves less than criminals would be less violent.
And by the way, I do not carry a gun either. Being a martial arts insrtuctor it would be fine with me if everyone depended on me for their self-protection. As a religious person and leader I feel this would be quite insidious. Everyone who obeys the law deserves the right to provide for their own defense in whatever law-abiding manner they choose. Trusting unseen forces for our individual protection is foolish and worse, it's ineffective.
Gun control, which is control put upon citizens BY citizens, is an insidious form passive-agressive violence. It amounts to one part of the citizenery saying to another part, "You must respond and believe as we do". It's no different than gay marriages, the right to have an abortion or any other basic freedom which we are suppose to enjoy by virtue of our American citizenship. In otherwords, it's all religion.
Thanks for your comments and thanks for reading.
Rev. Greg
Your are right, the militia was intended to be made up of armed citizens, just as the current U.S. Army is made up of citizens who vote, discuss politics and participate in the democratic process. And, just a minor point the Marines can be ordered by the President, the Army needs more involvement from Congress. Also, we take an oath to defend the Constitution not the President. And, the National Guard would defend us against an internal aggressor.
And yes I agree we should be able to defend ourselves. But, there need to be limits that are strictly enforced. Guns should be controlled not eliminated.
I also agree that we, as human beings, make the mistake of reacting in the face of fear by sometimes doing stupid things like making laws that restrict freedoms unnecessarily. We see this in the office where rules are made based on incidences and in the streets where laws are based on what is politically correct at the moment.
I am not suggesting that more guns mean more violence (I dont have the statistics to prove that) but I am suggesting that more guns do not mean less violence (possibly, since I dont have those statistics either would that come under the heading of cant prove a negative?).
Now, having been in the Army as a field medic and being required to train on several firearms, I do know how to handle and care for weapons. What I find uncomfortable is that there is too much ready access to guns by people who have little or no training and may have problems dealing with reality.
Again, I look at Gun Control as a measure of protection for those people who choose not to own a gun from those who SHOULD NOT own a gun. Not the elimination of all rights to own a gun. Just as with driving (my son just got his permit). In Georgia a person will have to have 40 hours of driving time they can test for a license (even though I think my son needs a job now and needs to be able to drive to get one, we live out in the middle of nowhere). Why cant we have thorough background checks before we are allowed to own a gun, even if they take some time?
When I was young and testing for my drivers license, the officer doing the testing gave his standard lecture before the test. And in it he said that Driving is a privilege not a right. I liked that statement and find it applies to a lot of things. My son hears it all the time.
Any privilege has its' abusers. Does that mean that we should stop enforcing strict rules and placing limits on the privilege?
I'm starting to ramble, it's been a long day. Keep up the writing - it makes me think.
Well Gary, your thoughts are well expressed. Rather than drone on and on, let me say, for myself, I agree with many of your views, but politically I will side with the NRA with whom I nonetheless feel is extreme.
Speaking for myself, I have never been robbed or mugged, or threatened, and I have been in some rough areas of the US and the world, doing stuff that is high risk. Is this because of luck? Is it because I'm blessed with enough physical size to be a deterrent to predators? Maybe it's because I do not fear predators or because on occasion I have performed functions that put me on the other side of the fence.
A world without guns is a world where bullies rule the day. Fine for me, but perhaps not as fine for my daughters. No one should be victim to those who seek power in the form of humiliation or violence.
Keep reading, and again - thanks.
Rev. Greg