CHEKHOV’S UNLOADED GUN ON THE WALL

After gun safety class, there’s no such thing as an unloaded gun until you check it out yourself.

Check the bolt, the magazine, the barrel, and check it while it’s pointed away from anyone.

And away from yourself.

Chekhov’s unloaded gun is a different deal.

He’s foreshadowing a coming event which involves that unloaded gun. But is it really unloaded?

Let’s make a big jump:

On one hand we’re living in Chekhov’s world with guns on the wall in gun stores all across America, all across Oregon, all across Tigard.

I asked my wife if she thought it was strange to have two gun stores in town.

– Where’s the second one? Oh, yeah. I know. One by H-Mart and one downtown on Main Street.

– How many in Lake Oswego and Beaverton and Tualatin, I wonder? Milwaukie?

On the other hand, we seem to be in Chekhov’s act three phase.

Those guns are going off.

What’s Next?

One reader left this comment:

The right to keep and bear arms SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.

Tragedy or not, this is the primary constitutional right from which all other citizen’s rights are protected with, by force if necessary.

Let’s not exploit a truly horrendous tragedy to propagate the false idea that banning or restricting guns makes people safe. It doesn’t. What we should be doing is enforcing the abundant, existing gun laws fully and looking for obvious signs of disturbed individuals. Yes, profiling works. Forget targeting 90-year old grandma, its young males that usually perpetrate violent crime.

By the way – if every teacher in that school was armed with a handgun, the chances of a horrible tragedy like this is greatly reduced.

To which I replied:

“Tragedy or not? Let me help out: It is a tragedy, a recurring tragedy with numbers growing.

Every parent worth a damn hears about kids getting gunned inside a barricaded classroom and feel the failure. Every parent of every kid who’s been gunned down at school should be loud about gun control.

Lastly, if young men want their hands on a gun like the AR-15, they need to participate in gun indoctrination. Badass eighteen year olds buying AR-15s on their birthday is a red flag. I was in the Army with guys who joined to learn how to use the weapons, the M16, the bipod M30, throw a few hand grenades. They discovered who they were compared to the pool they were in.

The big boys got smaller, the little guys got bigger, and everyone felt the change.

Loner dudes weirdly intrigued by weapons hear different voices than I do. Voices and choices and a Rambo gun slung to wipeout kids in classrooms, shoppers in a store, and parishioners in a church turn young men to evil.

What I’ve done and continue to do is engage in conversations that promote the greater good. Know what I mean?

By Any Means Available

I bought a book, actually bought a book, with a statistical breakdown of ‘head in the oven’ suicides.

And why it changed. They changed the type of gas.

The same book I can’t think of talked about suicides off the Golden Gate Bridge and what changed to reduce the number.

Found the book: Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know About the People We Don’t Know by Malcolm Gladwell.

In it, Gladwell seems to say the convenience of suicide on a bad day changes when the means change.

Differently sourced oven gas led to fewer suicides. Better bridge safety helped the ‘fuck it I might as well jump’ people.

In the same vein, fewer guns available through loopholes and lax gun law states would cut some convenience for a shooter having a bad day. Then there’s the other thing.

Take my AR-15, please

I don’t have an AR-15 because I’m not a gun fetishist. My dad’s old 30-40 Kraig from the Spanish-American War is enough. And it’s locked away.

I know it’s an unloaded gun, but I still check it every few years.

I’m not a sword guy either, but I own one. It’s hanging on the wall.

The people I’ve known who owned an AR-15 are people who could get along just fine without it.

I said as much to some cocky older guy. He came back with, “What are you, stupid?”

He knew his gun rights and used them. But he was a weird little guy with a twitch.

He seemed like a ‘GIVE ME A REASON’ guy.

Why not find a way to discourage sales of AR-15s? Add more licensing and yearly ownership reviews and a year long class before being eligible to buy.

Better yet, join the National Guard or Army Reserve for the complete experience. You can cuddle with your rifle in your shelter-half.

What’s even better? The only people allowed to own an AR-15 are veterans holding Honorable Discharge papers.

And special cases for those who know the difference between a loaded and unloaded weapon.

(PS: They are all loaded.)