March 19, 2018

"It’s hard to talk about guns, as well as about hunting and farming, at school because no one there knows much about those three topics."

"They’ve been told not to touch or talk about guns, and some of the kids think it is just absolutely wrong for people to own them. That is their opinion, and I respect it and am open to talking about it. But even if people try to be nice, they don’t really want to debate it. At the school I used to go to, a few miles away across the border in Vermont, it was a totally different culture. There were a lot of parents and kids who owned and used guns, and pretty much everyone hunted. And it was a small town where everyone knew who you were.... I think the people who are afraid of guns should talk to the people who are familiar with them, and both should keep an open mind. Even if people on the other side don’t agree, they need to be respectful, listen, be honest and not get upset with the other person."

Writes Dakota Hanchett, a junior at Hanover High School (in New Hampshire), in "Why I Didn’t Join My School’s Walkout" (NYT).

At first, I was thinking, is that the New Hampshire/Vermont distinction? But then I saw "Hanover." As one commenter there says:
Dakota doesn't frame it this way, but Hanover HS is an unusual mix of students whose parents are Dartmouth faculty or Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center staff and students who come from multi-generation farm or working class families in VT and NH. My son graduated Hanover HS and had friends on both sides of this sometimes awkward divide. 
By the way, that commenter goes on to criticize the arguments Dakota Hanchett makes, and in doing so, uses the pronoun "he." Why would you assume someone named "Dakota" is male? I don't think the writer ever says. A reader might easily assume the photograph at the top of the column shows the author. I know I did until I noticed the caption. It's a stock photo of a homely white teenager aiming a rifle. The tip of the barrel is in sharp focus, and the person is way out of focus — symbolically making the argument that it is the gun, not the person, that kills (the opposite of what the Dakota Hanchett argues). I'm not positive that the person in the stock photo is male, but when thought that was a photo of Hanchett, I assumed I was looking at a male.

Other things might make you think you were reading an essay by a male. First, guns, target-shooting, hunting, and butchering seem like masculine interests, though plenty of females are into them too. Hanchett says, "Sometimes I get the feeling these kids are afraid of me because I own firearms." I think (but don't know) that a girl is much less likely than a boy to imagine that other people are afraid of her. Third, if the writer really were a girl, a girl challenging Times' readers' stereotypes, I think the NYT would call attention to that, but then again, maybe they wouldn't in cases, like this, where the girl isn't expressing the viewpoint about guns the newspaper is pushing.

But I think it's interesting that NYT readers assume Dakota Hanchett is a boy. And now I've Googled enough to know the answer. Dakota Hanchett is a boy. Is Dakota more common as a boy or girl's name? I'm influenced by the actresses Dakota Fanning and Dakota Johnson.
Dakota is...the 203rd-most popular name for American boys in 2007, having ranked in the top 100 most popular names from 1995 to 2000.... 1985. It was the 239th-most popular name for American girls in 2007. It has ranked among the top 400 names for American girls since 1991....
That doesn't mean there are more American boys named Dakota than American girls. I think there are fewer boys' names in common use because parents naming girls go in for more creativity and fanciness.

73 comments:

Nonapod said...

First, guns, target-shooting, hunting, and butchering seem like masculine interests, though plenty of females are into them too.

Biggest gun nut I know is a woman, a co-worker of mine. I'm a big gun rights supporter and all but she will talk your ear off about her latest gun or what happened down at the range the other night or whatever... and even I get a little bored by it.

n.n said...

Rights and responsibilities, not rites and avoidance. Is it liberal women, or men, who are predominantly Pro-Choice?

etbass said...

And there is Dakota Blue Richards, who plays a female constable in the British detective series, Endeavor.

etbass said...

Dakota Blue does not carry.

Few British police carry.

etbass said...

She IS good looking. Is that sexist?

Ignorance is Bliss said...

Dakota is...the 203rd-most popular name for American boys... It was the 239th-most popular name for American girls in 2007.

It was also a reasonably popular name for pickup trucks. Pickup trucks tend to be pro-farming, pro-hunting, and pro-guns. Pickup trucks are also aware that many liberals are afraid of them.

Are you sure the author was not a pickup truck?

Ralph L said...

It's creative to name your kid from the top 100?

Naming your daughter Ralph would be creative. Otherwise, I'm off the charts.

Freder Frederson said...

I don't know why gun rights supporters think that those of us for more gun control are afraid of guns. That is just stupid. I am not afraid of guns, I am concerned about the paranoid people out there who don't feel safe unless they are armed.

And I have no problem with hunting or target shooting.

YoungHegelian said...

One of my clients used to have an employee who was a gun-totin', Christmas carol lovin', Jewish New Jersey farm girl.

Folks are strange sometimes.

PS: Blogger is seriously messed up today. Beware!

Sebastian said...

"I think the people who are afraid of guns should talk to the people who are familiar with them, and both should keep an open mind."

Several mistakes here.

Protesters aren't "afraid of guns." Progs don't need to talk to nobody. The people who are "familiar with them" are deplorable, so not worth talking to. Nobody should keep an open mind toward evil.

etbass said...

Not many would mistake Dakota Blue Richards as a male.

Expat(ish) said...

I am very very cautious around guns, even my own guns when they are cable locked, trigger locked, and sitting without a bolt. That's just good sense.

I'm no less cautious about my carry piece when it's loaded and with me. Exactly as cautious.

I am even more cautious about people who don't was "more" regulation and "more" common sense and "more" oversight and "more" prevention.

On anything really, but especially on speech, weapons, and privacy.

-XC

Bruce Hayden said...

This is how the 2nd Amdt dies, with talk about guns becoming wrongspeak. Something the NYT is completely behind. The right people, who go to Harvard, or have fashionable addresses in Manhattan, just don't talk about or own guns. Just isn't done by people with any class or breeding. Having armed security is just fine, and comes with a certain level of success, but you wouldn't want your kids marrying one of them. In short, othering guns and gun owners in society.

Gahrie said...

Naming your daughter Ralph would be creative.

Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively named one of their daughters "James".

reader said...

When I hear the name Dakota, first I think Labrador and then I think male. I don't pay attention to actors' names and my admin named her son Dakota. He was born three months before my son.

When I conjure unknown/unnamed individuals with guns my mind goes right to male. Growing up my father had a rifle but that should have been offset by the photos I have of my grandmother with a shotgun and the fact I found a 1910 Savage pistol in my mom's garage.

So I blame Hollywood.

n.n said...

A gun is a dual-use and multi-role tool, not the least of which is an equalizer between women and men of disparate strengths. This is similar to a scalpel, that can be used to conserve and abort life. However, where the former is involved in thousands of involuntary deaths, and thousands of life and dignity-saving actions, the latter is involved in hundreds of thousands, exclusively elective abortions, by ostensibly law-abiding citizens, that deny life, annually, in American alone. I guess the progressive liberals prefer the high-minded, euphemistic perceptions of the wicked solution, the final solution, engendered by the antiseptic environment at Planned Parenthood offices. #HateLovesAbortion

Anyway, rights and responsibilities. Until we close the "fast and furious", Planned Parent, self-abortion, and criminal loopholes, that account for the great majority of elective abortions committed with a firearm, then there is nothing to discuss.

Also, the shooting in Florida only happened because the abortionist operated in a high risk environment that left children vulnerable, and a climate that, possibly for political reasons, promoted prosecutorial discretion.

Freder Frederson said...

I'm no less cautious about my carry piece when it's loaded and with me. Exactly as cautious.

Obviously not as cautious or it would be worthless for self defense. And although you may be cautious a lot of people with concealed carry permits are not. Look how many people are busted because they "forgot" they had a gun on them or in their carry on at the airport (it averages about 70 a week). Heck, I was touring the U.S.S. Wasp when it was docked in New Orleans a couple years ago and the idiot in front of me thought it would be okay to board with a concealed handgun.

Michael K said...

Blogger Freder Frederson said...
I don't know why gun rights supporters think that those of us for more gun control are afraid of guns.


Experience ?

Hanover High is an interesting school, or was when I lived in Hanover. A lot of small towns in NH or Vermont don't have their own schools, especially high schools which are expensive. So the town pays tuition to another school district for their kids to attend. . Lyme and Hanover both have a lot of kids from other towns.

When I was there, the tuition for Hanover HS was $25,000 a year.

Some of the Hanover HS kids took classes at Dartmouth.

iowan2 said...

Forgetting you have a gun on you, or, in your luggage is not careless. Those guns are no more prone to accidents by the owners than anything else. That's what Expat explained. As to your claim that persons so paranoid they need to own a gun, are dangerous is 180 degrees out of phase with facts
Gun deaths. Take away suicides, gang bangers, criminals, self defense, and mental health sufferers, and you have a near zero rate of 'paranoids harming anyone. In fact, CCW permit holders are involved in criminal gun incidents at a small fraction the rate than Police. So check your paranoia before making false claims

hawkeyedjb said...

The governor of North Dakota wants to change the name of his state to Dakota. Not sure if it is a boy state or a girl state.

Bruce Hayden said...

"I don't know why gun rights supporters think that those of us for more gun control are afraid of guns. That is just stupid. I am not afraid of guns, I am concerned about the paranoid people out there who don't feel safe unless they are armed."

You must not be around a lot of people with carry permis who carry a lot. The ones I know do it more to protect others than themselves. The sheepdog attitude. Except, of course, in places or jobs where it isn't paranoid to be armed. The reality, of course, is that as this country has gotten better armed, and more frequently armed, most of it has gotten significantly safer from gun violence. Cause and effect? Or just correlation? Lott has statistics that show the former, so it cannot be discarded as a viable hypothesis.

JohnAnnArbor said...

Every once in a while, the city folks show some self-awareness about their divide from middle America. Like whoever drew this New Yorker cartoon.

Expat(ish) said...

@Feder - I'm equally cautious with my car (new VW!, woot!) going 80 on I75 or driving 35mph in a rainstorm in Miami. I just drive differently.

Same with my (primarily) hunting rifles that are stored as, effectively, clubs. My carry piece serves a different purpose so I'm cautious with it differently.

-XC

Freder Frederson said...

Take away suicides, gang bangers, criminals, self defense, and mental health sufferers, and you have a near zero rate of 'paranoids harming anyone.

So in other words, if you most of the reasons people get killed with guns (the only one I can think of that you missed is accidents), then there is no problem with people getting killed by guns.

That is kind of a ridiculous statement.

Forgetting you have a gun on you, or, in your luggage is not careless.

Really?! You and I have a whole different definition of the word "careless".

Freder Frederson said...

Lott has statistics that show the former,

Lott is a liar who makes up and distorts his data. After his last stunt about incarceration of Dreamers, I am surprised anyone continues to justify their beliefs with his bullshit analysis.

Freder Frederson said...

The ones I know do it more to protect others than themselves.

Well thank you very much but I do not want, or appreciate, your desire to protect me.

Bruce Hayden said...

"Also, the shooting in Florida only happened because the abortionist operated in a high risk environment that left children vulnerable, and a climate that, possibly for political reasons, promoted prosecutorial discretion."

I think that it went far beyond prosecutorial discretion. The school district and sherriff's office were intentionally and actively ignoring criminal acts on an increasing basis, so that by the end, the shooter committing violent felonies was ignored, primarily, it seems, as a rational response to economic incentives from brain dead Obama Administration social engineering attempts. They somehow, deep in their delusions, believed that paying school districts not to report crimes would actually reduce crime, instead of, as we saw, increase it.

Ralph L said...

3 of my 4 grandparents hunted. Grandfather slept with a pistol under his pillow until his first heart attack. We found 5 pistols in grandma's bedroom after she died. Navy dad kept all their guns and added more since childhood, but he took us shooting in the woods just once. He never used the others to my knowledge and never hunted or spoke of his parents doing so. His best friend's son killed himself twirling a pistol on his finger at a party.

Handguns are scary to me because it's easy to point them toward yourself.

iowan2 said...

So in other words, if you most of the reasons people get killed with guns (the only one I can think of that you missed is accidents), then there is no problem with people getting killed by guns.

There is no problem that can be fixed by gun regulation. That's the point. School Shootings? I have an idea, pass a law making it illegal to have a gun on school property. Fixed

Really?! You and I have a whole different definition of the word "careless".
What danger does my forgotten Glock in my bag present? Guns dont shoot themselves.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

iowan2 said...

Take away... mental health sufferers, and you have a near zero rate of 'paranoids harming anyone.

While I agree with your overall point, in this case your exception swallows the rule.

The Godfather said...

The vast majority of people I hear or read arguing for banning some or all guns are ignorant about guns and gun laws. They think, for example, that an AR-15-type rifle fires fully-automatic "bursts" of bullets (many think the same thing is true of "automatic pistols"); they think an AR-15 is "high powered"; they think that it would have been "suicidal" for the police officers at Parkland to confront the kid with the gun, because they were armed only with handguns; they think the 2d Amemendment applies only to the National Guard. Are they also "afraid" of guns? If I were as ignorant as they are, I'd be "afraid" of guns.

Freder Frederson said...

And I just love reading stories like this or this

Actually, they piss me off.

Molly said...

Perhaps it is a mistake to refer to the Washington Post comments pages, but there is a lengthy combination of threads in this article https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trumps-lawyer-calls-on-justice-department-to-immediately-end-russia-probe/2018/03/17/c7c58ac8-29f2-11e8-874b-d517e912f125_story.html?utm_term=.77254a26d572 in which commenters promise each other to "take to the streets" -- and some even more violent actions -- if Trump fires Mueller.

One would think that such a mindset would naturally lead a person to consider the necessity or advisability of having access to arms. Or is the anti-trump rebellion going to consist only of carrying signs, wearing hats, and posting bitterly hilarious (?) comments to articles in the Washington Post and NYTimes. (A shared belief among commenters is: The funnier your derogatory name for Trump, the deeper your sincerity of Trump hatred, and the more trenchant your anti-Trump arguments.)

I'm just having trouble squaring these two deeply held beliefs: "Gun ownership must be oulawed or severely limited." "Trump must be resisted by any means necessary, including armed rebellion."

Freder Frederson said...

They think, for example, that an AR-15-type rifle fires fully-automatic "bursts" of bullets (many think the same thing is true of "automatic pistols"); they think an AR-15 is "high powered"; they think that it would have been "suicidal" for the police officers at Parkland to confront the kid with the gun, because they were armed only with handguns; they think the 2d Amemendment applies only to the National Guard. Are they also "afraid" of guns? If I were as ignorant as they are, I'd be "afraid" of guns.

Can you provide any statistics to prove that what you think "they think" is what they actually think?

As for the National Guard thing, until Heller that was the prevailing legal doctrine. So it is not so far out there in left field as you seem to think.

Bilwick said...

Gun manufacturers could get "liberals" (that is, "tax-happy, coercion-addicted, power-tripping State-shtuppers") more interested in their wares by having the firearms in their catalogues being held by models dressed as IRS and ATF "enforcers." Captions could read, "As used by your favorite government thugs!"

Re "Dakota" . . . remember on SEINFELD the tv soap opera kid named "Porter"? That was an episode from the mid 1990s, I guess; and I note, seeing it in reruns, that when the kid's tv soap-opera dad addresses the son by his first name, the name "Porter" gets laughs. But "Porter" was just a kid first-name ahead of its time. In the subsequent decades, pretentious first names for kids would go mainstream. In that time I've lived in two Yuppified neighborhoods, and the names these people give their offspring always amuses me. At one time there seemed to be a big trend of naming the Yuplings after Hebrew characters from the Bible, although I doubt these people were Jewish; so you'd have these WASPy middle class neighborhoods full of little Zachariahs (never just "Zachary"). However, in more recent years, the nouveau-riche (or at least the nouveau-affluent) are giving their kids old-money WASP names like "Porter" and "Hunter." Female Yuplings seemed to get saddled more with trendy names like "Dakota."

Bruce Hayden said...

"Forgetting you have a gun on you, or, in your luggage is not careless."

I have, more than once, shown up at the airport with a knife. Last time, I had enough time to go back, put it in the backpack I carry when I travel, and check that bag. Southwest, of course, that doesn't charge for two checked bags, and this was my second. Wouldn't work with a gun, of course, because you need a locked case for it in the luggage. Mostly, I think, because baggage handlers at certain airports are notorious for going through luggage for the purpose of theft. When I check a gun, I want the airline on notice that there is a gun in my luggage. I want it for my own protection, so that I am protected against liability if anything happens to the gun while in their care. Paranoid? I would prefer to look at it as cautious, little different from carrying sufficient insurance.

iowan2 said...

Bliss, My comments are in regard to those that insist "regulation" is the solution to gun murders, I continue to point out all the existing regulations that are being violated, hence, more regulation is pre-destined to fail, as in, not move the needle on gun murders, and only restrict the enumerated rights of honest citizens.

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

It's not a Vermont/New Hampshire conflict, but the old town/gown divide. The right people who go to Harvard are probably a lot like the right people who go to Dartmouth.

Freder Frederson said...

"Trump must be resisted by any means necessary, including armed rebellion."

Again, where on earth did you hear this. There might be a very small minority who believe in the use of force to resist Trump.

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

And the right people who go to UW Madison, for that matter.

iowan2 said...

As for the National Guard thing, until Heller that was the prevailing legal doctrine. So it is not so far out there in left field as you seem to think.

Prevailing legal doctrine,according to legal scholars, because they ignore SCOTUS ruling on Miller, that states verbatim, that the National Guard is not militia. (oh and the definition of militia in the constitution that makes clear govt troops cannot be militia).

Gahrie said...

As for the National Guard thing, until Heller that was the prevailing legal doctrine

Bullshit.

Until the first plague of Progressives, no one questioned the fact that the 2nd Amendment granted an expansive, individual right to own any weapon available. Prior to the rise of organized crime in the 1930's you could buy fully automatic machine guns through the mail from newspaper advertisements.

The militia ("the National Guard thing") was created in and organized in Article I Section 8 of the Constitution:

To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;


So if all the 2nd Amendment did was create the militia it was superfluous.

Article I Section 8 also talks about the power to issue letters of Marque and Reprisal:

To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;

Letters of marque and reprisal allowed private citizens who owned modern naval ships armed with modern individual and crew served weapons to wage war against enemy shipping without being declared pirates. Again if private individuals had no such weapons this would be superfluous. (In fact such letters were widely used by all parties in our War of Independence)

Bruce Hayden said...

"As for the National Guard thing, until Heller that was the prevailing legal doctrine. So it is not so far out there in left field as you seem to think"

More wishful thinking by left wing jurists. Never consistent with founding era understanding of the 2A language, or, really, Supreme Court jurisprudence. Eugene Volokh (whose work was cited approving in Heller) has said that he started into the area of the law thinking just that, that the purpose of the 2nd Amdt was the militia (which makes no sense as it is part of the Bill of Rights, which otherwise protects individual, not group, rights). But the more he got into the research, the more obvious it became that it was, indeed, protection for an individual right.

Gahrie said...

Also it must be remembered that our Constitution originally created a government with enumerated powers. This meant the government could only do what the Constitution allows it to do. nothing in the Constitution, or the Bill of Rights, gives the government the power to regulate or confiscate guns. Thus the government had no power to do so. Until the fucking Progressives showed up and started fucking things up.

iowan2 said...

I have, more than once, shown up at the airport with a knife.

I have been caught up twice in the last 8 months with my knife at security checks. At the St Louis Arc, and at my local small town Social security office. At which the door was locked and a armed guard had to let me in, interview me, ask about guns and knives, and allowed to return to my car to stow my knife. This might be a protocol to implement in schools, hey? ( I have been carrying daily since I was 8 years old, that includes elementary school, highschool, and college).

traditionalguy said...

Gun Confiscation is the only reason guns are being talked about.But since Loretta Lynch did not become the Scalia replacement Justice, the re-interpretation of the Second Amendment is no longer on the table. The Amendment to repeal the Second Amendment is what is coming down the road now.

Which is literally insane. Only the guns of the good citizens actually in need of protection from roaming Soros paid Mobs will ever be confiscated. The Lawless will always have several guns the same way they get what ever illegal drugs the want just about everywhere.

Keep America Sane!

Ann Althouse said...

"It's creative to name your kid from the top 100?"

No. That's my point.

Parents name boys mostly from common names, from the top let's say 50 — stuff like Jacob and Michael and so forth.

Parents naming girls will pick from a larger set of possibilities. That means that the relative rank of the name isn't equivalent to the relative numerosity. I think a boy's name in 20th place might have the same number of individuals with that name as a girl's name in 5th place. But I don't know what happens when you get to 200th place. I think the effect would reverse, because odd boy's names are generally avoided, while the same few names at the top are reused over and over. The girls' names would be distributed over a larger set of names. If for boys, 90% of them get top 50 names, then only 10 percent of the boys will be distributed over all the rest of the names. If for girls, only 20% are getting top 50 names as parents go lower on the list in search of unusualness, there are lots of girls to get those names.

Michael K said...

"You and I have a whole different definition of the word "careless".

I suspect that you and I have a of of definitions that are different.

If you are so sure Lott is a "liar" lets see your research, I'm sure you have lots of it.

Just like your military treatises.

Henry said...

I missed the chance to name one of my kids Wyoming.

Hagar said...

On topic (for once).
The language in the article (there must be a word for it?) suggests it was written by a male regardless of the subject.

As for the name Dakota, it makes me think of a Sioux band, the states north of Nebraska, or John Thune and the GOPe.

Henry said...

I have been caught up twice in the last 8 months with my knife at security checks.

I always have a multi-tool in my backpack which includes a 2-1/2" knife. I know better than to bring it on an airplane, but I've once been asked to not bring it through a metal detector -- at an INS office getting my daughter's passport. So I stowed it on my bike, thinking, I sure hope no one steals my multi-tool.

Bruce Hayden said...

“Also it must be remembered that our Constitution originally created a government with enumerated powers. This meant the government could only do what the Constitution allows it to do. nothing in the Constitution, or the Bill of Rights, gives the government the power to regulate or confiscate guns. Thus the government had no power to do so. Until the fucking Progressives showed up and started fucking things up.”

That was, of course, part of why the anti-federalists got the Bill of Rights enacted. Sure, the Constitution only provides for a limited central govt. But what happens if it slips the reins? We know the answer to that now, and most of us are thankful for their foresight.

Molly said...

Replying to Freder who asks "where on earth did you hear this. There might be a very small minority who believe in the use of force to resist Trump." My original comment answers that question. Go to that article and read the comments. You will see there are something like 6,000 comments, and an overwhelming number of them endorse, or come very close to endorsing armed uprising, or other violence against Republicans and/or Trump supporters. I posted because I was surprised at the vitriol and the relatively small amount of pushback. The comments include (in the "most liked") promises to "take to the streets", statements of support "there will be millions with you", and statements that appear to endorse violence "I picture a row of gallows and heads on spikes". Perhaps you spend too much time in the Althouse echo chamber where such opinions are rare. I want you to realize how common those opinions are.

Friendo said...

Freder: "And I have no problem with hunting or target shooting"... The second amendment is not there to protect target shooting and hunting. It is there to provide a means to the people to defend themselves against tyrannical threats from within and without.

This is a good summary of your specious argument and a rebuttal to it.

http://thelibertychronicle.com/the-2nd-amendments-forgotten-value/

Rusty said...

Freder Frederson said...
I don't know why gun rights supporters think that those of us for more gun control are afraid of guns. That is just stupid. I am not afraid of guns, I am concerned about the paranoid people out there who don't feel safe unless they are armed.

I'm concerned about the paranoid people who don't feel safe because I am.
My rights are too important to me to let you think you can regulate my rights. I don't trust you.

Michael K said...

"I have been caught up twice in the last 8 months with my knife at security checks. "

What was really annoying last week was flying to LAX on business and having the Tucson TSA miss the fact that I had forgotten to leave my pocket knife in the car. It was in my bag. The LAX TSA zeroed in on it like a duck on a June bug.

If it was Tucson, I could have stashed it there as I was returning that afternoon. In LA, I just left it and bought a new one when I got home.

Annoying.

Rusty said...


As for the National Guard thing, until Heller that was the prevailing legal doctrine. So it is not so far out there in left field as you seem to think.

No. I refer you to the milia act of 1903.

Hagar said...

I am not so sure about it being the Anti-Federalists who got the Bill of Rights enacted, but have always thought that was case of the people - including deplorables and all - being smarter than the theoristers quoting Montesquieu et al. in the Convention and various published papers.
They looked at the proposed Constitution of the United States and immediately saw that this was no government of limited powers working only on the states, but would certainly become a very strong government working directly on them, and they wanted some protections against that.

As for the 2nd Amendment, Mr Justice Blackstone's in his "Commentaries on the Laws of England" says the rights of British subjects to bear arms should never be infringed upon for the reasons most often stated in defense of the 2nd Amendment (though they certainly have in modern times!), but Congress, having recently been through the alarums of the Shays' Rebellion, etc., thought it well to add the cautioning clause about a "well regulated militia," etc.

It is most curious that the ancestral Democrats, the Anti-Federalists, were those in favor of the British version at the time, but against it now, while today's Republicans, then the Federalists, wish Wee Jemmy just had left Justice Blackstone's comment alone.

Hagar said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Hagar said...

Condoleezza Rice says she is all for the 2nd Amendment (though meaning it in the Blackstone version) because when there were "troubles" brewing in her native Birmingham, AL, her father and some like-minded citizens of the neighborhood would gather at the bottom of the street very publicly displaying their long guns.

etbass said...

Two of my daughters carry. Neither are named Dakota.

Jim at said...

Well thank you very much but I do not want, or appreciate, your desire to protect me. - Freder the Totalitarian.

The world doesn't revolve around you, asshole.

Gospace said...

I noticed there weren't a lot, if any, walkouts in small rural high schools like where I live. Where kids have hunting licenses as soon as they can get them. Take the mandated hunter safety courses as soon as they're old enough. Who know when the first day of deer season is- in all forms. Archery, rifle... Who fish and clean, gut and eat their catch. Know how to cook it too, especially above a campfire. And, BTW, all of them know the 2nd amendment has nothing at all to do with hunting.

I've met city people, a lot of them, who won't eat fresh berries plucked off the bush. Methinks many city dwellers have no concept of where their food actually comes from.

Gospace said...

There's widespread agreement among 2nd amendment supporters that it exists so citizens can resist an oppressive overbearing government. With examples of how would things be different if the Jews in Germany had been armed. Or the civilians of Cambodia. Or the Tutsis in Rwanda. Or going on right now- the Whites in South Africa.

But that would never happen here! is the refrain and not terribly effective rebuttal. Especially since it happened in 1946 in the Battle of Athens. https://www.americanheritage.com/content/battle-athens

It also exists so citizens can take the law into their own hands when the government fails. I still haven't found the example I was looking for, but this one is close enough: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/16/us/16bully.html I'm fairly certain this type of thing has happened more then once, and also certain not publicized much. Also found this, where if I had been on the jury, he would have walked free, or at the very least, had a hung jury: https://www.10news.com/news/man-gets-out-of-prison-after-killing-bully-in-95 Unlike the Kate Steinle case where jury nullification was a miscarriage of justice, jury nullification here would have been justice.

mikee said...

I've looked and looked for any new argument from the anti-gun side in this round of well-organized demonization of firearms and law-abiding firearm owners. There are none. They are just yelling the same crap that has lost since the 1980s, louder.

tim in vermont said...

Well thank you very much but I do not want, or appreciate, your desire to protect me.

And therefore I am determined to remove your right to protect yourselves.

Molly said...

Adding to Gospace's list: Chile's coup d'etat in 1973 in which Gen. Pinochet siezed power from elected socialist Allende.

"In the final weeks before Pinochet's coup, the Army used a 1972 gun-control law to conduct numerous searches for weapons in Leftist-controlled factories." http://www.cyberussr.com/hcunn/for/chile-73.html

Glenfield said...

When you hear the name Dakota you think of actresses. I think of the Medal of Honor. http://www.dakotameyer.com/medal-of-honor/

Birkel said...

Freder Frederson: "Well thank you very much but I do not want, or appreciate, your desire to protect me."

Finally, I find a point of agreement with Freder.

Leftist collectivists can take their paternalism elsewhere.

JPS said...

Glenfield, re Dakota Meyer: I do too.

Freder Frederson:

"I don't know why gun rights supporters think that those of us for more gun control are afraid of guns."

I don't assume all supporters of gun control are afraid of guns, by any means, but a good many that I know personally are.

Though more and more it's just tribalism with (I believe) a big dose of class snobbery. They basically hate the kind of people who own guns, they don't themselves know anything about guns, and they seem to take pride in not knowing.

The Godfather said...

Guy upthread says,"I do not want, or appreciate, your desire to protect me." If he's ever in danger from an armed criminal, and you are an armed citizen in a position to save his life, my guess is you'll ignore his request to let him die. The folks I know who believe in the right of armed self-defense are like that.

Of course, YMMV.

J said...

One of the latest holders of the Medal of Honor a male is named Dakota.I believe he married the Palin girl.

LA_Bob said...

Some years ago, my grandson wanted to learn to shoot. His parents, especially his mother, were skeptical at first. I had to find a place he could take training. I found an organization called SoCal Top Guns, which teaches kids shotgun shooting. When my grandson was away, I took his parents to check it out. It was enough like his karate classes that his mom was impressed and agreeable.

One of the instructors explained to us he had once invited an anti-gun female attorney to shoot. The woman took to it instantly, shot well, and enjoyed it immensely. He explained that women tend to be better shots than men, because they have better eye-hand coordination.