nuc uni: People defending themselves from violent attackers is not vigilantism. No one is legally or morally obligated to allow themselves to be beaten, raped, robbed and/or murdered until such time as the police deign to arrive on scene.
Subjective rant - you're progun & unsurprisingly live in denial & spin but the author Marshall makes credible points (the article is a year old now, orig apr 9,2013, written shortly after newtown shooting).
You make a specious premise that American gun use is not vigilanteism (well duh not all of it is of course, just some), & tacitly suggest rather it is admirable & warranted. No, American gun use is generally unnecessary, too often creating larger problems than preexisted.
More of your speciousness - that 'no one is legally or morally obligated to allow themselves' to be violent crime victims, as if the only alternative were firearm ownership, & that the author marshall et al of us were trying to outlaw guns.
nuc uni: ...why do we care about Weber? He is, after all, just one German social scientist.. Bottom line: the author {marshall} is simply name-dropping in an attempt to sound erudite and well-read to an audience that is presumptively less so.
No, Marshall is not 'name dropping', he's using the weber quote to develop his premise, that gunnuts wanna be armed, & vigilante if necessary. This ties in with republicans blocking the background check bill, for vigilantes don't need no bg check, it could prevent them from getting a gun.
Refute these from marshall, his 'developments' from his weber preface: The Republican Party exists to elect people to run the government. Where are the Republicans who will stand for the civilized principle that the government, not private vigilantes, should provide basic law and order? Apart from a few honorable exemptions, such as John McCain, they have been intimidated into silence.
The NRA has a schizoid attitude toward government. In fundraising appeals to members, it fans fears that jackbooted feds are coming for your guns. In the political arena, it depicts government as pathetically weak, overwhelmed by the orgy of violent criminality and insanity engulfing our society.
.. the NRA-GOP vision for maintaining civil order in America: turn every public school into Fort Apache. And if our children’s lives are disfigured by a pervasive climate of fear and mistrust, well, at least they will be safe in their educational bunkers, and no American need ever be deprived of the “right” to own an AR-15.
Of course an assault-weapons ban wouldn’t have stopped Adam Lanza. But don’t we have a responsibility to try to limit the carnage psychopaths can inflict? Is forcing them to stop and reload really a threat to American liberty?
I think a national assault weapon ban may indeed have stopped lanza, or rather an extension of the 1994 awb which expired in 2004.
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