Printed
in the Conscious Creation Journal
April-May 2000, Issue 11
The
Tao of Gun
by Richard Roberts
Spiritual
Sovereignty
and the Hypocrisy of Gun Control
This
essay addresses gun control and Second Amendment issues from a New
Age perspective and develops the following themes:
It
is hypocritical to affirm that human beings are responsible for
their reality and at the same time ask the State to take away guns
to make the world safer.
We
are sovereign beings who have projected our sovereign rights onto
others to control us by licensing our rights back to us as privileges.
There
are no victims. There are no oppressors. We are responsible
for our own self-defense, our own well-being and our own problems.
By
supporting any State enforced gun control we deny our heritage as
sovereign spiritual beings in human form. We also put ourselves,
our loved ones and our communities at a statistically greater physical
risk.
Making
the world a better place comes through the personal transformation
of consciousness, not through external State control.
The
first step to regain sovereignty is discovering how much you've
given away to the State and to the "good opinion of others." A good
way to discover that is apply for a gun license, buy a gun and --
tell your friends.
You
are still a sovereign being. Now, go create a miracle.
Copyright
© 2000 Richard Roberts. All Rights Reserved.
Permission to cite and excerpt is granted provided material is unchanged,
author is credited and this URL
is referenced.
Last revision, February 2, 2000. Links invited.
Dedication
Introduction
New
Age Hypocrisy
Non-Violence
and Self-Defense
Irritating
Firearm Facts
The
Politics of Control
The
Individual and Community
Spiritual
Sovereignty
Notes
Bibliography
Dedication
On April 30, 1999, Hollis Littlecreek, my flute teacher, mentor
and friend, passed from this world. Hollis, an Anishinabe Native
American elder who freely shared his teachings, was an important
catalyst at many points in my life. How appropriate that on the
day Hollis left, I would apply for my Massachusetts Concealed Carry
Weapons (CCW) permit. I could imagine him laughing to himself. For
while his pipe, his flutes and his tools were never far away, neither
was his gun -- and among those who visited with him, I was one of
the most unlikely to get one.
Introduction
As I watched the hysteria grow after the shootings at Columbine
High School in Colorado, I realized that if I would ever want a
gun, best to get it now, because it would only be more difficult
later.
I
was under no immediate personal threat. In fact, whether traveling
in India or driving cab in New York, I've always felt safe and protected.
My reasons were more pragmatic -- like buying a chainsaw now because
you just learned you might not be able to buy one when you would
need it.
I
learned a lot buying a gun. I encountered Byzantine regulations
and media programmed biases. I made surprising legal, factual and
historical discoveries. I faced uncomfortable contradictions in
my beliefs about personal power, sovereignty, and an individual's
rights and responsibilities within the community. I also reexamined
my beliefs and actions and my responsibilities to the world our
children will inherit.
After
encountering some pretty strong anti-gun feelings when talking with
New Age acquaintances, I ran a survey
to better understand New Age sentiments toward guns. This article
developed from that survey and the research and numerous conversations
that followed.
New
Age Hypocrisy
We say we create our own reality. We say we're responsible for our
experience. We say we attract the events in our life. We say our
beliefs affect our experience.
We
also say that agents of the State should be more active in regulating
the purchase and use of guns. (See survey.)
This is the same State we don't trust to regulate Vitamin C. This
is the same State that wages the drug war. This is the same State
we don't want irradiating our food. But, we want this State to regulate
guns. In fact, many of us even think it's a good idea that only
agents of this State be allowed to have guns.
As
Ann Coulter asks in a recent article
in George Magazine, "Why is it that the same people who have
the least confidence in the police and military are the most willing
to allow only the police and military to have guns?"
I
think most of us in the New Age community aren't intentionally hypocritical,
we just suffer from what I call the Paint Chip Syndrome. The paint
chip looks great in the hardware store, but when you actually paint
your wall, you wonder what you were thinking.
In
one room in our consciousness, we agree with the Catholic mystic,
Pierre
Tielhard de Chardin that we are co-creators in creation. And
as we study the Course
in Miracles we learn there is no "other" to blame for our sorrow.
Meanwhile, in another room in our consciousness we see someone in
such pain that we're moved to tears. No one should have to suffer
that. Someone should do something. Someone or something is to blame.
"There ought to be a law." We start a petition, pass a law, illegalize
a thing.
As
Jane Roberts' channeled entity, Seth,
described, we carry contradictory beliefs. Each may appear logical
within its own particular context, but when they're set side-by-side
in the same room, the contradiction is obvious.
A
good example of this disconnect is in the survey. Nearly one fourth
(23%) of the New Age respondents each individually agreed or strongly
agreed with both of the following statements:
"Gun
control laws only affect law-abiding citizens -- criminals will
still be able to obtain handguns illegally whenever they want."
and
"If
the laws on gun ownership were stricter than they are now, the
overall number of violent crimes would be reduced."
How
can we with one breath repeat Louise L. Hay's first affirmation
in her book You Can Heal Your Life, "We are each 100% responsible
for all of our experiences", and then with the next breath insist
the State forbid a particular sharp object so our world will feel
safer?
Affirmations
not in alignment with our beliefs are impotent, no matter how emotionally
soothing they feel at the time. Accepting and directing the power
and creativity of our non-physical selves requires conscious, integrated
and coherent focus.
You
Create Your Own Reality - Sometimes
Some New Age folks play the parking space game. You know, visualize
the parking space at the entrance to the supermarket on a busy Saturday
and ta-da, there it is. I do it. Although I've not kept precise
stats, I at least imagine it works quite well. It's fun to take
credit for a hard-to-find parking space. It's less easy to take
responsibility for a flat tire, or an accident, or an assault.
Accepting
responsibility for everything may not be easy at first. You certainly
won't find much support for that approach on TV, or in magazines
or newspapers. We cannot pick and choose the realities for which
we'll accept responsibility. We either get to own it all and live
as the responsible sovereigns we are, or blame it all and playing
the role of victim, look to others and the State for protection
and compensation for our suffering.
The
question is, "Who is responsible for my life?"
Fear
of the Responsibility of Personal Power
Why do so many of us otherwise sensible and intellectually honest
New Age folks support State mandated gun restrictions? I think one
reason is that we're uncomfortable with the full responsibility
of our personal power.
I
lived in an ashram for many years. It was a very seductive environment
for me (at seventeen). I didn't need to think too much. My life
was figured out. Even my afterlife was figured out. All I needed
to do was meditate, work hard, and participate in a few group activities.
I knew I was in heaven and I was helping to bring enlightenment
to the world. Whenever someone was thinking about moving out, everyone
else would try to convince them to stay for their own good. But
now I think there was another, more important reason. You had to
keep people from leaving lest you doubt your own reasons for staying.
The
dominant paradigm for much of our culture is the Cult of the Victim.
It is a very seductive cult. We don't need to think too much. Entire
systems are in place to support us and reward us for our victimization.
Sovereign people who accept the responsibility of their personal
power threaten the Cult of Victim. So like crabs in a bucket who
pull back any crab that tries to escape, the victim culture acts
reflexively to squash acts of power.
Gun
ownership is the quintessential threatening act of power to the
victim paradigm. It's like waving a pentagram in Salem, Massachusetts
in the 1600's. Deep down folks know they're responsible. But their
denial requires they eliminate anything that reminds them of what
they're denying. That may explain much of the negative reactions
to my owning and wearing a gun.
Gun
ownership requires that a person acknowledge and ponder at great
length the responsibility of their personal power. Nothing symbolizes
that responsibility like putting on a gun. And nothing threatens
someone who's afraid of the responsibility of their personal power
like someone wearing a gun.
Whom
does the gun in the care of the good-hearted person threaten? It
threatens the criminal, the State apparently, and also individuals
who have learned to fear the responsibility of their personal power
and the unpredictable potential of their spiritual sovereignty should
it ever be free of externally imposed restrictions.
Bullets
or Arrows?
I have a bullet on a necklace I sometimes wear. It gets interesting
reactions and looks. My friend, who thinks the State should confiscate
all guns, wears an arrowhead on his necklace and no one blinks an
eye. Some tell me, "You've gone too far now," "A kid could never
sneak a bow and arrow to school," or "We romanticize arrowheads
because they remind us of a time before there were guns."
For
those who wish to return to a world without guns, do they really
understand the implications and responsibility of taking away the
tools which the outnumbered and overpowered need, which the women,
the elderly, and the disabled need to protect their bodies and children
from thugs with clubs or bows and arrows?
We
revere Native Americans as keepers of wisdom. We honor them for
sharing their teachings of prophecy, community living, and caring
for the earth. Every New Age bookstore has shelves of books about
the teachings and sufferings of Native Americans. Ironically, many
of the people who buy "Free
Leonard Peltier" bumper stickers and mourn the Indians' loss
of land and life at the hands of the "power hungry Christian, white,
males of the United States", now want the same State that took away
the Indians' lands and lives to take away the Indians' guns -- again!
All
my friends who have significant Native American heritage either
have guns or support people having guns. I wonder if that has anything
to do with remembering a time when their grandparents' grandparents
really needed a gun and couldn't get one.
Creative
Visualization and Wishful Thinking
When we learn creative visualization we're taught to define our
objective clearly, see it as accomplished and release it, knowing
it will occur. Just as in prayer, we put our supplication before
the Lord not as a whine, but with thanksgiving that the result has
already been accomplished. One thing that doesn't work in
visualization or prayer, is to instruct the Great Mystery or God
or All That Is how you want your goal to be achieved.
We
want a peaceful and free society for ourselves and our loved ones.
That's the goal, the prayer. And now we've presumed to instruct
the Almighty how such goal is to be achieved by saying that the
State should control the guns. Somehow the means became the goal.
Presuming to know the correct means, we seek to impose those means
on others. It's against our best interests to limit God's means
to achieve our objective. Besides, how can you limit God? God is
limitless.
Remember
the bumper sticker, "Visualize World Peace"? Do we want world peace
or do we want to live in peace? Both? Well, we're only responsible
for our world. As New Age author, Stuart
Wilde says, "You don't want to mess with world peace -- all
you want to do is be peaceful." Perhaps people try to compensate
for not being responsible for their own worlds by being responsible
for everyone else's world. Most people's worlds are already quite
peaceful -- we just have to turn off our TVs and ignore the State
alarming us to crisis after manufactured petty crisis.
"The
whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed
-- and thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with
an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."
-- H.L. Mencken
We've
mixed up wishful thinking with visualization. Imagining what a peaceful
world will look like, we attack anything that doesn't match our
projection of the final picture. We decide that in a "perfect" world
there will be no need for guns, so wishing we were in that world
now, we say, "Get rid of guns." But wishing doesn't make it so.
It's not about the presence or absence of guns anyway, it's about
what's in a person's consciousness, not a person's pocket.
The
idealists dream of magic wands. But their wands don't work, because
as victims, they have denied their own power. So they project their
denied power onto the State to perform magic through external control.
Just
because weapons have been used (mainly by the State against its
own people) to destroy people and cultures, does not mean that is
the only use for personal firearms. "Get rid of guns!" does not
equal "Get rid of war, hate and suffering." This is a task of the
heart, of the spirit, not a task to be given to the regulation writers
of the State.
"Thank
God I Don't Have a Gun!"
Folks who haven't accepted the responsibility of their own personal
power and the results of their choices don't seem to readily accept
it in others. Perhaps folks who haven't dealt with their own demons
figure everyone else is just like them, ready to blow up at the
next insult, and God forbid they have a gun.
In
Rambo and the Dalai Lama, Gordon Fellman writes about his
feelings while reading an account of firearms training at Jeff
Cooper's Gunsite Ranch,
I
finished reading Gobson's account with a gripping fantasy that
I would take the Gunsite course. I wanted to feel the thrill and
power Gibson did. I know murderous rage, but for the first time,
I felt something in me that would like to soldier, to shoot and
slay. I imagined killing Nazis in muddy battles in World War II
and hunting down rapists and child-molesters in big cities and
beating, strangling, and shooting them. I imagined myself, Rambolike,
living on the edge, honing survival skills and cleverly fashioning
weapons to destroy my enemies with perfect mastery and no aftermath
of guilt.
From
reading Mr. Fellman's book I've gathered that he supports gun control
and it's no surprise if he thinks everyone is as full of the self-absorbed
frustration, hate, anger, violence and revenge as he represents
himself to be.
It's
almost cliche´ to read of the man who snaps and goes on some
spree of violence: "He was such a nice, quiet man."
Isn't
It Ironic?
Many in the New Age community support a woman's right to choose
to continue or end a pregnancy, but not her right to use a gun to
protect her child.
Many
support a woman's right to control her own body, but not her right
to protect it with a gun.
Many
support the rights of the disabled to have access to bathrooms,
theaters and restaurants, but not access to the effective personal
defense of a gun.
Many
support not "judging" others' lifestyles, but then immediately judge
those who choose to protect themselves and others with a gun.
Many
support respecting the diversity of religions, cultures and sexual
preferences, but not the diversity of choosing a gun to preserve
the well-being of our selves, our families and our communities.
3D
Choices
We make choices in 3D all the time. Many of those choices are about
personal safety and defending our selves, our family, our home,
our community and our planet. We put on our seat belts, install
fire extinguishers, put our babies in child safety seats, lock our
doors, recycle, organize to keep the local landfill away from the
town reservoir. We stop using freon, asbestos and lead-based paint.
We eat organic foods, exercise, use condoms, take seminars and go
to ceremonies. We buy car insurance to protect our car, home insurance
to protect our house and possessions, health insurance to protect
our bodies and money. We even read books on psychic shielding.
We
revere the Native American tradition of making choices based on
what's best for the coming seven generations. And then we
support more gun control, the one thing that made all the genocides
and massacres of civilians throughout history possible.
Non-Violence
and Self-Defense
Christ's
view on self-defense was clear, asserts Douglas Kennard, a theology
professor at Moody Bible Institute, a seminary in Chicago, and
teaching karate sends the wrong message to churchgoers. "For those
who are kingdom-bound, we should allow ourselves to be abused,"
he says. "Even to the point of repeatedly being abused."
-- Wall Street Journal, Thursday October 28, 1999, front page
article on teaching karate in churches
Many
people are uncomfortable with the concept of self-defense. Some
Christians, like the writer above, completely reject the concept.
Some equate personal self-defense with the Mutually Assured Destruction
(MAD) strategy of nuclear warfare. Some reject self-defense, because
its need or preparation means failure to envision and create a better
world. They would say that preparing to defend yourself simply reinforces
the possibility of attack.
In
spirit, we may know there is no death and even though there are
times we may not fear death, this physical 3D experience is still
precious. All beings have a right, inherent in their existence,
to defend that existence in this beautiful 3D creation. All have
a right and duty to preserve and protect their family's and their
community's existence as well. This is not about competition. This
is not about control. This is not about violence for its own sake.
This is about honoring the sacredness of this experience of life
in 3D. This is about honoring and protecting our own, our family's
and our community's right to life, liberty and however we choose
to pursue happiness.
Some
utopian views may include no need for self-defense and I don't begrudge
such visions. But why are some folks so insistent all of a sudden
that only the police, military and other agents of the State should
have guns? Why are they so eager to take them away from regular
folk? What's the difference between the person who hits you and
the person who ties your hands so that someone else can hit you?
Whoever takes away your ability to defend yourself needs to be defended
against.
In
the atmosphere of today's victim mentality, self-defense can be
an irritating reminder of personal responsibility. Self-defense
also can be an irritating reminder of spiritual sovereignty. Metaphysically,
do we think events occur accidentally?
The
Right to Choose - (Defense)
Since we are responsible (response-able), we have a right to choose
how to respond. Actually, we can't not make that choice.
Increasingly
we are being trained to give our response-ability over to others.
We are taught to seek help, not self-defend. We're taught to call
police (with guns, by the way) to respond after the fact to a day-care/school/church
shooting, but we're shocked at the idea of a private individual
carrying a gun in a day-care/school/church. (See A
Nation of Cowards.)
I
imagine a person who lost a family member in a school or church
shooting being offered a chance to replay the tragedy with only
one difference -- that an armed woman or man of good heart be present
who might avert or lessen the tragedy. I can't believe that
even the staunchest supporter of gun confiscation would hesitate
for a moment to give anything to replay the scene again -- to have
a woman or man of good heart at the scene with a gun tucked beneath
their sweater
Many
people expect benefits without responsibility. Not aware of the
process, we hire others to do our messy work. Then we criminalize
or demonize the activity for everyone else, so we don't feel pressured
to do it ourselves. For instance, some people who disdain the hunting
and trapping of free, wild animals pay others to raise, kill and
butcher animals under unnatural and often inhumane conditions. Some
who support gun confiscation travel with their own armed bodyguards
or police protection.
Some
say you don't need a gun because the police are there to protect
you. However,
In
1856, the U.S. Supreme Court (South v. Maryland) found that law
enforcement officers had no duty to protect any individual. Their
duty is to enforce the law in general. More recently, in 1982
(Bowers v. DeVito), the Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit held,
"...there is no Constitutional right to be protected by the state
against being murdered by criminals or madmen. It is monstrous
if the state fails to protect its residents... but it does not
violate... the Constitution." Later court decisions concurred:
the police have no duty to protect you.
- (various)
"Women
are supposed to be 'nice.' They like to think of themselves as
nurturing and they don't like to think about hurting someone,"
explains Dr. Helen Smith, 38, a forensic psychologist in Knoxville,
Tennessee. Smith, who works with violent criminals in the courts,
sees the aftermath of violence, some of it gun-related, on a near
daily basis. Which is exactly why she says she's pro-gun.
"I
see so many women shot dead," she explains. "An ex-husband comes
back to the house, and if she doesn't have a gun..." She says
women hop on the gun-control bandwagon because it feels right,
because they don't understand how guns work, and because they
don't want to take the responsibility of protecting themselves.
"When
women get on their high horse, what they don't realize is they're
taking away someone's right to self-protection," she says. "If
you want to die on the street, that's fine."
-- Source
In
3D, all beings have the inherent right to protect themselves, their
families and their villages from lethal force. To acknowledge that
right, acknowledges the need for an effective response. You cannot
acknowledge a right and at the same time deny the means to exercise
it.
"The
irony is, if you're willing to kill a perpetrator, you probably
won't have to."
-- Massad Ayoob, Lethal
Force Institute
Once
I would have described myself as "non-violent" (in fact, once
I was, to the point of never defending myself) -- but after a
lot of consideration I have decided that what I am now is "nonaggressive."
Violence
is the use of destructive force against an object, or a person
who doesn't welcome it. Unfortunately, self-defense often involves
violence.
I
cannot claim I am "non-violent" or "anti violence," because I
am pro self-defense. I simply believe that one should never INITIATE
violence. I believe that most people would describe themselves
this way if you put this distinction before them in those words.
-- C.D. Tavares,
author
Gandhi and Non-Violence
When discussing non-violence, Mahatma Gandhi comes to mind. I used
to interpret non-violence as passivity in the face of violence,
but Gandhi's approach was never passive.
Gandhi
believed non-violence had to be a choice. He said a mouse can't
be non-violent with a cat, because a mouse doesn't have the potential
to be violent with a cat. Indeed, non-violence is only possible
from a position of power where there is the choice, the tools and
the ready opportunity to be violent.
More
importantly, Gandhi's philosophy was about shifting paradigms, not
conquering a violent opponent, as Mark Shepard writes:
How,
then, to oppose injustice and reform society? I hoped that Gandhi
held the answer. It seemed to me he had meant to work out just
what I was looking for: a way of defeating and overthrowing the
oppressors of the world, but by moral means.
That
was my myth about Gandhi; that was my filter. I had to read an
entire book and a half about Gandhi before it struck me -- and
it struck me hard -- that Gandhi was not talking about defeating
or overthrowing anyone.
Satyagraha
-- Gandhi's nonviolent action -- was not a way for one group to
seize what it wanted from another. It was not a weapon of class
struggle, or of any other kind of division. Satyagraha was instead
an instrument of unity. It was a way to remove injustice and restore
social harmony, to the benefit of both sides.
Satyagraha,
strange as it seems, was for the opponent's sake as well. When
Satyagraha worked, both sides won.
That
concept did not pass at all easily through my filter, and I understand
why so many others miss it entirely. But it is, really, the essential
difference between Gandhi's Satyagraha and so much of the nonviolent
action practiced by others.
You
may wonder, how did Gandhi himself come to this amazing attitude?
He said it this way: "All my actions have their source in my inalienable
love of humankind."
--
Mark Shepard, "Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths"
Similarly,
my objective with this essay is not merely to change gun confiscation
laws or who's in Congress. My objective is to bring about a greater
awareness and acceptance of our responsibility for our world.
"No
lasting change is ever wrought from without."
-- Ken Carey
Lasting
change comes from waking up to our inherent personal spiritual sovereignty.
To wake up, we first have to realize we're sleeping. We have to
realize just how unsovereign we've allowed ourselves to be treated.
We gradually become aware of how our beliefs and assumptions are
programmed and legislated -- they're not really our beliefs at all.
They are what Taisha Abelar in Sorcerer's Crossing calls
a forced inventory in our memory warehouse.
The
way I came face to face with my forced inventory and my programmed
assumptions was to become familiar with guns and how we view them.
"Among
the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look
upon the act of depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest."
- -Mahatma Gandhi, "Gandhi, An Autobiography", page 446
Christ,
Non-Violence and Self defense
Many accept Jesus Christ as the epitome of non-violence.
"Ye
have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth
for a tooth: But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but
whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the
other also."
-- Matthew 5:38,39
Actually,
that's excellent advice for any concealed carry gun safety class.
You'll find that folks carrying guns are extremely polite and go
out of their way to avoid confrontation. If you're getting slapped
on your right cheek (more an insult than an assault) and your life
and limb are not in grave, imminent and unavoidable danger, you
should offer the other cheek before you even hint that you have
a gun.
I
doubt Christ intended this verse to apply to grave bodily harm or
lethal force, (but whosoever shall cut off one arm, offer him the
other also . . .).
For
me, the key is in Christ's admonition "that ye resist not evil."
As we'll see later, the real change is to be made in the arena of
energy and consciousness, not by confronting evil on its own terms
which only reinforces it.
Also,
the translation of the sixth commandment, "Thou shalt not kill"
(Exodus 20:13) is misleading. I recently learned the word that was
translated "kill" actually means to "murder from a hidden place."
The commandment would more accurately be translated, "Thou shalt
not murder."
The
Medical Model
Medicine is shifting from a mechanistic world view to a holistic
world view. The field of medicine and health is developing consciousness
based interventions instead of relying solely on mechanical interventions
to address various "disease expressions." The strictly mechanistic
approach that removes the tumor and ignores the person and his or
her world is accepted less and less.
"The
mechanism of illness is not the origin of illness."
-- Dr. Deepak Chopra
Dr.
Chopra teaches the need to trust spirit as we explore health
and the origins of illness, even if it takes us past expected options.
These
same insights also apply to society and the individual. We can no
longer afford to assume that the mechanism of a social illness is
the same as the origin of a social illness.
Illness
is feedback, whether on the individual level or the social level.
A tumor in the body can cause pain and suffering, even death. We
now know that if we remove a tumor and the affected organ but ignore
or leave unchanged the underlying cause, the body is frustrated
and confused because the feedback the body created is gone, but
the reason it created the feedback still exists. So the body sends
another message and perhaps sacrifices another organ, and another.
Illness
in society is no different. Violent attacks, whether with gasoline,
fertilizer, knives or guns, are symptoms, feedback of an underlying
cause. As long as we address only the symptom and not the underlying
cause, the feedback will get louder and more insistent.
On
the cellular level, the human body maintains a level of high alert.
Macrophage cells, T-cells, B-cells and Natural Killer Cells roam
the body on the lookout for cellular threats. When this cellular
self defense system encounters a threatening cell, the Natural Killer
Cells shoot a bullet of tumor necrosis factor that penetrates the
cell membrane and kills the offending cell.
We
know that our attitudes impact our cells' performance. High stress
and an attitude of "What's the use?" is communicated to the immune
system and the immune response cells take up the refrain of "What's
the use?" and allow diseased cells to proliferate. In the same way,
if a person rejects the very concept of self defense, then what
should we expect the Natural Killer Cells to do with that information?
The
data from the 1990 Harvard Medical Practice Study suggest that
150,000 Americans die every year from doctors' negligence -- compared
with 38,000 gun deaths annually. Why are doctors not declared
a public health menace? Because they save more lives than they
take. And so it is with guns. Every year, good Americans use guns
about 2.5 million times to protect themselves and their families,
which means 65 lives are protected by guns for every life lost
to a gun.
-- Dr. Edgar Suter, San Francisco Chronicle, 7/12/94, Opinion
(p. A17).
The
Prozac Connection
Guns are not the only item present when a murderer intent on killing
another human being pulls the trigger. Drugs are almost always present.
And not just the ones the State has decided to make illegal. No,
the drugs that are often present are State approved SSRI antidepressants
like Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil, Luvox, Serzone, Effexor, Anafranil,
Fenfluramine (Fen-Phen and Redux), Deseryl, Meridia, and other serotonin
increasing drugs.
Among
the adverse signs and symptoms of SSRI antidepressants which Harvey
Sternbach, M.D. lists the following in his report The Serotonin
Syndrome are the following:
Insomnia
or bad dreams, agitation or restlessness, hostility, anxiety,
anger, violent thoughts and/or violence, suicidal thoughts or
behavior, self destructive behavior, rage, panic, confusion, superhuman
strength-energy, mood swings, unconcerned about consequences,
out of control behavior, and altered personality.
Prozac
- Panacea or Pandora
Prozac Survivors' Support Group
Kids,
Drugs, Guns and Psychopolitics
Irritating
Firearm Facts
The focus of this essay is not the wisdom of America's founding
fathers in writing the Second Amendment. Nor is it about adding
another bit of data to the ongoing statistical wrestling match over
gun confiscation. This essay is primarily about our inherent spiritual
sovereignty being at odds with relying on external State controls.
Nevertheless,
here are some leads if you're interested in facts. Unfortunately,
I don't believe the disagreement on this topic is rooted in facts.
If it really were about facts, safety and well being, guns would
be as common as seat belts, and gun training as accepted as drivers
education.
The
Second Amendment
"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."
--U.S. Constitution
Some
say that the Second Amendment acknowledges a preexisting individual
right to keep and bear arms for both personal safety and to check
inevitable state tyranny.
-
Gun Cite
- The Supreme
Court and the Second, essay by Don Kates, Jr.
- Second Amendment Foundation
- Independence Institute
- The Unabridged
Second Amendment
Some
say the Second Amendment only allows the states to have a militia,
now called the National Guard:
-
American Civil
Liberties Union
- American Bar Association
Guns Save Lives
"If it saves the life of even one child, it's worth getting rid
of that gun!"
Unfortunately
it's not that simple. There's volumes of research on this point.
If there wasn't a larger agenda at work here, and if it was just
about the safety for our communities, our children and our elders,
then gun ownership would be widely supported and encouraged. But
then if it were about facts, doctors would be prescribing prayer
circles for all post-op patients, too.
Some
say that guns save lives:
-
John Lott's More
Guns, Less Crime
- Jews for the Preservation of Firearms
Ownership (JPFO)
- Links to Source
Studies provided by Gun
Owners of America
- GunTruths.com
- A
Letter to Elizabeth
Some
say that the presence of guns increases the likelihood of gun accidents
and deaths:
-
Handgun Control, Inc.
- Violence Policy Center
What
do you think? Visit Oleg Volk's survey
and find out!
The
Politics of Control
Keeping sharp objects out of reach is not always the wisest choice.
Hollis once described how he learned not to touch hot stoves. His
grandfather explained to him that when the stove was hot he shouldn't
touch it. Then Hollis touched the hot stove, his grandfather didn't
try to stop him and it burned him. Hollis never burned himself on
a stove again. He also paid more attention to his grandfather's
suggestions.
One
time while visiting friends, I watched their two daughters, ages
four and six, pull out long sharp knifes from the drawer to serve
some dessert. Their mom said it was okay. The girls had been carefully
taught how to use them safely. Their parents had decided to teach
them how to move safely in the world instead of trying to create
a safe world for them.
In
contrast, I once visited a house with an elaborate fence around
the wood stove. While that child may not burn herself, she also
has been insulated from the consequences of her choices. She also
has no training in the personal responsibility of moving through
an environment that hasn't been made safe in advance.
Which
child will be better prepared to act responsibly and care for herself
and others?
The
ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is
to fill the world with fools.
-- Herbert Spencer (1891)
Legislating
Safety
Legislation is good for people who want something done, but who
don't want to do it themselves and certainly don't want the responsibility
for the solution working. Every time we clamor for agents of the
State to "just do something" we give away more of our power, sovereignty,
responsibility and freedom to the State. We reinforce the paradigm
of State control every time we ask for legislation to make the world
a better and safer place.
"One
of the greatest delusions in the world is the hope that the evils
in this world are to be cured by legislation."
--Thomas B. Reed (1886)
"If
laws worked, there would be no crime."
--Claire Wolfe
"There
are just two rules of governance in a free society: Mind your
own business. Keep your hands to yourself."
-- P.J. O'Rourke (1993)
"An
ye harm no one, do as ye will. This is the whole of the law."
-- Wiccan Creed
I
find it interesting that the spirit of the Wiccan Creed is quite
similar to the philosophy of the Libertarian Party:
"A
libertarian is a person who believes that no one has the right,
under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human
being, or to advocate or delegate its initiation. Those who act
consistently with this principle are libertarians, whether they
realize it or not. Those who fail to act consistently with it
are not libertarians, regardless of what they may claim."
-- Who is a libertarian?
Cause
and Effect
We've all heard of studies of rats kept in a small and crowded area.
They exhibit all sorts of "bad" behavior, biting and scratching
at each other. How to stop the violence? Are the claws and teeth
the cause? Perhaps we should declaw and defang them.
As
any good Vulcan would say, "That is illogical." The presence of
the claws and fangs are not the cause of the violent effects.
And disarming people will not address the violence any more than
will disarming the rats.
But
we're not rats, we are human beings!
Yes.
And perhaps it's time we realized that and take steps to extricate
ourselves from our unnatural and stressful circumstances. We would
do better to take responsibility and change our lifestyles than
to ask the State to protect us from ourselves.
False
is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real advantages
for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would take fire
from men because it burns, and water because one may drown in
it; that has no remedy for evils except destruction. The laws
that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They
disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit
crimes.
...
Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the
assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides,
for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than
an armed man."
-- Thomas Jefferson quoting criminologist, Cesare Beccaria
The
Compassion Fascist
I remember sitting around the table with Hollis and every now and
then we'd talk about what he called "do-gooders." By "do-gooder"
he meant people who, uninvited, poked their noses into other peoples'
lives and suggested what those people should do differently. For
him the actions of do-gooders was both a source of entertainment
and a good teaching aid, though he didn't particularly enjoy being
told to smoke less or eat differently.
Hollis
had a lot to teach and share, but he rarely did so unless asked
and I don't remember him ever volunteering the word, "should." If
his advice was solicited, he would offer it tirelessly. If it wasn't
he would remain quiet, even if in his experience, the result of
the person's choices was about to be painful for them. He was very
compassionate, but not a compassion fascist. He respected the person's
learning process and did not interfere. He was not responsible for
them, and he believed if he imposed his unsolicited advice he would
become responsible for the fruit of their actions and that was a
responsibility he did not want.
He
was as generous with his time, his advice, his tools and treasures
as anyone I have met. He was compassionate. But he did not force
his compassion on others and did not appreciate others forcing their
compassion on him.
Nowadays
we think an act is compassionate if it is for another's good. But,
how do we know what is good for someone else in the long run? If
we think we know what's best for others, then we've planted the
seeds of accepting that maybe the State know what's best for us.
When we accept the State's intervention in our lives in the name
of a compassion that it defines, I believe we accept a mindset which
sets the stage for the potential of great mischief.
Of
all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims
may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber
barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's
cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be
satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment
us without end, for they do so with the approval of their consciences.
-- C.S Lewis
Unintended
Consequences
Attempts to make the world safe, legislate morality or enforce a
world vision can create unintended consequences. Usually the problem
gets worse.
For
example:
Prohibition
- Objective: Stop people from ingesting a particular substance.
Actual result: Creation of organized crime, loss of respect
for law, criminalization of millions of Americans, invention of
the "drive-by shooting."
War
on Drugs - So far, similar results.
Child-Proof
Caps - Objective: Eliminate accidental child poisonings.
Actual result: Increased child poisonings. People
left the bottles around instead of putting them away because now
they were safe. People also just left the caps off because
they were so hard to remove.
Aid
to Families with Dependent Children - Objective: Help
suddenly widowed women with children get back on their feet. Actual
result: By paying women as long as there is no man at home,
and by increasing the amount paid for each additional child, we
have more unwed mothers having more kids.
Pesticides
- Objective: Less bugs, more food. Actual result: Poisoned
food chain, pesticide resistant bugs and people with pesticide allergies.
Gun
Control - Stated Objective: Reduce accidents and deaths
involving the use of firearms. Actual result: Rapid increase
in hot burglaries (while people are at home), rapes, assaults and
assaults with a weapon.
See
Australia.
See Great
Britain.
See Switzerland.
Dying
of Consumption
We've been programmed to be dissatisfied with what we have and seduced
to believe we'll be happy with the next whatever we acquire. Not
only are we looking outside ourselves for our safety, we're looking
outside ourselves for our happiness in the perfect car, seminar,
relationship, or paint color.
When
the emphasis is on stuff and getting stuff, then more energy goes
to concerns of safety, control and predictability and less goes
to concerns about freedom, liberty and sovereignty. Comfortable
and predictable consumption becomes more important than personal
freedom and sovereignty.
One
way to experience more sovereignty with time and finances is to
exit the economic squirrel cage. Instead of earning more, consume
less. I find it interesting that "consumption" also refers to "an
infectious wasting disease affecting the lungs." And in our culture,
consumption as a means to fulfillment has become an infectious wasting
disease affecting many lives.
We'll
all be dead soon. And the person who dies with the most toys is
still dead. Toys are lots of fun, but that's not where all the sweetness
of life's adventure is hidden. We can have lots of toys and still
live in a prison. But to enjoy freedom and liberty and sovereignty,
we have to wake up and walk out.
Rainbow
Eagle, a Native American teacher, shares the teachings of the
Peace Shield. He teaches that a community or a village is only as
strong and free and independent as is each individual in that community.
Strong and free individuals make for a strong and free community.
"If
a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom;
and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it
values more, it will loose that too.
-- W. Somerset Maugham
[On
ancient Athens]: In the end, more than freedom, they wanted security.
They wanted a comfortable life, and they lost it all -- security,
comfort, and freedom. When the Athenians finally wanted not to
give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom
they wished for most was freedom from responsibility then Athens
ceased to be free and was never free again.
-- Edward Gibbon
Just
Try Buying a Gun
There is a lot going on in our shared social world that is easy
to overlook. World-wide systems (Echelon)
are in place that read our e-mail and scan our phones and faxes.
We eat unlabeled altered food made with genetically modified organisms
(GMOs). Hybrid seeds replace
dwindling heirloom seed stock. Laws enable some state schools to
diagnose and treat children without telling parents or the child's
doctor.
School
principals may excuse any student in grades 7-12 school to obtain
confidential medical services without the consent of the student's
parent/guardian.
-- California Education Code 56010.1
Our
buying habits and medical records are carefully cataloged and marketed.
All that and more happens and you can miss it. I certainly did.
Then I applied for a gun license.
I've
since been photographed and fingerprinted and my life has been scrutinized
by the FBI, the BATF, and various State Police throughout New England.
If I move, even within the same town, I have to report immediately
to more local and state agencies than does a murderer or child molester.
If I don't report, I loose my "right" to carry a gun forever. When
I'm carrying my gun there are places I can't drive, buildings I
can't enter, parks in which I can't walk. In Massachusetts, I even
become a criminal if I walk in the woods or cut across an open field
during certain hours of the day.
So
apply for a gun license. Think of it as an exercise to loosen your
belief of who you think you are and where you think you live. You
may find you don't live where you thought. You may discover how
you've been tricked into giving away your sovereignty. You may think
about getting it back.
The
Global Village
The Global Village is the ultimate oxymoron. There will be no town
meeting in the Global Village. There will be no talking circle in
the Global Village.
Talking
with editor Eric Utne in 1977, anthropologist Margaret Mead said,
"99 percent of the time humans have lived on this planet we've lived
in groups of 12 to 36 people." Perhaps it is our longing for that
experience which makes the Global Village sound so good. Some say,
"It takes a village to raise a child." But what kind of child will
the Global Village raise? As I hear strains of Pink Floyd's Another
Brick in the Wall, I imagine a Global Village intent on raising
obedient bricks for the Global Village Factory and the Global Village
Mall.
We
are all humans and we share space on this earth. And yes, our experiences
are becoming more intertwined. But does that mean our destiny is
a Global Village where acceptable behaviors and beliefs are prescribed
to us by an unseen council of elders?
Disarming
the Village
I remember learning to look for the simple answer, the overarching,
uncontradictable theory. One theory I'm unable to punch holes in
is the Goal of Disarming the Global Village. While I don't see a
New World Order plot behind every local ordinance, I do believe
there is an ongoing effort
to disarm the Global Work Camp & Mall.
The
mainstream media's ongoing effort, as Noam Chomsky says in Media
Control, is to "manufacture the consent" of the "bewildered
herd", To promote further gun control the media creates
hysteria by providing a steady diet of slanted
reporting on the civilian use of firearms. Supporters of right
to carry laws are portrayed as shoot-em-ups who want to return to
days of the Wild West.
Liberalizing
concealed carry laws won't lead to a return to the Wild West --
though it wouldn't be bad if it did. ... in 19th Century cattle
towns, homicide was confined to transient males who shot each
other in saloon disturbances. The per capital robbery rate was
7% of modern New York City's. The burglary rate was 1%. Rape was
unknown.
-- David Kopel - quoted in the Wall Street Journal, February
28, 1994 in "Have Gun, Will Eat Out"
I
believe it's good to be suspicious when an armed State wants to
disarm its citizens. Why don't they want the people able to defend
themselves? What's going on?
A
friend responded to my survey with:
gunz,...
don't like 'em,... never will,...
gunz to all or gunz to none is my motto,...
but
until there is no need for violence,... someone will find a way
to get a bigger stone,...
-- z
And
when there is no more need for violence, when that awareness is
shared among all self-aware sovereign beings, it won't matter if
any one is carrying a gun or not.
Seeds
of Gun Confiscation
Rush Limbaugh got it right when he described the State's gun control
strategy:
-
Tragedy occurs with a criminal using a gun.
-
Pass more gun control laws.
-
Don't enforce those laws.
-
Another tragedy occurs with a criminal using a gun.
-
Claim the previous gun laws were not enough. Pass more gun control
laws.
-
Don't enforce those laws.
-
Another tragedy occurs with a criminal using a gun.
-
Say that gun laws alone are not enough. We need to register everyone's
gun and pass more laws.
-
Register everyone's gun. Don't enforce the new gun laws.
-
Another tragedy occurs with a criminal using a gun.
-
Claim that obviously even registration is not enough. Start confiscating
guns.
What
is our fear that the State is playing to? We need seriously to ask,
why the push to restrict, register and eliminate guns owned by people
who aren't agents of the State? All statistics show it's not for
the safety of the people. If it's for the safety of the State, then
why would the State be worried that good-hearted people own guns?
(The
Constitution preserves) the advantage of being armed which Americans
possess over the people of almost every other nation . . . (where)
the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms."
-- James Madison.
Some Historic Fruits of Gun Confiscation
I grew up in a small town with a large Armenian population. The
boy who sat next to me in seventh grade home room would tell how
his family was slaughtered and that his dream was to one day return
and kill Turks. When I was in the seventh grade I learned the Turks
killed 1.5 million Armenians from 1915 to 1917. What I didn't
learn in seventh grade was that in 1911, the Ottoman Turks enacted
a gun control law, Article 166 Penal Code.
A
scan of recent history reveals similar patterns.
In
1929, The Soviet Union enacted gun control law Article 166 Penal
Code. From 1929 to 1953, the Soviet Union killed 20 million Russian
anti-Stalinists and anti-communists.
In
1928, on April 12, the German Republic enacted the Law on Firearms
& Ammunition. In 1938, on March 18, they enacted the Weapons
Law. From 1933 to 1945, the Germans killed 13 million German
Jews, Gypsies and anti-Nazis.
In
1935, China enacted gun control law Articles 186-7, Penal Code.
On October 22, 1957, China enacted the gun control law Article 9,
Security Law. From 1949-1952, China killed her communists. From
1957-1960, China killed her farmers. From 1966-1976, China killed
her reformers. All told, China killed 20 million Chinese.
In
1871, on November 25, Guatemala enacted gun control Decree 36. On
October 27, 1964, Guatemala enacted gun control Decree 283. From
1960 to 1981, Guatemala killed 100,000 Mayan Indians.
In
1955, Uganda enacted the gun control Firearms Ordinance. In 1970,
Uganda enacted the gun control Firearms Act. From 1971 to 1979,
Uganda killed 300,000 Ugandan Christians and political rivals.
In
1956, Cambodia passed the gun control Articles 322-8, Penal Code.
From 1975 to 1979, Cambodia killed one million educated Cambodians.
But
it can't happen here in America, right? Not according to the JPFO's
review of Lethal
Laws.
It
did happen here. The conquest of North America by the European
settlers of the future United States was accomplished by "the
extermination of some Native American tribes and the near-extinction
of others, by U.S. government forces . . . ." The forced march
of the Cherokee people from the southeastern United States into
Oklahoma along the "Trail of Tears" resulted in the deaths of
a large fraction of the Cherokee population, and at best, differs
quantitatively rather than qualitatively from the 20th-century
genocides described in Lethal Laws. Hitler looked with admiration
at how the United States government had cleared the continent
of Indians, and he used the U.S. government's 19th-century policies
as a model for his own 20th-century policies of clearing Lebensraum
for the German people.
Disarming
citizens before killing or oppressing them is a time-honored American
tradition. After the Civil War, the first act of the Ku Klux Klan
(like the Khmer Rouge) was to round up all the guns in the hands
of ex-slaves. Only then did other oppressions begin. From the
middle of the nineteenth century to the first quarter of the twentieth,
race riots in the United States usually took the form of white
mobs rampaging against innocent blacks. Black attempts to resist
or to shoot back were often followed with governmental efforts
to disarm the blacks.
Has
every country whose citizens allowed themselves to be disarmed suffered
slaughter from their own State? Not yet.
Has
any country's citizens who kept their guns ever been slaughtered
by their State? Never.
For
The Children . . .
We make choices in 3D even as we explore out-of-body experiences
and attend ceremonies. We choose food, clothes, schools and jobs.
To keep and bear arms is also a choice. And if we're still here
after the year 2012, do we really want to leave our children in
a police state when we die?
What
kind of world are we allowing to be created for our children and
the future generations?
If
we don't leave in spaceships or dimensional shifts of consciousness,
do we want to leave our children in a reality identical to the realities
that preceded each of history's horrific slaughters
Better
Government or No Government?
I
heartily accept the motto, 'That government is best which governs
least;' and I should like to see it acted upon more rapidly and
systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which
I also believe, 'That government is best which governs not at
all;' and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind
of government which they will have.
-- Henry David Thoreau, "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience"
Isn't
that what we in the New Age work for? Isn't that what shifting consciousness
and raising awareness and working with energy is all about on a
community and social level? The goal is not to have more sensitive
masters controlling us with more enlightened laws. Enlightenment
is not about State empowerment, it is about self realization. Enlightenment
is about waking up and living each moment conscious of our divine
spiritual sovereignty. Enlightenment is accepting the responsibility
of our personal power. Enlightenment is embracing the inheritance
of our free will to make free choices.
I
believe we are on the threshold of unimagined possibilities. If
we step across that threshold wearing the blinders of old patterns,
we will see nothing new. Instead we will seek out those who will
tell us what to do and what not to do, when to do it and when not
to do it. And if we don't find anyone, we shall create them. Perhaps
that defines our situation right now. For with every breath we take,
we walk across a threshold of unimagined possibilities. But with
each breath we recreate the old world anew based on old beliefs
and old fears.
When
a baby elephant is trained for the circus, a steel band is placed
on its foot and tied to a stake in the ground. Try as the baby elephant
might, it cannot pull itself free from that stake. As the elephant
grows it takes more than a stake in the ground to restrain its bulk
and power. Yet that is all that's needed, because early on the elephant
learned it could not free itself from the stake.
We
have grown. It's time to pull at the stake made strong by programmed
beliefs. If we can remember visions of freedom and unencumbered
creativity, and if we can tolerate not having our hay brought to
us twice a day, then we must pull and pull hard. We may even find
that there was not steel, rope, or stake at all. It was just our
programmed fear of freedom that made that confining stake seem so
necessary.
All
government, of course, is against liberty."
-- H. L. Mencken
Whom Do You Trust (with Power)?
When we collectively deny our power and responsibility and project
it as the State, we create a momentum of control and force that
can backfire in our faces. That's the danger the earth is in now.
The danger is from people who don't trust themselves with their
own power, who don't want to be responsible for the results of their
choices, who only want, as Earl Nightingale said, "to tiptoe their
way safely to death."
The
result of our choices and our fears and our irresponsibility is
the leviathan State we see before us now which, like Audrey II,
the carnivorous plant in the Little Shop of Horrors, devours
any who would try even to prune a branch, slow its growth or not
bring it blood.
In
order to get power and retain it, it is necessary to love power;
but love of power is not connected with goodness but with qualities
that are the opposite of goodness, such as pride, cunning and
cruelty.
-- Leo Tolstoy
One
of the test statements on my survey was, "Armed citizens are a necessary
check on government." One respondent, after checking off "Strongly
Agree," added the following comment:
Do
you trust the government?
Does the government have guns?
-- Survey respondent
Enough
said.
The
Ultimate Heresy
Priests who defend their claimed monopoly of speaking with God label
as heretics any who would dare claim the experience themselves.
The State defends its claimed monopoly of control and knowing what's
best for us by labeling any who claim responsibility for their own
lives as a threat and a danger to society -- a heretic to the Church
of the State.
The
ultimate heresy for the Church of State is a parishioner with a
gun. All the priests and choir members and acolytes can be fully
armed, but let a parishioner bring a gun into a pew and there will
be hell to pay.
Government
is the god of the modern liberal, and woe to them that fail to
bow down before their golden idol. That, in a nutshell, is what
the "gun control" issue is really all about; modern liberals,
like Stalin's followers, cannot abide any person having any power
outside of government. Thus all rights are "granted" by government,
and all instrumentalities in society must be subordinate to government.
Anyone who might resist the golden-idol-god of government, in
any way, is thus warring against their god and must be dealt with
as a heretic. To own a gun is to have some limited ability to
resist attack, even by the jack booted thugs of the government;
thus, to own a gun is to be a heretic in the eyes of the modern
liberal.
--email from ataylor
Keeping
your gun means you have not yet submitted to the State's ultimate
authority over your life. You still retain a modicum of effective
response to its growth and control.
Every
large organization takes on a life of its own, independent of why
it was created. The organization seeks to grow and insure its survival.
The State does so by amassing control and eliminating threats to
its survival. The State has set itself up as a god, giver of all
things good to those who accept its growing controls. A free person
with a gun is seen a threat to that State, whether or not she is.
She is a heretic, free enough and strong enough to not run reflexively
to the State for her safety. For the State's well being, she and
her kind must be made to see the light.
The
Individual and Community
The way to the New Age is to begin living as if the New Age were
already here. If we wish to live as free spiritual sovereigns here
in 3D eventually, we must begin to live that way now. We begin,
not by violently confronting and challenging the State's controls
(for which we are 100% responsible, remember?) but by acting in
consciousness of our freedom, even if the acts are outwardly not
yet those of a free human being.
As
we resonate the conscious awareness of our sovereignty, we impact
the collective consciousness. Each one of us is a vital and integral
factor. Every drop in the vase preceding the "drop that overflowed
the vase" counted. Every straw on the camel preceding its breaking
back counted. Every monkey washing its fabled sweet potato preceding
the "Hundredth
Monkey" counted.
We
are forming communities of awareness more than communities of acreage.
We are beginning to live on what Ken Carey calls energetic "islands
of the future." These are not islands to escape to. For there is
no one from whom to run. There is no one to conquer. No one who
believes they are a victim can go to these islands -- not the person
who fears the State, not the person who fears the neighbor with
the gun.
Exercise
of Freedom
When I track back the jolt I first got when I put on my gun, I track
the feeling back to not having been in the habit of acknowledging
my inherent responsibility as a divine being experiencing 3D.
I
wear my gun as a practice, a kriya, a Tao, a way. Inherently meaningless,
but of great symbolic value because we have given it that. I wear
it because I can. I wear it because it is a reminder of the sovereignty
I am reclaiming. I wear it to add my part to shift the energy to
the idea that wearing a gun is not inherently bad or dangerous.
I practice at being skillful with it, as it is a tool which can
be of service to the community for food or defense. I wear it because
as people become more comfortable with the wearing of guns, with
the right to keep and bear arms themselves, then the likelihood
of a State tyranny becomes less. Wearing a gun is my part in shifting
from victim mentality to responsible sovereign mentality, my part
in reducing the power I project to the State.
We
don't have to defeat the State. We just have to understand that
the State is our collective creation born out of not acting as the
sovereigns we are. As we become more consciously sovereign, if enough
of us can dissolve the fearful energy we've been feeding the State
then perhaps the State's fear-driven controls will begin to atrophy.
What
you pay attention to grows. Don't pay attention to the dismembering
the State. Pay attention to remembering your sovereignty.
Recently,
a friend asked me to call the Vermont governor in support of the
Vermont supreme court gay marriage decision. I wrote her:
No.
Supporting this is just another step in empowering the State by
acknowledging that the right to marry is a State-granted privilege.
Discussing this only makes sense if you accept the State's power
to dictate "hospital visitation/medical decisions, rights of survivorship,
filing joint tax returns" in the first place.
Arguing
this point gives implied consent for all the power we've mistakenly
given the State regarding straight marriages in particular and
regarding everything else in general.
Supporting
this decision is a fundamentally misguided use of energy.
Freedoms
are like muscles. Exercise them or lose them. Begin to exercise
your freedoms, not because the Constitution or some statute says
it's okay. Exercise your freedoms because they are the inherent
rights of sovereigns. But like any good exercise program, start
slowly. Don't start off fighting with the State (which tends to
strengthen it ). Realize you've given your power away. Begin to
get some exercise retrieving it. Wake up. If enough people wake
up, then perhaps the violen | 