Another friend of mine, who happens to be a member of the Church, pointed it out. The Leftist friend simply ignored it, continuing with his buzzwords and saying that white Christian heterosexual men are lashing out because they can’t bear to see other groups get a bigger piece of the pie when it comes to social clout.

And I’ll state here: When Brazil reframed its Constitution in 1988 following the end of the military dictatorship, clauses were included to make it very, very difficult for rank and file to get a gun, if not impossible. And yet, shooting deaths during muggings and home invasions are getting so bad that the leading Presidential candidate is a right-wing nutcase who, at the risk of oversimplifying, wants to bring back aspects of the dicatorship, or at least encourage the police to be mini-Frank Castles. I bring this up at the risk of comparing apples and oranges, but it’s something to chew on.

Did you also point out to your friend that all the causes he lists are at their lowest point in American history? Why would school shootings be on the rise if all of its causes are ebbing? His thesis isn’t just wrong, it makes no sense.

His response was basically that the root causes weren’t fixable; gun control is only to help lower the murder rate.

I then thought of this post and your remark:

“Nor do I think that those who would work most energetically in the cause of weakening government recognition of the right expressed in that amendment, even if doing it out of compassion and a desire for the safety of others, would be doing it with an eye toward stiffening the nation’s moral fiber and then returning that right “when we can be trusted with it again,” as those forces doesn’t seem to ever want to temper their pity with responsibility, their inclusiveness with standards, their empathy with expectation. The moral skeleton would continue to atrophy under their compassion.”