Dodge City All Over Again: Slappin’ Leather in America

The following essay was written in 2005 in response to the law passed in Florida, the so called “stand your ground law.” The predictable result was the killing of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed and innocent other seven years later.

I have trouble sometimes deciding whether the culture that I live in is merely unconscious or crazy. And then I read about something going on that causes me to lose my cool and shout something like: “Are these people nuts or what?” Before I cite an example, let’s create a context that will add depth to the event in question. First basic assumption—Americans are paranoid. To me this is self-evident. Secondly, they suffer from the many afflictive emotions that accompany being extremely fear-driven. Among these emotions are anger, anxiety, alienation, confusion, panic, terror, uncertainty, etc. Again, look around and what do you see; or even more convincing, what are you experiencing yourself?

The following definition of paranoia provides a wonderful foundation on which to build an answer to our question. Remember the question: Are these people nuts or what? Paranoia—a usually chronic psychosis characterized by delusions of persecution or of grandeur, strenuously defended by the afflicted apparent logic and reason. (From the Greek paranoos for madness or demented and para for beyond + nous for mind.)  I love this stuff.

One of the most basic syllogisms in the science of logic has already answered our question. First, Americans are paranoid. Second, paranoia is a psychosis. Hence, Americans are crazy. That was too easy and I don’t want to stop here, I’m having too much fun.  Psychosis—a severe mental disorder, characterized by deterioration of normal intellectual and social functioning and by partial or complete withdrawal from reality. Most Americans I know are “withdrawn from reality” and do not function well intellectually or socially. The presidential election of W (2000 & 2004) proved the former (W? You gotta be kidding!) and the prevalence of substance and process addictions, abuse of women, children, the poor, the elderly etc. prove the latter.

Delusions of persecution? Well, remember the “Axis of Evil” that seemed to cause W so much anxiety? Are nations like North Korea, Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan really a threat to our national security? What is even scarier is our paranoia around our internal security which brings me to my promised example. Let’s go to Florida where we have a volatile mix of right-wing Cubans and senile veterans hallucinating “Communists” on every corner. Can “Mayhem in Miami” be far away?

Floridian Michelle Cotter reacts to a bill passed by the Florida legislature in 2005. “‘A well-armed society is a polite society’—holds true only if your idea of ‘polite’ is something akin to HBO’s Deadwood or the Sunni triangle. Which is why I’m perturbed by the Florida legislature’s decision to pass a bill, signed into law by Governor Jeb Bush last week, allowing virtually anyone who feels threatened at any time and in any place to whip out a gun and open fire. The law decrees that a person under attack ‘has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself herself or another to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.’…It’s as if the text of the bill somehow got transposed with dialogue from a 1970’s Dirty Harry paean to vigilantism.”

Having just decisively proved that Americans are paranoid, unconscious (withdrawn from reality), psychotic, and intellectually “deteriorated” what can we expect from a Florida “High Noon at Hialeah?” Well let’s turn to a noted expert in such matters. Wayne La Pierre, the N.R.A.’s executive vice president, in his usual macho fashion says, “[This will] make criminals pause before they commit their next rape, robbery or murder…. A triumphant N.R.A. has vowed to get ‘stand your ground’ laws passed in every state.” La Pierre threatens that, “Politicians are putting their career in jeopardy if they oppose this type of bill.”

The National Rifle Association (N.R.A.) would have us believe that Americans would all be safer if there were more homes with guns.  Is this in fact true?  “NBC News reported:  ‘From the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, the (Centers for Disease Control) conducted original, peer-reviewed research into gun violence, including questions such as whether people who had guns in their homes gained protection from the weapons.  (The answer, researchers found, was no.  Homes with guns had a nearly three times greater risk of homicide and a nearly five times greater risk of suicide than those without …).’”  It’s only a matter of time before the local “Shootout at the O.K. Corral” comes to a street corner near you.

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References and notes are available for this essay.
Find a much more in-depth discussion in books by Roy Charles Henry:
Where Am I?  The First Great Question Concerning the Nature of Reality
Simple Reality: The Key to Serenity and Survival