NOTE: The letter below appears partly in response to a story that appeared in the April 2024 edition of Healthcare Michigan.

EDITOR:

Any discussion of gun issues should begin with the reasons for and wisdom of the Second Amendment. The founders were quite clear on the rationale for this, so much so, that it was memorialized in the Constitution itself. Also rarely mentioned is the violence and even deaths prevented by armed law-abiding citizens.

Long lists of statistical data in a debate so immersed in political rhetoric, demagoguery and ideology should not be accepted as the final word. COVID has taught us that there are now two phrases that should evoke skepticism. They are “studies show” and “experts say.” That experts cannot solve the problem leads to several questions. Is it that they cannot or are unwilling or even apprehensive about stating objective truth because of the predictable political consequences? Perhaps they are looking at the wrong problem altogether.

One can wonder why scrutiny of our own U.S. culture and social factors might not provide objective easily observable insights even to those of us labeled as non-experts. The rule of law has moved from “equal and blind justice” to a politicized and ideologically progressive system that can hardly, if at all, provide a foundational roadmap for the ongoing evolution of a successful and classically liberal civilized society with civil liberties preserved. Defund the police, no bail laws, criminals viewed as victims, theft as a right of the aggrieved and frequently no punishment at all for repeat offenders all have consequences. Trivializing the family as the basic unit of a healthy society, lack of family values that have provided a moral foundation along with religious principles, an expanded welfare state that steals motivation and ambition all have consequences. Our public educational system is a failure by any measures. Yet school choice favored by most parents is resisted by many politicians. So many of our once exceptional colleges have become caldrons of hate including anti-Semitism, anti-Christianity, anti-capitalism and even anti-Americanism.

Ideological promotion of tribal divisions such as sexual orientation, race, gender, social strata and wealth have been advocated based on inherently divisive concepts such as “social justice,” D.E.I. and defining society as either victims or victimizers that creates even further division. We now have virtually open borders with the acceleration of crime, drugs, lawlessness, human trafficking and gang violence. Our culture has consequently become more violent. Leadership has become synonymous with politics, role models are absent, and trust in our institutions has been increasingly lost.

Technology has a dark side. Suicide and social media, crippling of interpersonal socialization and social media, even the ability to differentiate reality from fantasy by social media and entertainment are results. Then there is the abandonment of personal responsibility by the “victims.” The general respect for human life is a casualty of collectivism as it subjugates to the collective the primacy of each of us as unique individuals.

Of course there is also real mental illness.

Finally, it needs to be accepted that utopianism is a fantasy, actually responsible for millions of deaths. A free society is going to incorporate some degree of risk. But are the failed experiments of trading the promised lack of risk by relinquishing freedom mistakes that deserve repeating.

Really, is gun violence as a manifestation of violence generally that difficult to understand?

Then there is the solution. “We can bear neither our diseases nor their remedies. “This was stated by the ancient historian Livy (59 B.C.-17 A.D.) describing the long decline of Roman national character that, in his age, finally ended the Roman Republic. He further understood that the Romans knew that they had become corrupt and lawless. But the very contemplation of the hard medicine needed for restoration—and the furious reaction that would meet the remedy—made it impossible to save the patient. One can begin to wonder if we are there yet.

Allan Dobzyniak, MD