Stupid

I have in my small collection two 50 caliber cartridge cases that I found lying on the ground in the Mojave Desert. The headstamp on one has a W and A, and the number 43. I’ve always figured this identified the manufacturer and year made. And since I knew that General Patton trained his troops in this area before sending them to Africa and eventually Europe in 1943 and 44, I guess we can conclude that the rounds were fired around that time. So I found them more than 50 years after they were used in those exercises.

I was with a small group hiking the open desert when we came across a track on the ground left by an armored vehicle. An old track. You can tell when desert soil has been undisturbed for a long time. It gets this patina called desert varnish. Walk across it and you crack it. The varnish blending the old track with the rest of the surrounding soil was unbroken. 

Shortly, we found an old field telephone wire stretching across the land, and then a scatter of rifle cartridge cases on the ground, and these two larger ones. I had become the resident expert once I began identifying these things for the group, so they were brought to me when found. One lady on the periphery of the group had missed most of this, and when she caught up she asked what was happening. I smiled and held out my hand, holding a cartridge case, and I told her what it was.

The poor lady screeched, and ran away in abject terror. I tried to calm her, explaining that this cartridge had been fired 50 years earlier and thus represented no harm to her or anyone. I was wasting my breath, for this object had something to do with guns, and thus in her mind it represented a lethal threat to her. 

Any, even the most superficial knowledge of firearms would have negated this fear, but this woman was utterly uninformed in this subject. So for no rational reason, this harmless object terrified her.

Now, let’s step back for a moment and study why this last paragraph is totally erroneous.. .. 

This woman was not ignorant regarding firearms. She was in fact, thoroughly and effectively educated about firearms. Indoctrinated might be a better description. Since she was a babe in arms, she had been taught to fear and loath guns, by her parents and teachers, her political leaders, and her news and entertainment media. She knew all about firearms. They kill ya. They were to be feared. So she ran away from a harmless piece of 50 year old brass, simply because it was associated with firearms. Just shows to go ya that you don’t have to teach the truth in order for the teaching to be effective.

Now, the temptation here is to call this woman stupid. One 50 year old cartridge case does not represent a threat to anyone, and reacting as if it would climb out of history to harm this one woman does fail the likely test. I’ve a bunch of friends who would call this stupid. And I can assure you this woman has a bunch of friends who have implied that I am stupid because I harbor some notions they have been taught to disregard. 

I’m a rabid proponent of our Second Amendment rights, and it does toast me when most of the opposition arguments are tainted by misinformation. But that is how things are done in this world. Nothing new here, folks…keep moving. 

I’ve grown tired of being called stupid just so someone can disregard my arguments. But it’s gonna happen. I have enough faith in my own brain and my own arguments that I don’t fear losing these rights due to better arguments. But I do wonder how to counter all the lies and misrepresentations, and the indoctrination of so many. A lot of people want me to lose those rights. And a few of the others.  

With an election looming, the stupid word is flying around, sent from both extremes toward the other, and it is getting old. Both extremes are out to reduce our rights, so they should be recognized and opposed.

The first rule in debate is to address the issues, and not to denigrate the arguer. I’m tired of hearing that Bush was stupid, or Obama is stupid, or pick one. Stupid is what you pull out when you cannot counter an argument with a better one of your own. Why cannot we argue the issues, on their own merit, honestly, and leave the stupid word to those grade school bullies who have grown older, if not up? They still want to ruin our lives, and we don’t need to let them.