A musing Beam

This is the last in a 3-part series on the issues raised by the violence in Newtown, CT.  The first was on mental illness ( http://amusingbeam.blogspot.com/2012/12/issues-raised-by-newtown-pt-1-mental.html ), the second covered gun control ( http://amusingbeam.blogspot.com/2013/01/issues-raised-by-newtown-pt-2-guns.html ), and this one addresses our need to better handle the shifts in culture that our more connected world evokes. Our changing culture Our culture is changing in ways that make it easier for people to access materials with less social interaction. If I want to only read conservatives' posts, or jihadists', or Wiccans', or animal welfare rights advocates', or ...  I can comfortably do so.  I can watch snuff films without anyone knowing.  I can practice what it would be like to kill people in great detail by purchasing a video game, and I can order all of that online with relative anonymity.  Of course, I can also do all the neat stuff that we really lov

This entry is the second in a 3 part series on the issues raised by the horrific violence in Newtown, CT.  The first was on mental illness (http://t.co/NOJfvN6Y), and the last will be on cultural changes.  This one is on guns and gun control.  Unless you like legal stuff, feel free to skip the afterward on  the Constitution (it's marked). In summary, I think that Newtown gives us very little evidence about the need for changes in the way we handle gun laws.  It does give us a reason to pause and think, though, and so it is reasonable to take that time to inspect our gun policies and how we got there.  In the end, I think people should be able to defend themselves with small arms, and hunters should be able to hunt with them, with relatively little government oversight, but that significantly more oversight is good once we go very far into the assault weapon spectrum and beyond. An overview of a strategy The government should not be allowed to assume that most citizens cannot b