Radio Stations and the Second Amendment

Today I was listening to 91.9 or whatever that "Christian" radio station is.  Two men were discussing the horror that one girl was deterred by her dean from discussing the need and right for students to "bear arms" on campus.  Without weapons by their side, apparently, the students are "sitting ducks."

At first I was dismayed--what about suicidal/drunken/accident-prone people?  Really?  In our culture, many older "adolescents" seem to experience intense emotional pain from disappointment, guilt, and heartbreak.  (I guess this is before they become too jaded later to feel those emotions again.)  Many college freshman embrace in a maybe crazy way their new-found freedom from parental hovering and nagging by going out and "partying" almost every night.  Drunken, high?  Not that anything is wrong with those things in my opinion, but I am frightened by this scenario in my head: Someone completely drunk and stoned finds his friend's gun in a dresser door.  Interested in what would happen if he shot this or that, her or him, foot or doorknob, he experiments.  (Please know--I haven't ever known anyone to shoot anything while high.  This is purely hypothetical. :) )  Needless to say, the idea of having guns around just makes me...nervous.  

Secondly--I personally do not abide or rely on what the Constitution says as if it sustains or protects me, but for those who do put some stock in their American loyalty, I will say this: Please know your case law.  The "right to bear and carry arms" was not officially interpreted by the Supreme Court as an individualistic "go-ahead" until LAST YEAR.  2008.  Scalia.  Look it up.

Lastly (and for me, most importantly)--from what I heard on the radio, it seems that the only world these gun-advocating people live in is the world of white, middle-class suburbia.  The men spoke as if simply having guns around for students to "defend themselves" would solve all problems.  Perhaps they could learn better what life is like with lots of guns around by traveling to less white, middle-class places.  Maybe they could talk to people who are surrounded by guns all day.  Maybe they'll realize that not all people understand or handle guns the way they do, locked in their neat cupboards away from toddler hands. Perhaps more guns would create a chain reaction of killing.  Maybe.

The fact that this whole discussion took place on "Christian" radio is a problem in itself, but that discussion is for another time.  

(Shakes Head)--Bumper Stickers

The car in front of the house I'm taking care of displays one white bumper sticker which says in a large (and ugly) font to make it easier to read (or more forceful in tone), "Jesus is the Only Way to Heaven." Now that's odd, I thought. Jesus is the only way to...heaven? As if we all want to go to heaven? As if we all beLIEVE in heaven, and desire to get in?

It's a little bit confusing, this bumper sticker. It seems to assume that all "religions" aim to get into heaven, as if the point of practicing Buddhism or Daoism or New Age whatever is to get into the (Christian) heaven, and that those methods do not "work," as "Jesus" is the only "way." To set things straight--the point of the aforementioned religions or philosophies is not necessarily a heaven at all. There may not even be a point, or at least an "end goal" we we traditionally understand them in the West. This bumper sticker is just so silly.

One must first be a Christian (generally--you can be religiously hodge-podge-like if you want, or even if you just are) to even believe in heaven (and really, I don't believe in a floaty spirits one, but a redeemed earth), and yet, not all people want to "get into heaven." Not all people believe in heaven. Not all people are even afraid of "not getting into heaven." This bumper sticker assumes that heaven is the thing that exits, before all others, as opposed to something within the imagination and liturgy of Christian church. A Christian heaven does not exist without Christianity, contrary to the shouts of that bumper sticker.

Psychological Mishap

So I've taken lots of "quizzes" in my life, from the silly, ill-written Facebook "What kind of dog are you?" to the more serious Meyer-Briggs. What I have seemed to find is that each is based upon a presumption that there exists an "true self," deep down, or wherever it is. One difficulty psychologists face with all sorts of personality "tests" is the inability to make sure the person taking the test answers the questions "truthfully" (how one really reacts, feel, etc.) instead of how wishes she reacts, feels, etc. After recently taking one such test, I noticed that in my attempts to be "truthful" I was really quite negative (aftermath of a certain Christian upbringing), and as I went along, I felt myself slowly think horrible things about myself, began to hate myself, and then assumed I really would, if I was "truthful" or something, choose to preserve myself over others, or use others for my own purposes. I then began to wonder if this attempt to be "truthful" was actually working to make me this way. All in all, I've begun to think that mabye there is no real, isolated self to be "truthful" about. Maybe we only have choices.

Social Arrogance Observed

It seems to me in my current social surroundings (very white, very middle to mid-upper class) that the assumed age at which one is at the "top" of the social food-chain is somewhere in the forties. A forty-something year-old, I have seen, controls not only the youth, but also the elderly. To the forty-somethings, who obviously know all there is to know, both children and the elderly (perhaps even more so the elderly) are cute trinkets designed for their amusement. "Oh how cute," they say, not only about the toddler (who is at least dignified by the occasional scold, revealing the ability to challenge the forty-something's apparent universal power), but also about the eighty year-olds at a nursing home. "They just love when I play music for them. I don't even have to play well. They just love it!" I woman I recently met generally said these things, and she was so sincere and, in her way, so kind-hearted, but I could not stomach the image her words painted of silly, nearly dim-witted old people, swaying happily to badly sung 30's tunes. They're not dogs, damnit! I mean, come on. What happened to assuming that that eighty year-old person sitting next to you knows significantly more about life, and has much to teach you? When did they become floppy, empty-headed hand puppets?