My Fond Memories

My Fond Memories
The picture above is of me as a baby, my dad David Richey (center), and my granddad Ben Richey (left). There is no date on back of the photo, but it had to have been 1959 because that's the year I was born! I'm lucky to have this picture. Three generations of men in one shot!!

Friday, May 14, 2021

My Take: "The Possible Culprit of Chronic Shootings" (Transcript of podcast)

This is the first episode of my second weekly podcast, called, "My Take." My opinion about a specific issue, past, current or future. Today, I want to share my feeling and the possible solution to the recent spate, and long-term history, of chronic shootings, in the U.S., and globally. 


I'm still so very happy with the two most recent election results, and I'm so very pleased and optimistic about how the Biden administration is handling most all of their agenda. But I am also so deeply despaired by the continued tragic epidemic of gun violence, evidenced by of all the recent mass shootings. Although support of the 2nd Amendment is definitely bipartisan, in the wake of the many recent mass shootings, it is beyond a tragedy that so many people still feel resistant to any restrictions on guns and that unrestricted access to guns seems to be more important in their lives than the safety and lives of people. That priority is clearly not working to stop the incessant carnage of all the shooting deaths, domestic or mass. I have heard the argument raised by gun rights advocates and gun enthusiasts that "Guns don't kill, people do." There is obvious truth to this. It takes a person to fire a gun. Few injuries or deaths are caused by a gun going off by itself. Or the argument by many to focus instead on treatment for the mentally ill who procure guns. There is obvious truth to this, too. Clearly, mentally ill people need treatment. However, these legitimate arguments should be separated from finding a solution or solutions to chronic shootings. In other words, to gun proponents any alternative argument seems better than blaming the gun. What both of these previous arguments, of a person needed for killing and focusing on treatment for the mentally ill, entirely overlook—and perhaps purposely as a deflection—are the obvious facts of a gun's sole function and its ease of use. The sole function of a gun is to destroy, when fired, whatever is in front of its barrel. The ease of use is simply pulling the trigger. Therefore, a gun makes it much *easier* for a person to kill. This ease of destruction, plus the far too easy availability of almost all guns and the refusal of too many people to enact any new gun control legislation at all, are why the carnage continues. But I concur with another culprit, a genetic one. I think it may be at the heart of the problem of all gun issues. It is a less widely acknowledged or discussed theory, and one that is very awkward to think about much less mention: That a gun is a machine substitute for providing a more powerful male appendage, a more powerful phallus. A psychological, exaggerated, and false antidote for the male fear of erectile dysfunction. It is a fact, not a theory, that the majority of the perpetrators of mass shootings are men. Most manufacturers, sellers, and owners of guns are men. Guns make many men feel dominantly, sexually, and powerfully invincible. So for many of these men, it is very nearly their indestructible male member. Not only has this point been written about before, but it doesn't take much imagination to notice that a gun clearly resembles a penis and its testes. 


It is not a phallic fixation to notice this resemblance. In his April 17th, 2018 article, Guns Are the Last Bastion of American Masculinity, Taylor Kalsey wrote, "Guns symbolize manliness, both directly as a phallic symbol and as a tool for independence and strength." https://medium.com/@tkalsey/why-guns-are-the-last-bastion-of-american-masculinity-e742e3148312

In his article on March 5, 2013, The Psychology of Guns: 12 Steps Toward More Safety, H. Steven Moffic, M.D. wrote, "The unconscious meaning of guns may of course vary from individual to individual. Although some view their ideas as anachronistic, Freud and Jung offered some basic interpretations. For instance, in their shape, guns can be an obvious phallic symbol." https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/psychology-guns-12-steps-toward-more-safety

And in the Disarmament Forum of 2003, in his essay, Disarming Masculinities, Henri Myrttinen wrote, "Guns as violent phallic symbols are used, for example, in chants of the U.S. Marine Corps (‘This is my rifle [holding up gun]/ this is my gun [pointing at penis]/ one’s for killing/ the other’s for fun’) or in pro-gun bumper stickers available in South Africa (‘Gun Free South Africa—Suck my Glock’). Condoms issued to soldiers in the Second World War and in later conflicts were often used to cover the muzzle of their rifle to protect them from dust and sand." https://philarchive.org/archive/FERRMA-2


Why else would a man utter the phrase I have heard more than once, "I'll give you my gun when you pry (or takeit from my cold, dead hands" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_my_cold,_dead_hands 

That is obviously a severely exaggerated and defensive statement. But it is akin to the very real and legitimate fear of, and obvious objection to, the prospect of genital mutilation or castration. In Quentin Tarantino's film, Django Unchained, while suspended upside-down from a barn roof, Django's involuntary screams are muffled by a metal helmet on his head as the sadistic plantation rancher, Billy Crash, takes a fire-heated knife and nearly castrates him, before being interrupted by the equally despicable plantation butler, Steven. It is the tireless and fearless Django's most vulnerable moment in the story. Next to our deepest fear of death, fear of damage to, or the loss of, one's genitalia is nearly as horrific, especially for men. 


Rifles also look like a phallus, and with longer-length aspirations. So do cannons and tanks. Machine guns could simulate multiple orgasms, of which women are much more capable than men—an obvious clitoris/vagina-envy for men. Actually, knives, spears, and arrows are phallic too, for that matter. But while a bow certainly propels an arrow at a considerably fast speed, it is still much slower than a bullet fired from a gun. And a spear or knife requires far greater effort, skill, and closer proximity to cause the same or similar damage as a single bullet. Spears,  knives, and arrows are also less efficient (less easy) at inflicting nearly instant mass carnage, much less by one person. Hence the reason that there are far fewer mass stabbings, spearings, or by bow and arrow. And the discharge of the bullet or projectile through and out of the gun barrel is clearly a simulacrum of the male ejaculation. I don't think that is in the least a far-fetched idea. I think it is blatantly obvious. And it only confirms to me why I sense strongly that such deep and chronic resistance to any restrictions on the acquisition of any gun is a reflection on many men, and some women, of their deepest fear of personal and emotional loss. Fear of the loss of use of their sexual organ and its performance. Their gun becomes their tag-team wrestler. And the prospect of any restriction or infringement on their guns seems to be a deeper loss than the contined loss of lives from said guns. It is a very selfish and self-serving posture. Putting one's own insecure needs over the safety of others. 


The proof that more restrictions on gun use works to reduce gun violence and deaths, and that there are many other people who don't need a gun to bolster their own inner personal and sexual worth, are in the countries whose gun deaths are decidedly lower because their gun laws are much more strict: New Zealand, Australia, Norway, Japan, Canada, Israel, the UK, Switzerland, and Germany, to name only a few. In those countries, gun ownership is legal but it is not unlimited, either in type of gun, ease of acquisition, or license-free use. So the problem of an indiscriminate and unlicensed purchase, by anyone, is all but eliminated in those countries. 


I also agree with the argument that guns should be treated with at least the same caution and restrictive tests and laws as automobiles. In this country, you have to have a license to drive a car, and you have to pass a driving test (and in some states also a written test) to acquire the license. Case-closed almost right there. But guns obviously need more restrictions than cars because a gun is more destructive than an automobile. Though a car can become a lethal weapon depending on the driver, a car's intended function is clearly not to destroy; a gun's is, solely and unequivocally. Automobiles and guns are therefore a good comparison, because a car can become a lethal object and it is often a reflection of the personality and sexual posturing of the driver/owner. But the laws for obtaining and owning a gun should definitely be more restrictive than cars because cars cannot inflict anywhere near the same degree of mass carnage as can and do guns. 


So, to me, the solution for reducing the amount of mass shootings in this country, or anywhere, is definitely not easy, but it is clear and practical and in two parts: First: As with drug and alcohol addiction, honest awareness on the part of men and women that the phallic association and need with guns exists, which requires individual support and recovery. And second: To learn and adopt the same or similar legislation enacted in the many other countries where the gun laws have clearly worked to significantly reduce their respective deaths from guns. It would take immense courage on the part of many men (and their supportive women) to change the focus of bolstering their feelings of masculinity: from the destructive tool of a gun to their own beautiful and loving inner self-worth. And an even stronger sense of the worth of the safety and lives of others.   


Thank you all so much for taking the time to read. And love to all of you!

 


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