Thursday, January 31, 2013

Magical criminals and anarchy

Step 1: Someone shoots a lot of people.
Step 2: Someone else calls for gun restrictions.
Step 3: Someone else says "criminals don't follow laws."
Repeat endlessly

Given the prevalence of the third step, I am getting scared.  Criminals don't follow laws.  Ever.  In fact, any attempt to restrict their activities only harms us more.  Apparently criminals are magical beings who do not merely attempt to defy laws with varying degrees of success, but are in fact entirely immune to them.

Given that criminals are magical law-immune beings and therefore laws only affect law-abiding citizens, then it is clear that there should be no laws.  Consider this: if we restrict guns, then only criminals will have guns, and all criminals will have guns, because that's what they do: break every law.

But why stop there?  I'm worried about theft.  If someone robs my apartment, how can I get my stuff back?  The police will take too long to investigate.  Instead, I should find the person I think did it and take it back.  When you criminalize taking things without permission, only criminals will take things without permission.

While we're at it, get rid of laws on bribery, since all they do is hold back us non-bribing citizens.  Apply the same logic to all forms of corruption, but of course they'd not be corruption if they were legal and considered acceptable.

Alternatively, it might be that Step 3 was stupid and in fact, criminals are not magical.  It is possible that there are links between the legal and illegal markets.  It is possible that discouraging straw purchasing will reduce the supply of illegal guns.  It is possible that fewer legal guns will reduce the potential for stolen illegal guns.  It is possible that "enforcing the existing laws" could help, and it is possible that "enforcing the existing laws" is a blatantly deceptive false argument when delivered by the same people who do everything they can to prevent the enforcement of existing laws.

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