We are addicted to conflict and confrontation

The recent Supreme Court rulings and other court cases bring up an interesting dynamic that seems to be misunderstood and unrepresented in the way citizens argue about the future of their country. This dynamic is the systemic oppositional argument process that is so fundamental to Western rule of law and to the founding of our government.

What I mean by this is the principle that a person stands up for a “side” or set of beliefs, with the rigorous attempts to both strengthen that position, but for making of that position dominant or “the winner” in any/every argument. From the back porch discussions, to court rooms, to Congress, the principle implies these things:

1. There are two sides to every issue. This is restrictive to ONLY two sides as well as creating the principle that if my opponent supports it, I must oppose it. In this way, we generate a second side when we would ordinarily be in agreement.
2. We must set ourselves up as opponents. This has to do with our love affair with competition, but the belief is that we are able to challenge and inspire each other to do better.
3. We must see the opponent as an enemy. We are not allowed to trust our opponents, nor should we in anyway help their position. Even though the spirit of challenging and inspiring encourages our opposition, we develop hatred for those very opponents, as their beliefs mean the downfall of all that we hold dear.
4. Many arguments are intellectually or experientially appealing but statistically inaccurate—often dramatically so. My favorite examples of this are quite common knowledge and yet not factored into our decisions. Over 60% of homeowners killed in home-entries are killed with their own gun: this runs counter the self-defense position. Another is the abstinence-only position of sex education. It is based on the argument that if you teach children to not have sex then bad things won’t happen, but the opposite is true: there is clear evidence of increased sexual behavior, broadening of sexual expression, decreased use of contraception, and increased pregnancy and STDs.
5. And many others that I haven’t thought of.

But this sense of oppositional argument creates strange political hay as opposition to war policy means to some that you hate the United States or the more vague because terrorists chose to commit murder in the U.S., then it means that “terrorists hate our freedom”.

More difficult to discect, however, is the place that this process has in our judicial system. The fundamental principle is that the state is in the process of prosecuting those they deem as offending or breaking the rule of law. Defense attorneys are hired or appointed to not only protect the rights of the defendant, but to attempt with all of his/her might to limit the criminal repurcussions or prove the innocence of his/her client without regard to actual circumstances.

Personally, I am in awe of this system and would defend it to my dying day. The problem isn’t this process, but public ignorance of the basic elements of this process. We argue about crime and legal matters from the gut level or intellectualize the ramifications of each decision without recognizing the fact that there is no position of neutral independence in the process outside of the judge and jury—whose jobs are not the crafting of arguments (outside of state and federal courts charged with providing a legal opinion).

Let’s take the recent gun argument, for example. Discussions about 2^nd Amendment naturally gravitate toward traditional positions of ‘gun control’ and ‘gun rights’: personal defense, (seemingly inalienable) ownership rights, crime, sport, and the granddaddy of them all: personal experience. If I start talking about this ruling opening up gun rights in not only an unprecedented way, but in a way that is both counterintuitive toward both historical opinion and current opinion, someone will invariable be “forced” into telling me about the ineffectiveness of gun control laws, that guns are used for protection, and that it isn’t an ownership thing but an education and safety issue, etc.. In fact, I think all NRA members have the talking points memorized. We can’t have an honest discussion, nor can we communicate what happens tomorrow because of today’s decision.

What happens when the historic position and the current/future reality both negate the current understanding and judicial position? What happens when we no longer want citizen militias to be ready to overthrow a tyrannical government? What happens when our nation is too heavily populated for a ‘Wild West’ view of gun ownership? What happens when the majority of our citizens live in urban centers that cannot afford violent altercations in the streets, in public places, or even homes (which are more likely to include condos, subdivisions, apartment complexes, and lofts above businesses—in other words, more heavily crowded areas than wilderness and towns)? The original intention of the 2^nd Amendment and the future reality are antithetical to the modern interpretation of the 2^nd Amendment—especially in such broad preference toward the freedom to own a gun and the rising movement to give greater freedom in using guns. Legal opinions that don’t take the environment into consideration are just academic arguments with no place.

But then again, we don’t really want to think about the complexities of issues that are matters of life and death—the simple, traditional short cuts make for easier arguments.