America Under the Gun
There's a song that's been running through my head for the last month or so. It is a song by the rock group Extreme from their 1992 album, III Sides to Every Story. The song, titled "Peacemaker Die," makes its satirical point very clear with a few lyrics:
Blessed are the warmongers/For they shall be called/Sons of God
Don't turn your back on me/Cause I'm the one with the gun
There are a lot of reasons why these lyrics, this song, has dug itself out of my CD collection and into almost plain view. The first trigger was the nomination, or, rather, the reaction to former President Jimmy Carter winning the Nobel Peace Prize. It is no secret that American political culture places very little value in words like "diplomacy" or "peace" in our own foreign policy (ironically, though, when "advising" or allies we can't seem to use these words fast enough). This is despite the fact that true military sense has come from not only having a strong armed force to wield at any time, but believing that using it as the first solution, the only solution, every time out of the gate is idiocy of Forrest Gump proportions. The Cuban Missile Crisis was defused precisely because we didn't bomb Cuba (the commanders of the operational Russian missile batteries were under orders to launch- with no confirmation needed from Moscow- in the event such an attack took place). The Vietnam War was lost because we didn't fight a defensive war and safeguard South Vietnamese hamlets which were under constant terrorist attack from the VC. Why not? Because General Westmoreland, the original commander of American forces in Vietnam, didn't feel that there was much honor in that kind of fight. Yet when Carter won the Peace Prize a kind of pure-white hate was generated on the American Right against a man who has spent his retiring years brokering peace agreements and building homes for the homeless. His supposed crime? The fact that he is an advocate of peace has branded him an "appeaser" and there have been no shortages of comparisons to Neville Chamberlain and the Munich Agreement (and in this case appeasement wasn't really appeasement- is it possible that he helped sign away a part of a Slavic nation to Germany in order to ruffle the Soviet Union's feathers and get Hitler and Stalin to turn on each other? More than possible- Chamberlain's disdain for Hitler was matched by his hate for Stalin and Communism).
The second reason for my sudden trip back down Musical Lane is the release of Michael Moore's documentary, Bowling for Columbine. The title refers to the 6 AM class that Columbine High shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold were last seen at before they began their vicious rampage on April 20, 1999. Moore is one of the more provocative liberal voices in the United States and his major drawback is that he is a talented rabble rouser. His topic-of-the-month attacks are, if nothing else, entertaining- however because of his showman-style and in-your-face form of guerrilla docu-making he holds little credibility to audiences not sitting in the "converted" section. It is no surprise that many critics have, at the same time, applauded Bowling for Columbine but have expressed wishes that the very same points could be extended by a filmmaker with less personal exposure.
Bowling, surprisingly, doesn't go after the guns. Moore argues that lax gun control laws are only part of the problem (but, of course, persistent efforts by the NRA to block any kind of control don't help matters). The problem is deeper than violent movies and video games. The problem is deeper than Marilyn Manson, who, incidentally, canceled a Denver appearance after the Columbine massacre out of respect for the victims, while NRA chief Charlton Heston did not. Is the problem the lack of prayer in schools? You've got to be kidding.
Moore confesses that he has no answers- only hints that the reason the United States has a murder rate over 10 times higher than any other industrialized nation is embedded in the American culture. It is an exploration that made me think about Jimmy Carter and Extreme all over again. Popularly, violence in American society is seen as an outside-coming-in phenomenon. It is sprung from ideas planted by music, television, and the media and becomes horrific reality in the hands of unstable Americans. But the question this raises is where I separate from Moore's tract and go back to where I started: what if the problem is actually the exact opposite? Pointing out the glorifications of violence and apathy in song lyrics is easy. But what if we are, as we denounce these values in the media, are embracing them and spreading them in our "real world" society?
In one scene in Bowling Moore interviews a representative of Lockheed-Martin; a major employer in the suburbs of Denver, including Littleton. Moore makes a strained connection between Lockheed's building of weapons to be used indiscriminately and the indiscriminant violence Harris and Klebold showered on Columbine. Before I continue, I have to answer a charge made by many of Moore's critics that his tactics and questions are designed to trick subjects and portray them as idiots. Actually, for most of Bowling the questions Moore puts forward are either benign or reasonable- but it is the subject's short-sighted answers that get them in trouble. But I digress. The representative dismisses Moore's notion and says that the United States doesn't suddenly "get mad and start dropping bombs on people." Now consider this: compare who we are really holding up as a role model in this country. A former President, known world-wide for his humanitarian works, works that, within his own country, have made him Public Enemy No. 1, or a sitting President with no diplomatic skills, no military savvy, who is getting ready to commence a war for reasons that he refuses to make clear to the American public. Personally, I think that people who think that we could do worse with Marilyn Manson need to leave the room.
Moore argues that ever since September 11th, Americans who have already been driven into a panic by countless stories of rapes and murders on the news, became even more scared. I only agree with him in part- I think the more appropriate term would be hateful. And I'm not talking about hate applied to those with dark skin, Arabic names, or who study Islam. I'm talking about hate towards an entire important, necessary, political and social thought. It is no revelation that conservative administrations place far greater emphasis on diplomatic saber rattling and military spending and less money on American social evolution (Eisenhower was probably the only exception- being Supreme Allied Commander in Europe during World War II he knew that war was much more than a reelection stunt- a lesson that future presidents would have benefited from learning). Yet in the last year the fever has grown so intense that the pundits on the American Right have gone from branding other concerns (such as the flap over the economy) not as unimportant, but almost treasonous to bring up. How can you dare talk about improving public education when we are fighting a War on Terror? Don't you realize trying to solve the homeless problem is only letting the terrorists win? Government programs which, five years ago, could only be called benignly progressive are being slapped with that NC-17 equivalent rating of "socialist" by ultra-conservatives who want to roll back the clock to an America that never existed (or, if it did, should never be allowed to exist again). The United States may be the world's cultural, technological, and industrial leader, but we are fast becoming the most socially backwards nation on the face of the planet. The legacy of the Bush administration's foreign policy has not been the War on Terror, but the insistence that we turn our back on as many international agreements as possible, including the Kyoto Accords (and then, ironically, Bush would have no qualms about shaking his finger at the rest of the world and admonish them for not being "team players" regarding Iraq). We are one of few, if not the only, industrialized nation to not only reject the idea of universal health care but to reject it with deafening spite. The current social philosophy, that Americans should grab whatever they can, forget about their own fellow citizens, and take it all with any means necessary, isn't happening under our noses. It is accepted and is being promoted as the "American way" more and more. It if funny that the people who are doing this are, mostly, the same who screeched at the phrase "under God" being removed from the Pledge of Allegiance. I guess they don't have a problem with throwing out the "One nation" part of it, though.
The epidemic of gun violence is a symptom of this moral sickness- and our gun culture, some argue, is contributing to it. However, this gun culture is built on a foundation of sand. Most of the values that we associate with guns today- to protect our freedom from tyrants, to protect ourselves from the harsh world around us, were actually inspired by the advertising of Samuel Colt after he introduced his revolver in the 1830s. Before this time, private gun ownership was a rare bird. Members of militias, as stated in the 2nd Amendment, did bear arms and keep them in their homes, but the crucial difference was that these weapons were considered property of the state militia and could be collected at any time. In Bowling, Moore interviews James Nichols, brother of Oklahoma City co-conspirator Terry Nichols. James declares his ownership of guns (and his construction of bombs) an absolute right which he defends as both a patriot and a student of history. Yet when Moore explains the real history and background of the 2nd Amendment James is thunderstruck and replies, "I didn't know that."
The final segment of the film- the talked-about interview with NRA president Charlton Heston- shows the inherent contradictions (or downright falsifications) of the fanatical, all-or-nothing approach that some fringe groups take in regards to gun violence. First, Heston argues that he keeps guns for protection, an idiotic claim given that he lives in a secured compound in one of the most fortified regions of California. When Moore calls him on this, Heston backtracks and says that he keeps his guns simply because the 2nd Amendment says he can and if "it was good enough for those dead white guys, it is good enough for me." Moore then asks Heston about his views on why American culture is so violent- to which Heston's reply is "mixed ethnicities." Moore, in shock, restates Heston's answer as a confirming question, but Heston changes gears again and says, no, it has nothing to do with ethnicities. In a very quick session, Heston has shown us that he has no reason to stand on- and if he did, it would be indefensible.
In his book, In the Shadow of War, Michael Sherry notes this epidemic. America, simply, is a nation obsessed with violence and war. We place everything we do in the context of annihilating an enemy. Business strategies are built around action words like "operations" and "missions." Sun Tzu's The Art of War has become required reading for many MBAs. Even in our domestic agenda such references can be found. The war on drugs. We have even declared war on poverty.
What Bowling for Columbine does well is show how anyone who is grasping at guns, Marilyn Manson, or Quentin Tarantino as the breeding source of our violence is committing an Empire Building-sized feat of self-delusion. The problem, in my opinion, is one much more inherent to our identities as Americans. It is frightening, though, that this is a characteristic we seem to be in no real hurry to change. In fact, we've begun to embrace it like a long, lost uncle.
As far as the film Bowling for Columbine itself, I call it about 1/3 deft and insightful, 1/3 propagandistic, and 1/3 silly but savagely entertaining. I give it an A-