Once upon a time, as an American Patriot set off for market, he asked each of his three daughters what she would like as a present on his return. The first daughter wanted a brocade dress, the second a pearl necklace, but the third, whose name was Beauty, the youngest, prettiest and sweetest of them all, said to her father:
“All I’d like is a gun for self-defense!”
When the Patriot had finished exploiting the free market, he set off for home. However, a sudden storm blew up and progress was slow. Cold and weary, the Patriot lost all hope of reaching an inn when he suddenly noticed a bright light shining in the middle of a wood. As he drew near, he saw that it was a castle. He drew his gun.
His weapon, an AMT Automag II, made him feel safe and powerful.
When the Patriot reached the door, he saw it was open, but though he shouted, nobody came to greet him. Taking the safety off his weapon, he went inside. Wary of an ambush while calibrating his optimal kill zone and putting on his night-vision goggles,
he called out, hoping to flush his target from hiding.
Nothing.
As he continued his room-to-room search, he came upon a great hall where a splendid dinner lay served. The Patriot shouted for the owner of the castle, but no one came, so he sat down to a hearty meal.
Exploring his new surroundings, the Patriot ventured upstairs where the corridor led into magnificent rooms and halls. A fire crackled in the first room and a soft bed looked very inviting, so the Patriot lay down, carefully put the safety on his weapon, placed it beneath his pillow, and fell asleep. When he woke next morning, a mug of steaming coffee and some fruit were by his bedside.
The Patriot had breakfast and went downstairs to have a look around when he saw a beautiful, unlocked gun collection. Remembering his promise to Beauty, he reached in to the display case to pick out a great semi-automatic he thought would be appropriate for his favourite daughter. Instantly, a horrible beast wearing splendid clothes appeared from out of nowhere. Two bloodshot eyes, gleaming angrily, glared at him and a deep and a terrifying voice growled: “Ungrateful man! I gave you shelter, you ate at my table and slept in my own bed, but now all the thanks I get is the theft of my favourite semi-autmatic! I shall put you to death for this slight!”
These were the last words the beast ever uttered.
Blam!!
Blam!!
Blam!!
Blam!!
Blam!!
Blam!!
The Patriot, shooting in a controlled manner and ever conscious of maintaining a tight kill circle on the beast’s chest, emptied his entire clip into it, killing him on the spot. Any man or beast careless enough to leave a gun collection unlocked deserved whatever he got! The Patriot, knowing that 9/10th’s of the law is possession, moved his family into the grand castle and enjoying the high ground and excellent site lines from the turrets, lived happily ever after, sparing his daughter, through savvy gun ownership, of ever having a relationship with the beast.
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It’s a bad movie, a very bad movie, and bad in a way that only a movie made in 1985 can be bad. If you’ll recall, Rocky ends up in Russia to fight Ivan Drago, the invincible Soviet super villain played by Dolph Lundgren.
Various dramatic things happen and Rocky wins, as he does pretty much every second movie. What’s striking about it, beyond how awful, cliched and child-like it is, is how vivid and oppressive the American propaganda is.
America has never been particularly subtle about propaganda, and this movie is no exception. It’s an Us Vs. Them proposition, the Soviets are all passionless robots and functionaries living under a cruel and despotic regime, and the Americans, well, they have heart, man, they’re real!
About five years after this movie was made the Soviet Union collapsed beneath it’s own rotting weight. This meant that The Cold War was over, and once again all that was good and free and just and true had won. However Operation Desert Storm, in which the US invaded Iraq, immediately commenced, and ever since, the Middle East (in one form or another) has been the enemy of the West.
After seeing Rocky IV, it struck me that America was always at war, it was as if they HAD to be at war, as if it was a necessary and functioning part of the system. “The Military Industrial Complex,” as it is conspiratorially called, is a huge business in the US, accounting for hundreds of billions dollars. It is a primary economic driver, one from which so much else flows, and it surely looks like it now exists as an essential part of the economy than some subordinate wing of government used to defend abstract principles like justice.
Recently, on December the 2nd there was another mass shooting in the United States, this time in San Bernardino. It was the 355th of the year.
As the news broke, politicians assigned some assistant take to their Twitter accounts and Tweet out their feelings. The event, immediately politicized, had one flavour of politician crying out for gun control, while the other flavour of politician offered “thoughts and prayers.” It turns out that the “thoughts and prayer” crowd had all accepted donations from the NRA.
Granted, this is no scientific study, but it seems to confirm something that we already knew.
On the face of it, the NRA and the on-going weapon crisis is utterly mysterious. Why only in America? Why haven’t they done anything to try to solve this problem? I mean, from 2004 to 2013, there were 316,000 firearm deaths in the US set against 313 deaths from terrorism, but the resources are where?
In the US, politicians and thus policy, are bought.
That’s the way the system works.
War, be it with the Communists or the Terrorists, is very profitable, as is the production and sale of guns. It’s the sort of thing that should actually be put in the Constitution, just so everybody is clear about profit, rather than freedom, being the guiding light of the nation.
Until the anti-gun lobby starts to give representatives money commiserate with what the NRA does, then we are going to have to expect these trends, and all these deaths, to continue.
