Stay Small<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My town, Pataskala, has a gun range. It is a popular place where folks can shoot, buy weapons, and socialize. Guns are a reason they get together, discussing, evaluating, and comparing. It\u2019s become a very successful business here in town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The range has been around for a few years, but this year they opened an outdoor shooting area. It\u2019s two miles from my house, and I don\u2019t really think we hear them on Sunday afternoons, though we occasionally hear shots. There\u2019s enough farm fields and woods nearby, the sound may be coming from there. But there are folks who live much closer to the range, and one of them had the temerity to complain about the noise on Facebook.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The town rose en masse to defend the range. There were over eight hundred comments, with very few defending the complainant. And, unfortunately, many seemed to personally attack the person who spoke out against hearing gunshots half a mile away. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201c\u2026you\u2019re not a man if you don\u2019t own a gun\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That was one of the comments on the post. Here in Ohio, some young men in their twenties and thirties, walk around openly carrying pistols on their belts, even at kids birthday parties. During the Renaissance, nobles wore a \u201ccodpiece\u201d as part of their apparel. The codpiece was an article of clothing worn over the groin of various shapes and sizes, implying, the size of the male equipment underneath. To some today, the openly carried pistol seems to serve that same purpose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But to others it is a sign of the fear that permeates many in our time. Fear of the unknown: of crime in the city, usually associated with people \u201cdifferent\u201d than them, and with the threat of \u201cbrown people\u201d from the border, or as columnist Mike Barnacle puts it, \u201c\u2026fear of the other.\u201d Many are afraid of \u201cthe other\u201d who will come to hurt them or steal from them, and that \u201ccodpiece\u201d on their belt is a visual demonstration of that fear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fear of the government coming to take something away: that\u2019s why some claim to need military type weapons. That’s for some, but not all. Many want assault weapons not for protection or defense, but because they are fun to fire. And that\u2019s another part of the problem: there is a distinction between fear that demands a loaded weapon always close at hand, and firing weapons for fun and socializing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Perhaps the mass reaction wasn\u2019t about the range, or the guns, but about the fear. We live in an era where fear is \u201cpurveyed;\u201d sold on television, by politicians, and in our social media. The old newsroom saw, \u201cif it bleeds, it leads,\u201d has been around for a century, but today it seems even more prevalent. On the Fox News webpage this morning: murder in the Caribbean, bridge collapse, police kicked and kneed, eagles poisoned, Obama feels like mobster, Everest covered in bodies and trash, child abuser found hanged in cell, hospital drops newborn; that\u2019s the scary and disturbing list of headlines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We are being told to be afraid. And we are being told to \u201cStay Small;\u201d to keep a low profile, not stand up, not put yourself \u201cout\u201d in the world. Maybe that started after 9-11, when we all worried about where the next terror attack might be. The caution still is apparent: metal detectors to go the hockey game or Broadway plays, lockdown drills in schools, armed guards in the malls and at the games. These are very real symbols of fear, symbols that keep people trapped in their familiar communities, afraid to \u201cventure\u201d into the city or the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The person complaining about noise at the gun range, wasn\u2019t demanding that the Second Amendment be repealed. She wasn\u2019t inviting a political discussion, nor was she asking for more than just a cessation of disturbing noise from a neighbor. But it tapped into a wellspring of fear in the community; and challenged a lot of folks at a very core level. It challenged the way they dealt with fear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Don’t get in between people and their guns. They need to \u201cStay Small\u201d: not allow themselves to become a target, nor get in unfamiliar places or positions. And if they have to go there, then bring a gun to balance the scales.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"