Somalia came up in the discussion this morning on TV. Someone said it was a country in chaos. That in its self is an intriguing thought . . . an entire country in chaos. As a person interested in evolutionary psychology, I believe that people do not like chaos in any form. Peck order, or some kind of hierarchy dominance, seems to be innate. It is found in a vicious pack of wolves as well as in groups of people. As geneticists might say, it seems to be a well “conserved” trait, meaning it is found across a wide spectrum of animal genera. What government does is establish a system of order. If an entire society is in disorder, it begs the question, why? If people hate chaos and government establishes order, the next question is what happened in Somalia to destroy the government? Is there truly chaos? I do not think so.
Social order is based on rules of conduct. In most societies, it seems there are two basic forms, secular and religious. In animal societies, it seems to be a matter of strength or a series of reinforcing physical ability related to millions of years of survival. Humanization, on the other hand, has tended toward laws (sins) to give the weak power equivalent to strength and finally to dominate strength. I cannot help but think in those terms when it comes to the current gun debate.
A 97 pound weakling with a snub nosed 38 (pistol) has strength. In fact, has more strength than a person schooled in the marshal arts. People tend to add what they perceive as strength to more strength. Look at Arnold Schwarzenegger: a mammoth man, with excessive muscle mass in one of his dramas holding a hideously large weapon. There are scores of people out there that admire him, fear him, and respect him—I am not one of them. He is an icon these people hope to emulate.
Go to a gun show and look at the people in line, yes, long lines since the killing of children in Connecticut, to buy guns exactly like or “bigger” than that killer used. Do they want to kill children? Of course not. By buying assault rifles, what they are saying is that they are joining an arms race. They (the killer of children and theatergoers, the would-be assassin of Congresswoman Gabby Gifford’s, the students of Virginia Tech.) had guns so everyone really needs larger guns. If they had 30 round clips, we need 100 round drum clips. They had regular bullets so we need armor piercing bullets. Russia had 1000 atomic bombs so we need 2000 bombs. Russia had an atomic bomb so we need a hydrogen bomb. No we don’t! It was all very expensive but rational; after all, we have to defend ourselves no matter the cost. Not only that, in terms of self-defense like anything else, to survive we have to be at the top of the pecking order. When everyone has guns, logic no longer applies nor do laws apply, only bestial mentality, far removed from IQ, aided with the strength of having a weapon applies. I am sure a careful examination of current Somalia society would reveal a person with a “big gun” at the head of each of numerous groups, each defending his or her own narrow interests. Those long lines of people buying guns scare me. The way you “stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun”; however, the point of this blog post is to suggest that when everyone has guns they are innately all bad guys. They all want to be “Top Gun.” Laws no longer matter. Somalia is a case in point.
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