No Justice, No Peace
Throughout the world there are individuals who feel victimized, who feel that there has been an injustice against them. In many areas of the world there’s no recourse for the individual, and this can magnify into hopelessness. With this hopelessness comes feelings of humiliation, frustration and anger. How individuals respond to their hopelessness often depends on their perspective, and that perspective is largely defined by the individual culture.
Whether we look towards Iraq, Afghanistan, Cuba or any other place in the world, we can see how individuals respond to their hopelessness when justice is not available to them. While this same hopelessness can be found within our own culture, particularly within the inner cities, there still remains a belief that an individual can seek and obtain justice.
Currently on Capitol Hill the US Senate is debating the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (S.397), which would provide gun manufacturers and gun dealers with sweeping immunity from lawsuits. Supporters of the gun liability bill claim the law would put a halt to “frivolous lawsuits” against gun manufactures, yet of the 10 million wrongful death/injury suits filed in US courts from 1993-2003, only 57 were against gun manufactures. Damages paid in gun suits each year is $441,800, excluding unreported confidential settlements.
This bill would not only provide the gun industry with unprecedented protections against individual claims, but it would ban state and federal authorities from filing suit as well. Police officers, federal agents, and citizens killed or injured would have no recourse against dealers or manufactures of guns no matter how libel they are.
In essence, supporters of this bill are saying that they don’t trust the law or the courts or the juries or the judicial process, therefore they will provide a shield from the law for gun dealers and gun manufactures. In seeking to appease the gun lobby, some lawmakers are willing to chip away at the individual right to seek legal recourse. It’s quite telling when lawmakers are willing to put the interests of the gun lobby ahead of the rights of the individual. Without the individual right to pursue justice in a court of law, the individual is left with hopelessness and becomes resentful of law itself. It then becomes only a matter of time before individuals take the law into their own hands.
July 29th, 2005 at 3:55 am
WTF is wrong with people?! Individual’s rights should come before the gun lobby. Grrr.
I think everyone has the right to protect themselves BUT there should be stricter policies where guns are concerned - major training before they can have one, and they should be held responsible for their gun and its uses.
Me personally - could never even touch a gun. Give me a nice baseball bat for intruders.
*HUGS* and Aloha Friday!