Unforeseen Contingencies

Memo to the young survivors of the Florida high school murder rampage who are now calling for gun control.  Your victimhood does not give you wisdom, insight, or authority.  I am against gun control, and since one of you have framed it this way and you accept it by your silence, I'm against you.

Progressives have adopted the notion that victimhood gives one special status.  As progressives see it, victims need "to be given voice," that is, we are to listen uncritically to whatever they say.  I reject that.  No one should suspend their critical faculties, for any one or any reason, ever.  We should always ask, of any statement, "is it true?"  Statements from victims of wrongdoing are no exception.  In this specific case, the fact that a repellent murderous thug, who should long ago have been hunted down and removed from society, failed at murdering some people, does not suddenly bestow on them special understanding of what my rights should be, nor how to prevent similar murder attempts in the future, nor anything else.

Unfortunately, modern progressives have adopted this nonsense.  I oppose all forms of progressivism, but it's hard to imagine older progressives, e.g. Teddy Roosevelt or Woodrow Wilson or Franklin Roosevelt, espousing this nonsense.  Modern progressives have allied themselves with the New Left.  The New Left -- the Frankfurt School and other post-modernists -- confronted with the "problem" that capitalism actually makes everyone better off, had to find new grounds to justify the revolution. Hence the focus on racism, sexism, fascism, cisnormalism, able-ism, patriarchy-ism, etcism.  Since the "proletariat" is actually liberated and uplifted by capitalism, the New Left needed new grounds for revolution, and new categories for victims.  This is all a strategy for the New Left.  It's revealed religion for progressives.

The late historian and progressive Tony Judt argued that the one thing progressivism still has to offer is fear.  He was right.  Progressivism is a losing philosophy -- it is intellectually bankrupt.  It claims to be able to push us towards utopia, but we've seen progressive policies fail, one after another...New Deal, Great Society, Obamacare are obvious examples, but there are many others.  It's little wonder that those with a penchant for progressivism move towards the left.  The alternative would be admitting one was wrong and abandoning progressivism. Both the New Left and progressivism now promote emotion over reason.  Hence the imaginary authority victimhood bestows on one, in leftist eyes.

It's bunk.

If readers thought this post might delve into details of AR-15s and gun control, that's already been covered here.  See this and this.  If you want a quick version of my opinion, read the words of Mike Vanderboegh above.
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Note: For those who can't be bothered to read carefully, the memo is specifically to advocates of gun control, not to victims in general.  And it is about their advocacy of terrible policies, not their status as victims.  I always am sympathetic to victims of crime, all of them.  Sympathy for their victimhood is not the same as bestowing authority on those who espouse bad ideas.

I realize this is hard to understand for muddleheads who suppose emotions should trump all else... but try to follow the distinction.