Reverend Greg

A mystic present for you.

namaste

gachiriki

I read some time ago of the attitudes, in this case of Chinese immigrants, toward government by new Americans. They feel the government is right and that therefore there is no need to ever disagree with government, let alone have a need to ever rebel against the government, something our Founding Fathers wrote extensively about.

One cannot extrapolate from the Japanese experience to the American situation. One might not be inaccurate to suggest that the lower violent crime levels in Japan are totally unrelated to their firearms laws. David Kopel, author of the article, has demonstrated, as has award winning sociologist Marvin Harris before him, that the people who tend to own the firearms en bloc in America, middle-aged, middle-class, Majority types have levels of violent crime similar to those of Japanese in Japan or Englishmen in England. One could only replicate the guns vs no guns theory if the demographics of both lands were the same.

For myself I feel the Dalai Lama, albeit not the type of Buddhism I practice, still makes very good sense here:

"If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you, it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun."
The Dalai Lama, speaking at the "Educating Heart Summit" in Portland, Oregon, when asked by a girl how to react when a shooter takes aim at a classmate.
(May 15, 2001, The Seattle Times)

Hi, Greg - thanks for this link. Over the past few months, I have become very interested in the contrasts between Japanese and American culture. This information helps "flesh out" my other reading. I think it's interesting that the Japanese voluntarily cooperate with gun control -that would never happen in Texas.

Talk to you later, Byrd in LA