Never Again, Probably

Andrew Rothman – firearms instructor and blogger – awrote last Friday, in the wake of the Holocaust Museum shootings and, as it happens, on what would have been Ann Frank’s 80th birthday:

“Never Again” is not a prayer.

On Facebook [last Friday], I noted that today would have been Anne Frank‘s 80th birthday, and closed with “Never Again.”

A Jewish friend sent me a message, saying I was too optimistic.

I’ve often wondered how American Jews can mix endemic (and justifiable) pessimism about anti-Semitic persecution with their reflexive support of the American left, which not only roils with anti-semitism, but – more importantly – has such a breezy, pollyannaish worldview about dictatorships and tyranny?

Rothman:

It’s not optimism.  When I say “never again,” it’s not a prayer — it’s a warning.

European Jews had a shtetl mentality.1 Unfortunately, a lot of American Jews do, too. Israeli Jews, largely, don’t.

And neither do I. If they should come with the cattle cars, they won’t find all sheep: there will be some sheepdogs2 in the herd. Fuzzy and gentle, like sheep, but with teeth and claws, too, and the willingness to use them.

It’s scant accident that “gun control” laws in Israel – a state founded on making the prayer a warning – are “liberal” enough to make a Wyoming libertarian nod with approval.  And some of my best friends in the firearms rights movement – Rothman and Joel Rosenberg, among others – are Jews who bring a certain historical awareness to their “gun nut-ism”:

Read about the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.3 That’s what a small group of utterly unprepared Jews did. Well, we aim to be better prepared, which may go a long way to prevent the next time from even happening.

And yet so many American Jewish liberals are on the other side.

“You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a man with a rifle behind every blade of grass.” – [a fully accurate  statement which is, nonetheless, often falsely attributed to] Isoroku Yamamoto, Japanese Admiral Do you know why the Japanese never invaded the U.S. mainland during World War II? As admiral Yamamoto famously said “You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a man with a rifle behind every blade of grass.”

Well, the same goes for the Buford Furrows, the James von Brunns, and the Mahmoud Ahmadinejads of the world. Don’t try it — there’ll be an armed Jew behind at least some of those blades of grass, and we won’t come quietly again.

Happy Birthday, Anne. Never again.

It’s a prayer, and a warning…

…and in places like California, where Buford Furrow was able to slaughter disarmed Jews with impunity, a “to-do” and a plea.

23 thoughts on “Never Again, Probably

  1. Yeah, that’s the same thing. Only if you’re an Israeli Jew, it’s like living in Vermont and the residents of New York, New Hampshire and Massachusetts are sworn to your destruction and have tried to annihilate your country in the past. And the Canadians randomly lob shells into the northern part of the state just to make things interesting. So maybe there’s a reason Israeli Jews and American Jews could rationally have different views on gun control. Ya think?

  2. angryclown said:

    “So maybe there’s a reason Israeli Jews and American Jews could rationally have different views on gun control. Ya think?”

    Do “ya think” that’s the smart thing to do, given some historical perspective? Yes, you probably do.

  3. Where “takes history seriously” = “opposes gun control” no doubt, eh? Cause believe it or not, Angryclown has met one or two Jews in his time in New York. And some of them actually have the temerity to disagree with you.

  4. Angryclown has met one or two Jews in his time in New York. And some of them actually have the temerity to disagree with you.

    Just as people have the G-d-given right to self defense, they have the G-d-given right to be wrong.

    It’s not quite as pro-survival, granted, but each must decide how to shape his own destiny.

  5. The father of one of my Jewish friends once said, shortly before he died:

    “Any Jew who supports gun control is p—–g on 6 million graves.”

    He was right. If there is any group of people with a historical understanding of what happens when government holds all the cards, it is the Jewish people who suffered under the Nazi’s.

    That any of their children actually go along with the insane policy of disarming their brethren, is simply an abomination.

  6. I can tell you’re a religious man, Andrew Rothman.

    “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy Glock and thy AK-74 they comfort me.

  7. I can tell you’re a religious man, Andrew Rothman.

    “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy Glock and thy AK-74 they comfort me.

    Not really, but that doesn’t matter. Nearly every religious and legal tradition has recognized the fundamental right of self defense, from the Bible and the Talmud to the Code of Hammurabi to the Dalai Lama to Ghandi to a little document we call the Constitution of the United States.

  8. Once again Mitch passes off BS as history. Yamamoto never said that quote:

    http://wire.factcheck.org/2009/05/11/misquoting-yamamoto/
    “this quote is unsubstantiated and almost certainly bogus, even though it has been repeated thousands of times in various Internet postings. There is no record of the commander in chief of Japan’s wartime fleet ever saying it.”

  9. DickyDFL misses the point once again. Threadjack.

    Yamamoto spoke English? Without an accent? Are you sure?

  10. And once again Rick goes off on a mindless tangent, and takes it up with the wrong guy to boot.

    Since Yamamoto’s or whomever’s quote is utterly immaterial to the story, really, who cares?

  11. Mitch:
    “really, who cares”

    a. You should always care about the truth. b. You seem to care enough to avoid admitting it is fake. The quote is not “Yamamoto’s or whomever’s”, it a made up whole cloth.

  12. You should always care about the truth

    Right. Gun control plays into the hands of anti-semites and tyrants.

    That is the truth we’re looking for, here.

  13. Yup. It turns out that the Yamamoto quote is apocryphal. I thought it was real when I used it. Whoops.

    So, if it helps, replace it in your mind with the dozen or so times in the last 100 years that civilian disarmament preceded genocide.

  14. “the dozen or so times in the last 100 years that civilian disarmament preceded genocide.”

    What times were those? If there an example of a large minority with a high level of civilian gun ownership, that was first disarmed and then exterminated?

  15. Do some homework, DickyDFL. Find at least one instance when civilians were disarmed and that the action preceded a mass slaughter of citizens.

    Nothing comes to mind? Really? Never happened? Hmmmm.

    Why am I now reminded of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?

  16. RickDFL said:

    “What times were those? If there an example of a large minority with a high level of civilian gun ownership, that was first disarmed and then exterminated?”

    Do you really think being oh-so-specific about the example you want will win the day for you? A non-“large” minority with a non-“high” level of civilian gun ownership would not prove the point? Are you eleven?

  17. Mitch:
    That chart is really pathetic. You really think the Cambodian genocide can be traced to a 1938 ordinance? You think the Rwandan Decree-Law No. 12, 1979 kept the Tutsis disarmed?

    For starters is not clear that any of the gun control laws were effective or reduced the level of gun ownership.

    The inclusion of deaths in the Chinese civil war 1929-1945 is just bizarre. The country was awash in weapons which all sides used to kill each other and civilians. Any civilian who wanted a gun could easily have found an army to supply one.

  18. Mitch said: “Right. Gun control plays into the hands of anti-semites and tyrants.”

    You don’t think it would be more persuasive to write:

    “Gun control plays into the hands of anti-semites and tyrants.” – Albert Einstein

    or

    “Gun control plays into the hands of anti-semites and tyrants.” – Martin Luther King

    Cause who looks that stuff up anyway?

  19. RickDFL said:

    “For starters is not clear that any of the gun control laws were effective or reduced the level of gun ownership.”

    So let’s spend time trying prove in each instance that the gun control laws implemented were effective? So you assume they were all ineffective? Wow! That’s pretty hair brained, even for you RickDFL. Please prove your “point” that the laws were ineffective, Captain “Let’s Do Science”.

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