, but I love this line:<\/a>\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re pretending we\u2019re having a debate about gun control but we\u2019re really having a debate about the nature of evil and whether big enough government can control it.\u201d<\/p>\nCan we talk?\u00a0 I mean talk honestly, about the difference between gun violence in Las Vegas versus Chicago?\u00a0 Here\u2019s the difference: it\u2019s all about risk.<\/p>\n
Everybody knows there are certain neighborhoods in Chicago where shootings occur.\u00a0 People who can afford to avoid those neighborhoods employ a risk-avoidance strategy of private red-lining.\u00a0 We don\u2019t go into bad neighborhoods, especially not at night.\u00a0 We live elsewhere, shop elsewhere, send our kids to school elsewhere. \u00a0As long as ghetto thugs stay home to kill each other, we don\u2019t care.\u00a0 That\u2019s why statistics on violent crime in Chicago leave us unmoved. It\u2019s NIMBY-ism, pure and simple.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Las Vegas was different.\u00a0 The victims didn\u2019t take the risk of gun violence by going into a bad neighborhood, the concert-goers stayed in a decent neighborhood with plenty of security.\u00a0 That\u2019s what causes the outrage \u2013 this should have been a safe place to be.\u00a0 Think back to other mass shootings: school, movie theatre, night club, Christmas party, military base, softball field.\u00a0 We followed the rules, we stayed within the lines, we should have been safe but we weren\u2019t.\u00a0 We\u2019re angry because we\u2019ve been cheated.<\/p>\n
Can government prevent cheating?\u00a0 Can government eliminate risk?\u00a0 How big, how intrusive, how domineering must government become to have the power to keep everyone perfectly safe at all times? \u00a0Is it even possible?\u00a0 If not, what\u2019s the alternative? \u00a0How much risk do we live with and what are the appropriate private risk-avoidance strategies?\u00a0 That\u2019s what we\u2019re really discussing.\u00a0 If we\u2019re honest about it.<\/p>\n
Joe Doakes<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The difference between expectations and reality is behind a lot of outrage in many areas – this foremost among them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Joe Doakes from Como Park emails: Column by Andrew Klaven, whom I do not normally read, but I love this line:\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re pretending we\u2019re having a debate about gun control but we\u2019re really having a debate about the nature of evil and whether big enough government can control it.\u201d Can we talk?\u00a0 I mean talk […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-64768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crime-and-punishment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64768","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=64768"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64768\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":64769,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64768\/revisions\/64769"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=64768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=64768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=64768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}