Rifles, Knives, and Broken Minds

Recently, I learned of a medical student who watched decapitation videos posted online by evil religious extremists, to help him develop a detachment, so that he might be able to provide better care for his future patients. I was asked by a mutual friend, what I felt when I saw those videos. Was I squeamish? Not having seen these videos in a long time, I reluctantly decided to watch them again, to remind myself of my feelings.

Initially, I felt a cold, scientific detachment. In one video, I watched a broken body make loud, wheezing sounds as it tried instinctively to deliver oxygen to a partially connected brain. The respiratory and cardiovascular connections between brain and body were severed. The body fought to survive, but could not, with that kind of damage. The brain commanded the throat muscles and diaphragm to force air into the lungs, but the brain would not get that oxygen.

As an engineer, I saw a control system go open loop with a complete loss of feedback. Control systems don’t often work well in this mode.

As a civilized and respectful human being, I started to become angry. Very angry.

I intentionally didn’t name the videos out of respect for the families involved. For me, this isn’t about violent videos. This is about evil men, with guns and knives and broken minds that feel free to do what they want, where they want, and to whom they want, because they have guns and knives and broken minds.

I grew angry because the innocents were restrained and, no doubt, feeling a fear few of us will ever feel. I grew angry because there is nothing special about the guns and knives these monsters used to control the victims, in fact many can be purchased for a couple hundred dollars. My guns and knives are just as powerful, maybe more so. My constant training makes them even more dangerous. Why then were these innocent people so easily overtaken? Why were they unable to defend themselves?

I find it incredulous that there are more evil men than good men. It’s easier for me to believe that maybe the evil men trained to use their weapons and the innocents had not, assuming the innocents even had equal or more powerful weapons with which to defend themselves when they were captured. I recognize that even our highly skilled Marines are sometimes overpowered. Shit happens. Still, the man, whose broken body fought hard to survive while being beheaded, was lying in a field along with a dozen or more who also met his fate. I only saw one evil man with a rifle, maybe two, if you include the cameraman.

What if all those innocent men were armed and highly trained in the use of their weapons? Could they have repelled a half dozen evil men with rifles, knives, and broken minds before they were all forced to the ground and shot in the head?

I am so angry because there are leaders in my beloved country who want to take away my right to defend myself. While I believe it is sometimes necessary to fight evil with evil, many deluded liberal extremists want to address the problem of evil by delivering empty speeches with words like “We offer our prayers for the victims and families of this act of senseless violence.” How do hollow words empower us to prevent atrocities from occurring again? Shouldn’t our collective goal be to control evil so that we can pursue life, liberty, and happiness?

Even more useless, these same liberal extremists want to pass laws that will interfere with my right to defend myself, while doing nothing to control evil. Have you ever met an evil man that obeyed the law? Isn’t kidnapping, assault, rape, and decapitation already illegal in most civilized cultures?

I keep wondering how successful evil men would be if more good men, and women, around the world were armed and highly trained in the use of their firearms and the tactics required to make them effective. Evil doesn’t exist only in places with unpronounceable names by men with faces hidden in checkered scarves and black masks searching for victims to behead. Evil exists here at home as well.

Who is the more evil in this world — the religious extremist with the gun and large serrated knife or the selfish liberal extremist that disarms their entire community and leaves it vulnerable to the whims of the lawless? Whose mind is more broken?