A little bit, sure, but you left home a long time ago... the important part is you have a clear and verifiable story for your Nation's beginning. When a Nation's birth is so well recorded, the people find it hard to truly move on - there's a narrative running through American culture that the way things were at the time of the Founding Fathers is the way things should be forever - and that includes the gun violence. America was won down the barrel of a gun... and through hunting and genocide (no moral snark, we did terrible things) it was tamed down the barrel of one, too. In the 1700s and 1800s, America was a very dangerous place indeed... guns were as necessary as they've ever been... but you've been civilised for centuries now, it's time to let go of some of the old ways.pkay wrote:magma wrote:pkay should've wrote:The us is mire violent because.... we're a society obsessed with its own amazingly glorified beginnings, most of the events of which were gun related. The good guy always wins in an American gunfight, God makes it so; for America is the anointed Land of the Free, but only thanks to the Brave gun-toters. This is an improvable fact.
England mad we took their self centered mindset and did it a bit better? We are our fathers son
The concept of "England" goes back into Neolithic times and can be argued to be centred on any number of traditions, but our most ingrained myths, the ones that produce much of the national psyche tend to heroise people toting bows and arrows, swords or tournament lances... Robin Hood, King Arthur, Boudicca, Richard I, The Black Prince.. even our more modern war überheroes (Nelson, Wellington etc) are more associated with ship-mounted canons than rifles and pistols - weapons the common man couldn't and still can't really aspire to unless they join the Army. Our heroes, largely Medieval and many probably entirely made up (Robin Hood, King Arthur) take on a sort of fantasy life with their ceremonial weapons and dogged devotion to chivalry, romance and piety... they're sort of superheroes that you don't really believe were real, Robin Hood and King Arthur get stowed in the same childhood box as Luke Skywalker.
Most of the founding heroes of America had guns by their side and have their exploits recorded relatively accurately for posterity - there's no argument when you have the facts; the gun was central to securing American freedom and so it is kept central to the American psyche today. Even the names of the gun manufacturers are lionised - Smith & Wesson still trades off it's Wild West image (myths of criminals, vigilantes, law-enforcers and savage natives sold in equal measures)... you too can enjoy the Land of the Free, but only if you're Brave enough to fight for your share and protect it with deadly force. I'm sure most Englishmen would love to have a suit of armour at home and a broadsword with their family isignia hanging from their waist, but it's not a terribly practical way to roam the streets... if only we'd been through the Cowboy phase... we could feel like true Patriots by having a handgun concealed in our elasticated trousers too.
