The Second Amendment: Or, taking up arms against U.S. troops

Clearly, freedom depends on this. It's not uncommon for me to use my Twitter account to berate, mock and condemn conservative policies and causes. Normally, my tweets might draw the irate response of an occasional conservative here and there. In the wake of the horrific massacre in Newtown, however, my tweets about the reasons that conservatives are so dedicated to preserving the legality of such weapons of mass murder received a decidedly different reaction. Conservative ideologues and the National Rifle Association may continue to claim that there's never a good time to have a conversation about gun control in this country, but that certainly does not stop them from spreading their defenses about their interpretations of the Second Amendment.

Now, I know people who own AR-15s and similar weapons because they're gun enthusiasts and very much enjoy going to the range to hone their marksmanship skills. I have gone to the range with them, and sincerely appreciate their passion for their hobby. I won't lie: It is fun to shoot one. Consequently, I wouldn't deign to tar everyone who owns such a weapon or desires to with the same broad brush. But unless you are one of those people who simply loves shooting at spots of metal or sheets of paper at a well-regulated range, the only other reason to own one of these mass-casualty-inducing weapons is if you firmly believe that at some point, you will have the opportunity to use them.

I won't mince words: I firmly believe that many of the people who want to be prepared to kill a lot of other people are suburban and exurban whites who think they will get the opportunity to kill a lot of black people if and when the social order ever breaks down. While some may consider this outrageous, it's really not: All it takes is a brief visit to Free Republic or any other such outlet to see posters actively fantasizing about the breakdown in the social order so they can:

[...] deliver what they deserve, 9mm from a MAC-11. 900 RPM.

Perhaps brashly, I tweeted various things to that effect, and got a bunch of angry replies from conservatives who defended their arsenals on the grounds that the quite substantial quantities of bullets those arsenals could fire were not designed for black people, but rather to protect them against government tyranny. At this point, many rational people would have given up, rather than continuing to engage in conversation with people who believe that the massacre of dozens of people is but a routine inconvenience to preserve the fantasy of armed rebellion. I am apparently not one of them. I continued a string of conversations with people who advocated this notion, and asked them how they felt about the idea of killing members of the United States Armed Forces.

After all, let's examine some basic, common-sense provisos behind the "protection from tyranny" argument. If, as some right-wing conspiracy theorists fear, President Obama will declare martial law at some point in his second term and use that to impose the latest evil du jour (fascism, socialism, communism, Islamism, atheism or a combination of all of the above), it would stand to reason that the military would have to be summoned for the purpose: That is, after all, what martial law means. At this point, resisting this tyranny in the name of freedom would require being actively willing to kill soldiers of the United States. Even beyond that, however, there is a larger question at work.

(Continue reading below the fold.)