Thank goodness nobody was armed

NEW YORK — A subway passenger was stabbed to death in front of horrified riders in a dispute with another man over a seat in the car early Saturday morning in midtown Manhattan, police said.

So by all accounts, the many citizens on the train just stood there while one of their own was brutally and systematically murdered. No resistance? Nothing? Some would draw the conclusion that all of those New Yorkers did not have the most effective means to resist; indeed I came to that same conclusion myself, but this shouldn't distract from the simple fact that those people probably wouldn't have tried to help regardless of whether they had the means.

These days, I am under the firm belief that large metropolitan cities emasculate the population as a general course of business. An intimidated and meek population is needed to live in such areas. Some of you that live in large cities that chance upon this blog will probably roll your eyes and shake your head in disagreement, but of all the large, densely populated rural areas that I have been to, including the one I live in now, virtually all of them share one thing in common: the citizens are largely self sufficient and independent. By that I don't mean that people live with some sort of isolationist attitude, sitting in their houses with their double barrel shotgun and talking about country boys and trot lines; I'm talking about people who take providing for and protecting their communities seriously.

In living in coastal California some years back, I got the impression that people there think that providing for their community meant paying taxes for emergency type services; that protecting their neighbors meant putting a "I support xxxxx sheriff's office" sticker on their bumper, and that volunteering to work for the day at a soup kitchen every few years was all that was needed to show support for their fellow man. Around here, folks take community protection as a personal responsibility, as they always have. I have no doubts that the general Wal-Mart population here wouldn't stand by while some scumbag murders a fellow citizen. There may not be a good guy with a gun, although that is likely, but you can bet that those who are physically able to will dogpile the degenerate in question, if not forcefully dismember him with a pocket knife. And that is why I believe that violent crime here is remarkably rare, while violent crime in large cities is accepted.

It's not the guns, it's the attitude. The guns are just tools of the citizen.