The Paradox of Liberty

The paradox of liberty extends to its defense and preservation.  If force can take away liberty, force is necessary to preserve it.  It is the hatred of violence alongside the willingness to use violence that preserves liberty.  In order for us to live as free men, we have to hate the violence that takes away liberty, yet at the same time, we must embrace the violence that preserves it.  That is the paradox our founders appreciated and made work for over 200 years. 

'Modern liberals, however, do not fear the "long train of abuses and usurpations" because they do not believe in popular sovereignty.  They worship tyrannical authority.  Liberals show affection to and apologize for evil men like Hugo Chávez, Che Guevara, Fidel Castro, Mao Tse-Tung, Bill Ayers, the Muslim Brotherhood.  They show disdain for patriots like John Adams, Patrick Henry, Joe McCarthy, Ronald Reagan, and the Tea Party.  Liberals fear their liberty-loving neighbors more than they do their power-hungry politicians.  Liberals would rather shackle their neighbors than let them live in liberty.

In a fiery speech on August 1, 1776, Samuel Adams bellowed, "If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom -- go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen!"

Liberals prefer shackles to the wild adventure of liberty.  Because they prefer shackles, they cannot bear others having liberty.  In their bleeding hearts is not love for people, but a will to dominate them and to be dominated.  Our Founders knew that taking away firearms from the citizen was essentially to turn him into a subject, a slave.  Congressman Allen West affirmed this sentiment when he said, "An armed man is a citizen.  A disarmed man is a subject." 

Turning men into slaves is not love.  But that is what gun control is all about: turning men into slaves.  Love for mankind is not in taking care of him, but in letting him be free to take care of himself.  With gun control, liberals want to take away the means for men to preserve their liberty.

Liberals say they want gun control because they want to end the bloodshed.  But beware.  What is at the heart of support for gun control is not love of men, but hatred for them.'

- Christopher Brownwell, 'Gun Control and the Pardox of Liberty.'