| > Because the state has the monopoly of violence. I'm fascinated by this viewpoint, but I'm afraid I've never fully understood it. How many weapons to the population have to have before the state is no longer considered to pose a threat? Do we stop at clubs or knives? Small arms? Assault weapons? Explosives? Armoured vehicles? Missiles? > How many deaths in 2012 due to complication related to obesity? How many due to guns? How many due to road accidents? Those three are almost entirely unrelated. Complications related to obesity almost only ever affect the physical wellbeing of the obese person. Road accidents arise from the operation of a useful tool by many millions of people, every day, and generally aren't malicious (and thus are more difficult to prevent). This doesn't make these two causes of death any less tragic, but the sort of gun violence the current US administration wishes to legislate against is wanton slaughter of humans, pure and simple. To paraphrase Michael Moore's "Bowling for Columbine"[0], assault weapons and armour piercing rounds are not useful for hunting[1]. [0]: Now there's something you could call "propaganda". That movie had a lot of good information, but it was often obscured by horrible misrepresentation and questionable conclusions. [1]: Contrary to popular belief, gun control does not preclude those who need weapons in their day-to-day lives from purchasing them. Gun control is not a binary. |
A monopoly on violence it a huge responsibility that today we balance with the liability that comes inherent in being a democracy. It seems today however that the extent to which the government uses it's monopoly requires a great deal more liability.
Since liability requires transparency, the realization that the government has a monopoly on violence should in turn reinforce importance of transparency in all things the government does. If the government feels the need to act independently without overview in some matter, that additional responsibility should come out of a "responsibility budget" that always remains in balance with a liability budget. If you want secret police and your responsibility budget is running low, fill it back up by adding some additional liability (perhaps steeper penalties for government officials that break the law) or free up some responsibility budget by reducing responsibility in other areas (perhaps by disarming other police).
Totalitarianism occurs when we give governments a responsibility budget completely decoupled from liability.