Shoot 'Em Up

Hardly a week seems to go by without the news carrying a report of another multiple shooting in the US. It always seems to be the same - some dissatisfied individual harbouring unspecified grudges goes on a rampage with his legally owned firearm and exacts his revenge upon either society in general, or on specific individuals, by shooting a number of people. Often institutions such as schools, colleges, postal depots and the like are the location/target of the gunmen. Inevitably, these incidents are used by the British media to illustrate our cultural superiority over the US - obviously, we are civilised enough to have gun control and have fewer uneducated rednecks running around, at least, that seems to be the sub-text of the news reports. Personally, though, I don't buy it. Trust me, those Yankee Doodle Dandys aren't stupid. I know, I've been over there. Whilst I've never met any hillbillies there, I have encountered lots of extremely intelligent and well educated people. None of whom seemed to have any desire to go on homicidal rampages. So, clearly there must be some other reason why they allow just about anybody to own a firearm. OK, I know all that business about the Constitution and the 'right to be arms', not to mention the persistence of the frontier mentality, and the pervasiveness of violent crime. But let's be brutally frank: that's all bollocks.

The truth is that gun rampages are actually a form of culling. Think about it - the only people who get shot are too infirm, too stupid or too unfit to simply run away and hide when they see a crazy man with a gun coming. By getting rid of them, the US is ensuring that only its fittest citizens survive. This is particularly significant when you bear in mind the number of these massacres which occur in schools and colleges: the unfit are removed from the gene pool before they have had a chance to procreate and cause further genetic pollution. Now, I know what you're going to say - the flaw in this thesis is that the person doing the culling is surely exactly the sort of person you'd want removed from the country's genetic heritage, yet they survive. Hah! That's the genius of the system - in reality the shooters are either gunned down by the police, shoot themselves, or are captured and executed. If they're lucky enough to commit their crimes in a state without the death penalty, they'll find themselves banged up in a maximum security prison or secure mental institution for life. Either way, the chances of having sex anywhere other than up the jacksie are minimal, and the last time I checked, you couldn't reproduce through the back door. So, no replication of their defective genes. Job done! All-in-all, a pretty clever scheme - eugenics without resort to concentration camps. It all looks as if it is the result of random acts of violence perpetrated by psychopaths - how can the government be held responsible for that? And it is working - how else is it that the US leads the world in so many fields of endeavour? Why do their sportsmen and women win so many gold medals? Why do their armed forces sweep all before them in war after war? Because they've weeded out those weak genes, that's why! Bear that in mind next time a US shooting spree is reported - they're not all crazy, they're just improving the breed!