Suicide might be built into our US constitution...

[Sleeper System]

I feel like the second ammendment can be inturpreted as the right to end your own life. It's meant to keep the goverment in check by empowering the individual to protect themselves. You could turn your gun on the goverment to protect yourself but what if the goverment gets so corrupt or set up for the individual to be enslaved that the only way to defend yourself from such an oppressive power is to turn the gun on yourself and remove yourself from being at their whim? A single person with a gun weilds a lot of power. It would explain why it feels like the powers that be want to abolish the second ammendment. Just a thought I had.

 

[MatrixPrisoner]

We should just feel lucky that the punishment for attempting suicide isn't the death penalty.

 

[Sleeper System]

We should just feel lucky that the punishment for attempting suicide isn't the death penalty.

That's actually unlucky. I would prefer that. I'd fake attempt it and they would have to kill me themselves based on that. Take all the pressure off me and be done.

 

[MatrixPrisoner]

That's actually unlucky. I would prefer that. I'd fake attempt it and they would have to kill me themselves based on that. Take all the pressure off me and be done.

Exactly. That is the irony of it. Constitutionality is irrelevant when we're not even afraid of the worst possible punishment, which is death.

 

[cryone]

ahh, i wish. interesting interpretation. however, the Constitution is kind of a bunch of contradictory statements imo because there's just far too many interpretations. for example, the commerce clause determines that the federal government has all power over commerce, including firearms. this nullifies the entire 2nd amendment and gives the gov power to regulate how you use your gun.

 

[Daughter of Sorrow]

ahh, i wish. interesting interpretation. however, the Constitution is kind of a bunch of contradictory statements imo because there's just far too many interpretations. for example, the commerce clause determines that the federal government has all power over commerce, including firearms. this nullifies the entire 2nd amendment and gives the gov power to regulate how you use your gun.

Luckily, I have a degree in this. Whatever the latest amendment is overrides what was written previous. The commerce clause was in the original document. Then the amendments came around, and basically added an "except not this" to the original document. It's also why one amendment can override another. The law works the same way. Example: the government passes a bill that prohibits eating ice cream after 6pm (yes, it's absurd, intentionally so). Then a few years down the line, the government makes a new law that says ice cream can be eaten any time on Sundays. The new law overrides the old on. On Sundays, ice cream can be eaten any time.

 

[Blurry_Buildings]

I feel like the second ammendment can be inturpreted as the right to end your own life. It's meant to keep the goverment in check by empowering the individual to protect themselves. You could turn your gun on the goverment to protect yourself but what if the goverment gets so corrupt or set up for the individual to be enslaved that the only way to defend yourself from such an oppressive power is to turn the gun on yourself and remove yourself from being at their whim? A single person with a gun weilds a lot of power. It would explain why it feels like the powers that be want to abolish the second ammendment. Just a thought I had.

It's kind of interesting how the 2nd amendment was made to always create the possibility of a civilian uprising, and yet a civilian uprising has always been viewed as treason, one of the worst possible crimes one can commit, and the only one outlined in the constitution itself. I remember someone had a quote about that "Revolution is great but only the first time..." or something.

Isn't everything just how you subjectively interpret it though? I'm sure someone has to have made a philosophical argument that objectivity doesn't actually exist. All we can use in place of "objectivity" in politics is the intent of the law itself when it was written. The founding fathers were extremely religious (like everyone else in the 1700s). I can't imagine the individual act of suicide remotely being within the intent of the second amendment, which was to allow for an organised uprising, with the ultimate goal of removing a corrupt government from power.

How could that be seen as any more of a stretch when interpreting the original intent of the second amendment than seeing it instead as a mandate for absolute security from power- abusing petty criminals? Or maybe seeing it as a call for total social control enforced not just by the government but by all members of the society - like how in North Korea civilians report each other to the government for infractions... but instead of civilians reporting each other, here it would be self righteous vigilantes shooting the "perpetrators".

If the original intent of the second amendment is to prevent an abuse of power from the government by allowing for an organized uprising, I am not sure how the law continues to effectively perform it's duties. With the massive US intelligence community tracking you and the world's most advanced military stationed all over the nation, you could argue that the true purpose and intent of the 2nd amendment has already been lost since at least the end of WW1. It's not like a small group of people with pistol-calibered AR-15's could openly fight an insurgency without expecting a precision drone strike. As warfighting technology advances even further and leaves small firearms behind, it would be hard to see a point in keeping the second amendment around unless we begin legalizing heavy explosives (not just RPGs) and armored vehicles for civilian use as well.

I'm just glad enough people still think that they stand a chance against the federal government in some kind of drawn out guerilla insurgency campaign. It will make reaching the end of my own life so much easier.

(edit: I realized this might sound condescending rip I shouldn't write when I'm too tired to check to make sure it doesn't sound mean lol. No shade to my 2nd amendment believers out there. I hate it myself but I know people have uses for firearms that is central to their way of life/ sense of freedom.)

 

[IWishToDie]

small group of people with pistol-calibered AR-15's could openly fight an insurgency without expecting a precision drone strike

America lost Afghanistan, just saying.

 

[Blurry_Buildings]

America lost Afghanistan, just saying.

I mean… I personally would frame it as "America chose to leave Afghanistan after killing over 50,000 Taliban insurgents and roughly 2,000 each of Al-Qaeda and ISIL fighters, only losing a little under 2,500 of its own."

It begs the question of why America even invaded in the first place, but either way the Taliban won only because America did not continue to engage. An insurgency in America itself though would not be ignored in the same way, at least imo.

 

[Captive_Mind515]

I feel like the second ammendment can be inturpreted as the right to end your own life. It's meant to keep the goverment in check by empowering the individual to protect themselves. You could turn your gun on the goverment to protect yourself but what if the goverment gets so corrupt or set up for the individual to be enslaved that the only way to defend yourself from such an oppressive power is to turn the gun on yourself and remove yourself from being at their whim? A single person with a gun weilds a lot of power. It would explain why it feels like the powers that be want to abolish the second ammendment. Just a thought I had.

The pen is mightier than the sword however. Violence without reason or valid rationale, is rarely something that inspires others to follow.

Also, absolute power corrupts absolutely. It's ironic that a firearm gives the individual this absolute power in the form of life and death decision making… but yet it was intended to prevent a form of corrupt absolute power at a government level. There is evidence that the power of the gun has corrupted many people in the US today, where life has become very cheap and it's just too easy for someone to wipe out innocents in the most callous of ways.

If a gun culture can cheapen life in this manner, doesn't this contradict the values of individual liberty and freedom… where you in essence become a prisoner to fear and a slave to an ideology?

 

[TAW122]

Hm, that's a very interesting read and interpretation, especially when viewing it through the lens of escaping modern 'slavery' or being subjected to a life of wageslaving just to eventually die (after having one's labor extracted for many many decades and more). The freedom to escape tyranny, instead of beating tyranny (which is realistically not likely in our modern world), one escapes it by no longer being a cog to be exploited.