The Ridiculous Suggestion that Ghandi was Pro-Gun
Waging Nonviolence
Those familiar with pro-gun activists know that they love a good
quote. Do some surfing on pro-gun websites and you will find a cottage
industry of quotations from American leaders and other voices of wisdom
from throughout history. Some are legitimate, and some are completely
bogus, but all are cherry-picked and presented entirely without context
to suggest that their subjects hold the same pro-gun beliefs as Ted Nugent.
Even history’s greatest proponents of nonviolence are not immune from
such treatment. This includes Mohandas Gandhi himself, whose words
appear on countless pro-gun websites as follows:
“Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will
look upon the Act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest.”
Pro-gun activists frequently use those words to suggest
that Gandhi supported individual gun ownership both as a means of
defending oneself and as a tool to violently resist government tyranny.
But are these assertions true?
In that passage, Gandhi references India’s Arms Act of 1878,
which gave Europeans in India the right to carry firearms but prevented
Indians from doing so, unless they were granted a license by the
British colonial government. The full text of what he wrote is: “Among
the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon
the Act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest. If we want the
Arms Act to be repealed, if we want to learn the use of arms, here is a
golden opportunity. If the middle classes render voluntary help to
Government in the hour of its trial, distrust will disappear, and the
ban on possessing arms will be withdrawn.”
These words come from a World War I recruitment pamphlet that Gandhi
published in 1918, urging Indians to fight with their British colonial
oppressors in the war, not against them.
Ghandi Quotes On Fighting Tyranny
ReplyDelete"There are times when you have to obey a call which is the highest of all, i.e. the voice of conscience even though such obedience may cost many a bitter tear, and even more, separation from friends, from family, from the state to which you may belong, from all that you have held as dear as life itself. For this obedience is the law of our being."
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"Non-cooperation is an attempt to awaken the masses, to a sense of their dignity and power. This can only be done by enabling them to realize that they need not fear brute force, if they would but know the soul within."
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"You must be the change you wish to see in the world."
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"Non-cooperation is directed not against men but against measures. It is not directed against the Governors, but against the system they administer. The roots of non-cooperation lie not in hatred but in justice, if not in love."
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"Abstract truth has no value unless it incarnates in human beings who represent it, by proving their readiness to die for it."
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"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they attack you, then you win."
I have little respect for Gandhi, either for the man or for his philosophy, but look at the point of this statement. He identified a law that divided his society into a privileged class that could have arms and a vast body of peasants--slaves, effectively--who were mandated by their foreign oppressors to be unarmed.
ReplyDeleteToday, perhaps he'd write the same comment about Dianne Frankenstein and Dog Gone having guns and carry licenses while both of them argue that the rest of us are unworthy.
You conveniently miss the point that his famous quote is not about fighting off a tyrannical government, as it is purported to mean.
DeleteIt's referring to a tyrannical measure instituted by a foreign (and only occasionally tyrannical) government, and a means to reverse it.
DeleteHe states that "...history will look upon the Act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest."
Funny that you post the entire quote then cherry pick it so that it means what you want it to.
The statement is about what it says.. There are many reasons why such an act is seen as evil. One is that it takes away the ability of the people to resist a tyranny in force, but that's only one reason.
DeleteJim, the meaning was in the historical context, which is what the cherry-picking, mendacious pro-gun lairs were overlooking.
DeleteMike, the meaning was that the Act was the most evil. Period. How Ghandi planned to get it overturned is completely beside the point, and certainly not germaine to our discussion concerning the 2nd Ammendment.
DeleteIt's perfectly germane to the way pro-gun liars take things out of context and misrepresent them and then the way the other pro-gun liars repeat them over and over again.
DeleteAnd Mikeb, what are you doing when you take plain words given in their context and try to tell us that they don't mean what they obviously mean?
DeleteMike - was Ghandi in favor of citizens having weapons? It looks to me like he proposed a solution to end the ban on possession of weapons by Indians. What exactly is your point with this post?
DeleteThe point is the gun-rights folks who keep repeating this bullshit are applying it to the good fight against tyrannical government. It wasn't that at all.
DeleteNo, the point is that he called the Arms Act the worst thing the British did in India.
DeleteWhat a miserable failure of an argument. Do you anti-gun wackos even think before you open your mouths?
ReplyDeleteWhat are you 8 years old? The post is about how ridiculous YOU are for this Ghandi nonsense.
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