A black teenager was shot in Kansas City on March 21, 2023, for not answering a doorbell. His mother says “a man came to her house looking for a cousin who he thought lived there,” and when the teen wouldn’t let him in — there were young children there — the man opened fire. The teen died at a hospital; the shooter is still at large. (See story here.)
Another black teenager was shot in Kansas City on April 13, 2023, for ringing a doorbell. He went to the wrong house to pick up his younger brothers, and the homeowner shot him in the head, then after he was down shot him again, but this kid made it to a hospital still alive. The homeowner has been released pending further investigation. Protesters are picketing his house. He’s probably not there. (See story here.)
In the tribal lands between Mexico and Canada there are two main tribes, white and black. Like the border lands between Pakistan and Afghanistan, known as the Northwest Frontier, these lands are lawless and violent, with frequent clashes between tribes. In Kansas City, which lies in the middle of these border lands, doorbells lead to shootings.
It’s probably impossible to do anything about the estimated 400 million guns circulating in the North American Frontier, many of them clones of military-grade weapons. What possibly could be done is get some law there. If we can’t get the guns off the streets, then let’s get the people using them off the streets. We can put them in special gun-free communities.
An example of such a community is shown in the photo below. These communities will still be tribal and violent, but at least kids on the outside will be safe from them.
In all seriousness, I’m for getting tough with gun owners who casually shoot people. That’s about the only thing we can do about gun violence. Self-defense should be hard to prove, and the exception rather than the rule. We shouldn’t tolerate politicians who try to make it easier to get away with shooting people by claiming self-defense.
The established legal standard is that self-defense is justified in the face of an imminent threat of death or grave bodily harm, and the force used has to be proportional to the threat. Absent such a threat, the mere act of ringing a doorbell, or not answering a doorbell, doesn’t remotely satisfy this standard. Properly interpreted and applied, “stand your ground” doesn’t mean you can shoot anyone who comes to your door merely because you don’t like their looks.
Both of these shooters belong in a “special community” as described above. Let’s get the trigger-happy citizens among us out of our communities and into special gun-free communities where they can’t hurt harmless kids. This tribal warfare has gone too far.
