Immigration, guns and morality

The benefits of immigration; a Swiss perspective according to this site.

Violent crime is almost unknown, and when murders are committed it is usually between asylum seekers. Like it or not, 44% of the persons convicted of criminal offences are foreigners, half of whom do not even officially live in Switzerland.

Incredibly, this is a company who make their living out of immigration! Perhaps even more remarkable is that you could never imagine a British company being quite as direct as Micheloud & Co.

Their claims are backed up by one Stephen P. Halbrook who notes that ...

The Swiss Federal Police Office reports that, in 1997, there were 87 intentional homicides and 102 attempted homicides in the entire country. Some 91 of these 189 murders and attempts involved firearms (the statistics do not distinguish firearm use in consummated murders from attempts). With its population of seven million (which includes 1.2 million foreigners), Switzerland had a homicide rate of 1.2 per 100,000. There were 2,498 robberies (and attempted robberies), of which 546 involved firearms, giving a robbery rate of 36 per 100,000. Almost half of these criminal acts were committed by non-resident foreigners, which is why one hears reference in casual talk to "criminal tourists."

Why am I mentioning this? Well, it follows on from my post the other day about gun law. You see, guns are part of the culture in Switzerland and yet gun crime is rare. Halbrook states that ...

Although there is more per capita firepower in Switzerland than any place in the world, it is one of the safest places to be. To the delight of Americans who support the right to keep and bear arms, Switzerland is the proof in the pudding of the argument that guns don't cause crime.

That is the whole point. Guns do not cause crime. Criminals do and criminals will always be able to acquire guns if they want to. So why is it that the US - where guns are freely available - and Switzerland - where guns are also freely available - have such differing outcomes for gun crime. As Halbrook notes, it is down to one thing.

The bottom line is one of attitude. Populations with training in civic virtue, though armed, generally do not experience sensational massacres or high crime rates. Switzerland fits this mold. But the United States does not. As H. Rap Brown declared in the 1960s, "Violence is as American as apple pie."

Civic virtue is a curious phrase, but what it amounts to, in my opinion, is this. The national culture. Which is why multiculturalism is a dangerous thing. The reason why the US has such a problem with gun crime - and why we in the UK have a growing problem - is that lack of a single dominant and preferred culture that creates "civic virtue". In Britain, this was typified by good manners, politeness and stoicism for which we were famed across the world. Since the sixties, this culture has been attacked and systematically undermined by various "sub-cultures" which we are told are equally valid and equally important.

Encouraged by liberal progressives to break taboos, push back boundaries and pull down the barriers we have destroyed that "civic virtue" - the glue that held society together. The result - as we see all around us - is the decaying society that exists today. Those taboos, boundaries and barriers were not there just to be a spoiler on us having fun or just to prevent us doing what we want - they were there to provide a basic fundamental foundation of morality which was accepted as the common moral baseline for society to work and function.

This can be seen in a number of ways. Unrestrained drug abuse, underage promiscuity, homosexual promiscuity, public displays of foul language, drunkenness, violent and abusive behaviour, abortion on demand and many, many other instances. And the problem is - the people behaving like this do not believe there is anything wrong with what they are doing! They believe that because they have been led to believe it's OK to kick back against authority, to break taboos and to push back boundaries. These people have been taught that what is moral is whatever they choose to be moral.

Ironically, in place of the moral baseline, liberal progressives have tried to impose their own common morality - a new "civic virtue" but it is generally structured around support for the various causes that liberal progressives have deemed as "good". Homosexuality, abortion, opposition to war, understanding of terrorists grievances, animal "rights", gender "equality", race "equality" and so on and so on. Thus people feel very good about themselves because they go on anti-vivisection marches or demand a woman's right "to choose" (doesn't she choose by deciding whether to have sex or not?) - and then they go out and get drunk, sleep around, smoke some dope and puke up in a doorway. The next day they tell everyone what a "great time" they had!!

The trouble is, this morality is not a moral baseline but an attempt to create a collective mentality which demands societal conformance, but fails to impose restraint on individual behaviour and without that restraint on individual behaviour we lose all sense of civic virtue - and that causes the breakdown of society