Left Rudder

In comments, Sebastian Sassi lies again:

Lots of Freud scholars have suggested that fear of weapons is a sign of sexual and emotional retardation.

In reality, this is a lie perpetrated by Don Kates, Jr.–who is neither a Freud scholar or particularly honest.

From Wiki:

“A fear of weapons is a sign of retarded sexual and emotional maturity.”

This is not is not a statement that appears in any translation of any of Freud’s works. It is a paraphrase of a statement from the essay “Guns, Murders, and the Constitution” (February 1990) by Don B. Kates, Jr. where Kates summarizes his views of passages in Dreams in Folklore (1958) by Freud and David E. Oppenheim, while disputing statements by Emmanuel Tanay in “Neurotic Attachment to Guns” in a 1976 edition of The Fifty Minute Hour: A Collection of True Psychoanalytic Tales (1955) by Robert Mitchell Lindner:

‘Dr. Tanay is perhaps unaware of — in any event, he does not cite — other passages more relevant to his argument. In these other passages Freud associates retarded sexual and emotional development not with gun ownership, but with fear and loathing of weapons. The probative importance that ought to be attached to the views of Freud is, of course, a matter of opinion. The point here is only that those views provide no support for the penis theory of gun ownership.’

Due to misreading of this essay and its citations, this paraphrase of an opinion about Freud’s ideas has been wrongly attributed to Freud himself, and specifically to his 10th Lecture “Symbolism in Dreams” in General Introduction to Psychoanalysis on some internet forum pages: alt.quotations

In an attack on Marc McDonald of BeggarsCanBeChoosers, Sebastian Sassi resorts to a number of lies about UK gun violence:

The point you’re missing isn’t that England has a low murder rate. We’re not disagreeing. What we’re pointing out is that they had a low murder rate EVEN BEFORE they had strict gun control laws.

I’m surprised you’re trying to argue that England’s low murder rate is gun law related–as anyone with two fucking brain cells would also realize that you’d have to establish that they had a higher murder rate before the gun control laws came along. Unfortunately…that’s not the case, and thus all your ranting is for naught. England actually has seen gun crime go UP and not down since they confiscated all the legally registered handguns. The murder rate in the UK has always been minimal (which is a cultural phenomena, not a legal one), and was so well before they went around the bend on gun control.

No wonder you don’t allow comments on your blog; having people eviscerate your arguments is embarrassing, isn’t it?

So many lies here, it’s hard to gather them all.

Lie #1: “What we’re pointing out is that they had a low murder rate EVEN BEFORE they had strict gun control laws. ”

Nope. Sebastian is propagating the fiction that gun control in the UK began in 1997. In reality, gun control began in 1903 in the UK; there have been a number of minor and major gun control initiatives since then. In reality, the 1997 gun control laws affected fewer than 50,000 weapons.

Regardless, Tim Lambert has done the heavy lifting here and one can see the homicide rates in the second half of the nineteenth century were higher than today.

Lie #2: “England actually has seen gun crime go UP and not down since they confiscated all the legally registered handguns. ”

Again, untrue. According to the Home Office-Crime in England and Wales 2005/2006, violent crime in the UK has decreased 43% since 1995. Other crime such as burglary and vehicle crime has decreased 59% and 60%, respectively, in the same period.

The rest is merely Sebastian’s typical bluster and ad hominems.

Muay Thai Expert Sebastian Sassi goes into thug mode:

Sooner or later you’re going to pick the wrong fight with somebody not nearly as gracious and gentlemanly as myself. Something to think about, as I certainly do worry for your safety.

Comment by Sebastian-PGP — December 9, 2007 @ 11:48 pm | Edit This

This is classic GunLoonery; after the lies, denials, name-calling, etc.–the threats start coming out.

It should be pointed out Sebastian Sassi is an Executive Member (whatever the heck that is) of Maryland Shall Issue, a GunLoon group that wants everyone to be carrying guns. Sebastian Sassi also wants a permit to carry around a firearm all the time. The MSP really should know Sebastian isn’t a good candidate for such a permit.