Sandy Hook, Gun Control, and appeal to moderation

Teacher: What is 17 plus 18?

Student A: 25.

Student B: No, it's 35.

Teacher: Ah, then the correct answer must be around 30.

Along these lines goes the logical fallacy of the argumentum ad temperantiam, or appeal to moderation. It's also known as the Englishman logical fallacy, meaning that British gentlemen are so prone to the middle ground approach that if fallacies were classified by countries, the ad temperantiam would doubtlessly fall in the English's camp. If two groups are arguing, one claiming 2+2=4 and the other 2+2=6, an Englishman would surely moderate the discussion by claiming 2+2=5 and denouncing both as extremists. 

I have seen the fallacy used this week by a Republican in favour of gun control. Her position was that gun control is usually advocated only by city dwellers, and that guns are actually useful in the countryside. A rabid racoon, a venomous snake, hunting, or the occasional armed home invader when the nearest police station is several tens of miles away and unable to answer the call promptly. 

My view evolved, after some debate, that gun ownership by citizens is a contradiction when we have police and army. We either have a state or we don't. Once conceded that guns have no place in urbia and suburbia, one is agreeing that the state works well there in that respect. That established, claiming that every farm and ranch must have a gun is to argue that rural areas are inherently anarchic or subanarchic, and therefore that state effectiveness in these areas is a hopeless utopia. 

This is instead an argument for strengthening the state to reach out better in rural areas, not to abolish it or to accept its shortcomings. Low population density is not an insurmountable problem. Increase the police per capita ratio if needed. The middle ground approach of state in urbia and rural anarchy is a form of the Englishman logical fallacy.

As for the other scenarios, guns may be effective against rabid raccoons and poisonous snakes, but they are not the only effective actions. These arguments were just versions of "It's the end of the world, and I have a gun!". One debater went as far as to state that when Civil War II strikes and armed hordes came in raid and pillage, we would be looking like fools for having debated gun control. This is argumentum ad metum, or appeal to fear. He might as well have said we need guns to defend ourselves against the zombie apocalypse.

As for hunting, since the neolithic revolution ten thousand years ago, hunting is not a necessity but a sport. We can either do without it or require stringent regulations on it. In the last situation, the armed robber, the urgency is caused by a gun itself. What a piece of circular logic to argue that guns are needed to fix the problems they created. By similar reasoning, God exists because the Bible says so. The best course of action is not to descend into anarchy and provide a shotgun to every household, but to avoid the robber from getting a gun in first place.

Another one argues for banning automatic and semiautomatic weapons, but that advocating complete disarmament is an overreaction, and that we should still allow for rifles and pistols. Very interesting piece of logic. Mass murder is unquestionably bad, but killing only up to six innocents before police shows up is admissible. Sounds like this use of the Englishman fallacy:

Inquisitor: Would you rather be thrown into boiling water or molten lava?
Prisoner: I don't like either option. How 'bout something in between, like boiling oil?

All in all, I have not heard a single well-thought argument in favor of guns. In the same day of the Sandy Hook shooting that left 20 children dead, a similar attempt at mass murder occurred in China.  The difference is that with very strict gun laws, the attacker was armed with only a knife. There were 20 injured people. No deaths. 

Some Republicans say that guns don't kill, people do. Comparing Sandy Hook to this event in China should make it clear as day that even though killers indeed are to blame, if they didn't have weapons of mass murder, no mass murder would have taken place.