What is wrong with the West?

Early this week as I listened to the news on the memorial service in Norway to commemorate the massacre a year ago, I thought of an incident that happened a long time ago.  I was standing in a queue to go on a ride in Disney World, Orlando when a pleasant elderly lady asked me how I liked America.  I told her it was fun.  Come on, I was in Disney World.  She asked me if I ever thought of living in the States.  I replied in the negative partly because I could tell that she, like most locals in any country, would welcome tourists to her country but not immigrants who would compete with locals in the job market.  I jokingly mentioned my own native food which I was more used to as a reason.  She didn't seem convinced and she asked me to tell her the "real reason" why I wouldn't want to live in America.  There was a shooting spree (I now forget which one) in the US just months before and I could tell from her tone of voice that she was alluding to this.  Being an obliging chap and one who is careful not to offend others, I told her that one day, I would have kids and if I was told that there had been a shooting spree in my child's school, I would laugh my head off because such a thing couldn't possibly happen in Singapore.  I told her I liked to be assured that my children would be safe when they were in school.  She told me she knew what I meant.  A close friend of hers was shot just months before.  "What do you do to people who smuggle guns into your country and use them?" she asked.  "We hang them.  Capital punishment," I replied without flinching.

Proponents of the abolition of the death pealty will go namby-pamby here.  The State shouldn't take the life of a human being.  Well, Breivik took the lives of 77 people.

At the memorial service in Norway on 22 July, Norway's prime minister, Jens Stoltenberg told the people, "He [Breivik] failed, the people won."  In Oslo Cathedral, Bishop Helga Haugland Byfuglien told Norwegians: "The light shines in the darkness; darkness hasn't been able to overcome it."

Let's be serious and not babble like fools here.  How have the people won?  Breivik killed 77 people.  The people DIED.  Breivik lives and will continue to live.   You can say a million times that Breivik failed and the people won but words don't mean a thing if they don't reflect reality.  Who would you rather be? Breivik or one of the 77?   Knowing how hospitable penitentiary facilities are in Norway, I would rather be in Breivik's shoes any time.  I might even write a book about the day I killed 77 people.  Have I missed something?  How have the people won? 

Just two days before the memorial service in Oslo, there was a shooting incident in Colorado at a cinema screening the new Batman film.  12 people were killed.   Hours after the shooting, Republican Louie Gohmert suggested on a radio show to the host Ernie Istook that the shooting was caused by "ongoing attacks on Judeo-Christian beliefs." Gohmert also wondered aloud why nobody else in the cinema had a gun to take down the gunman.

Instead of banning guns, Gohmert is suggesting that Americans should all carry guns to a movie.  It's back to the Wild Wild West, folks!

Singapore should hold its head up high and make no apology for its death penalty.  Breivik could never have done what he did if he had lived in Singapore.  And I mean NEVER.  Even if he did, he'd by now be swinging by his neck after which doctors would harvest his body parts for transplant purposes.  At least there would be some use for Breivik's carcass.  A curse to humanity while he's alive, Breivik can at least be of some benefit to patients when he's despatched with.  As he should be.

Stoltenberg was dead wrong - the people have not won.  They're dead and buried.  Breivik has won and let's make no mistake about that.  The West must stop using words to change reality.  The people can only win if you do two things - ban guns and kill anyone who disobeys.

The West has no moral right to tell Singapore what to do.  They can't even keep their house in order.  It's that disgraceful.  I have lost count of the number of shooting massacres in the West, especially the US.  Criminals and potential criminals in Singapore who don't like the harshness of its laws should just get the hell out.  Go to Norway or the US and buy as many guns as you legally can.  There's no room in Singapore for criminals.  It's the noose for the likes of Breivik here.  They swing and decent people applaud.