Every time a kid walks into a school with a rifle and murders a score of people, the predictable clamor arises. Liberals want to ban guns; conservatives propose a variety of measures to shut up liberals, which they would ban if they could. But neither liberals nor conservatives get this right, at least not fully—and they fail it for a common reason. They do not take into account the most important factor, of which they are both guilty.

This is admittedly about the improper use of guns, but they’ve got it all wrong. It is wrongly imposing one’s will on others through the barrel of a gun.

While each can argue over the specifics as to how to keep the children in these schools safe, both are complicit in the injustice at the root of the schools to begin with; and yes, it is founded upon imposing their will upon others through the barrel of a gun.

You must face up to the fact: public education is founded upon the principle of imposing your will on others at gunpoint. It is a specific application of power through the barrel of a gun.

Only a relative few understand the problem in this key way, and most of these have too much tact to say what needs to be said in public. It is one of my few God-given gifts to eschew tact—at appropriate times, of course.

In times like this, some say blame the gun. They call for tighter gun controls.

They say they want to ban AR-15s. But they don’t, really. They only want to ban AR-15s for everyone except for government agents under their control.

Others say the schools need armed guards, or teachers should be armed. By this, they apply the same principle as the others. They mean schools should remain gun-free zones except for government agents under their control.

Both sides believe only good guys should have guns, and both sides believe their government agents are the good guys.

Granted, there are differences, but they are not at the root of the matter. The root of the matter lies yet deeper, in the nature of public education itself.

Public education cannot exist without imposing its will on society through the barrel of a gun. It rests upon this principle at its root.

Public education is based upon coercion. You must pay. It is mandated by government. It is enforced by armed government agents. You will pay. If you do not, you will be fined and prosecuted. Your property will be confiscated. Resist, and you will be arrested. Resist that, and you will be beaten into submission. Resist that, and they can shoot you until you quit resisting, dead or alive.

Power, out of the barrel of a gun.

We all recognize that, for there to be godly order in society, there must at some point, ultimately, be the authority and power to use deadly force. The big question—the underlying question—is who, when, and where?

As it stands, we have included in our answer to the question of lethal force, enforcement of forced payment for a government-owned and -operated system of education.

As it stands, we have armed government agents, police, and SWAT, on active standby, 24–7, to enforce these unjust laws at gunpoint. Public education cannot exist without stealing money from people against their will at gunpoint. It’s one big, prolonged, constant, inescapable robbery.

Public education is one big existential threat of an active shooter situation.

We could go a step further and acknowledge that for every unjust law or government program on the books, we have a similar potential active shooter situation. They are all enforced at the threat of gunpoint, at all times, in all places.

Take abortion, for example. What greater evil is there in society today than a legal holocaust of infants? In every abortion clinic in every state, there are thousands murdered every day. Thousands, every day. Yet it is protected by the state. It is protected by armed agents of the state.

Do you think you can resist one of these murders? You cannot. If you do something even so small as block the doors to these death chambers, you will be arrested. If you resist, you will be beaten into submission. If you resist, they will shoot you.

An agent of the state can murder you if you try to impede the murder of a child in an abortion clinic.

Worse yet, there are Christians, conservatives, and Christian leaders who condone and even demand such behavior, and there are professing, born-again Christian police officers who will do the beating and the shooting.

When even the Christians and conservatives protect and enforce even murder at the point of a gun, in the name of law and order, what do you think society has come to? What are the foundations of such a society?

When the foundations of society are so desperately wicked, what else do we expect? Why are we even surprised? We should only be surprised it does not happen every day.

Examine the laws of God in regard to virtually any major aspect of life, and you’ll see us make similar abominable compromises: in life, liberty, property, money, and more we commit a whole variety of other wickednesses that work directly to the hurt, loss, damage, and murder of millions of people. We just usually get the government to do it for us., with the ultimate threat behind the evils being the barrel of a gun.

Let’s just put that on the table, shall we?

We don’t think twice when we, by government proxy, point guns at people in order to secure funds for education, welfare, a variety of unjust laws, not to mention corporate subsidies, competitive advantages, infrastructure, bailouts, fiat money, and so much more—most of it bipartisan.

We point guns at our own children, by proxy, with every single dollar of deficit and national debt we wink at. Those who cry out when Obama does it, cheer when Trump does it, and vice versa. Whether it’s for food stamps and climate change nonsense or walls, wars on drugs, and another aircraft carrier, the principle is the same. Your children will pay, and if they resist. . . .

It’s power through the barrel of a gun, and we not only do not resist it, we cheer the ones holding the guns. It seems our greatest priority in our political lives is mainly to make sure only that guys who agree with us are holding the guns.

How about instead we regain a vision of freedom? How about we commit to sacrifice and fight for that? How about we privatize the schools, and a great many other things? Then the private schools can fund themselves freely, and can hire armed guards, armed teachers, or not, and we can see what works better (hint: we already know). (Also, most homeschools are very well armed already, too.)

How about we return to constitutional carry? How about we return to the original American ideal—that the guns are there for free citizens to protect themselves, even against overreaching government. That is, the guns are there to protect us against the state imposing its will upon us through the barrel of a gun.

I am not advocating an armed revolution. I am simply telling you the facts of the American way. If you recoil at that vision, it will tell you whose side you are really on and why we are really in this mess.

And if you think public education is the American way and ought to remain government-funded (through the barrel of a gun), that will tell you about all you need to know about why you are on that side to begin with, and probably how you got there.