by Breyen Canfield

If we learn nothing else from Socrates we must recognize the value of clarifying our terms. In a dialogue with Euthyphro, Socrates demands an objective definition of piety in order to defend himself against charges of impiety. Unfortunately for Socrates, his defense is unsuccessful. Unfortunately for us, his lessons on clarity have drunk their own hemlock. We are repeating Euthyphro’s muddled mistakes.

With a topic so accurately and commonly described as supercharged, the gun control debate is raging and ubiquitous. It’s probably for the better that the common voter’s voice is positioned to be heard like never before. But it’s certainly for the worse that so many voices are uttering dangerously unintelligible jiggery-pokery. (Scalia’s hyphenation; not mine.)

None of this is to say that the Left or the Right or the pro- or the anti- is any more or less guilty than the other. But when there is a standing order – in this case the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America – the burden is on the disagreer to offer a compelling reason why the order should be changed. And if that disagreer is not exactingly careful, the replacement order may end up doing more work than originally intended.

In the gun control case, the most common example of linguistic vaguery is something along the lines of civilians don’t need assault weapons or, more specifically, civilians don’t need AR-15s. Regardless of whether civilians do or do not need anything, or even whether it’s anyone’s place to decide whether anyone needs or does not need anything at all, the terminology being employed is troubling. Those who don’t wish to join the “ban them all” crowd or the “civilians should be allowed to have anything the government has” crowd have found a home in the “sensible gun control” arena. However, that group is compromised — and inexact language is often to blame for the declension of some of its arguments from sensible to nonsensical.

Although a few reasonable people are still debating gun policy in a civilized and intelligent manner, the misunderstanding of important terminologies is threatening the issue’s progress. In an attempt to be helpful, Stephen Gutowski of the Washington Examiner created a concise explanation of numerous guns, their usages, and their capabilities.

According to the Defense Intelligence Agency Small Arms Identification and Operation guide, assault rifles are “short, compact, select fire weapons.” An assault rifle, then, must be at least capable of fully automatic firing. Assault weapons are specifically semi-automatic: not capable of fully automatic firing. Thus, when advocates of stricter gun control say they favor banning assault weapons, rather than banning assault rifles, they are – knowingly or not – advocating a position that would restrict access to a comprehensive category of firearms that by themselves are no more likely to be used in mass murders than the hunting rifles they swear they do not condemn.

In 2013, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein pushed for a renewed Assault Weapons Ban. Feinstein’s bill specifically banned the sale of “all semi-automatic rifles that can accept a detachable magazine and have at least one military feature,” one feature of which could be a “pistol grip.” The bill also banned the sale of “all semi-automatic pistols” with a magazine that detached from any area other than the grip. If successful, the ban would have restricted the sale of many weapons that are functionally equivalent to standard hunting rifles and only cosmetically distinguishable in most cases. Terminology matters.

I always adamantly disagree with those who say now is not the time for <insert policy discussion here>. If a policy affects a lot of people and there are varying views on what is best, it’s always the right time to debate it. If a policy position is well-reasoned from defensible first principles, by all means, let’s hear it. To hold otherwise is to condone, however tacitly, emotive blockades to civil discourse. But if we are going to come to any sort of agreement on any sensitive topic, we serve ourselves best when we are all seated at the same table.

In a his paper “Wittgenstein’s Poker: Contested Constitutionalism and the Limits of Public Meaning Originalism,” law professor Ian Bartrum suggests that indeterminacy of language leaves little room for ground-gaining in public policy debates. Bartrum further argues that intentional vagueness is even more problematic. Bartrum may be describing issues of constitutional interpretation between United States senators, but he could just as easily be talking about the conversations in which many Americans engage following the all-too-common school shootings like the recent murders in Parkland, Florida. By not being specific about what exactly each term means and what each position entails, its defenders do a disservice to their own ideas.

It may end up the case that there is enough public demand for stricter gun laws to override the wishes of Second Amendment proponents. It may also be that the strict constitutionalists carry the day, and Congress makes no new laws infringing upon the rights of gun owners. A 2013 Pew poll showed that 49 percent of Republicans polled favored banning semi-automatic weapons, while only 44 percent favored banning “assault-style” weapons. (In the same poll, Democratic respondents voted 68 percent and 69 percent, respectively.) But all of these various terms – assault, weapon, rifle, and especially style – are usually only clearly defined in the laws that permit or restrict their usage, not in the poll questions that are read to respondendents by pollsters.

How many of the Pew respondents, for example, understood that part of the definition they were advocating against includes a firearm that features a “grip that allows for a pistol style grasp in which the web of the trigger hand (between the thumb and index finger) can be placed below the top of the exposed portion of the trigger while firing.” Perhaps all 44 percent of Republicans and all 69 percent of Democratic respondents really are fully aware of at least that definition, but I doubt it – given the fact that 5 percent more of the Republican respondents favored banning all semi-automatic weapons, i.e. weapons that may not even feature the pistol-grip enhancement.

After the CNN townhall following the school shooting in his home state of Florida, Sen. Marco Rubio claimed on Twitter that “banning all semi-auto weapons may have been popular with the audience at #CNNTownHall, but it is a position well outside the mainstream.” The Pew poll suggests otherwise, but the incongruity between Sen. Rubio’s claim and the poll results may not be as dramatic it seems at first glance. It is unlikely that 5 percent more of the Republican respondents favored banning all semi-automatic weapons — weapons that may not even feature the pistol-grip modification, compared the smaller group that favored banning the modified weapons.

If we do not even know what weapons we are advocating for or against, how can we expect politicians to make policy based on our preferences?

Beyond the clarification issue, a secondary concern arises when disagreers concede their first point and shift the goal posts: fine, use whatever words you want, those kinds of guns will still not be able to defend against a tyrannical government. That argument may be practically accurate, but it misses the greater point: even if it’s true that “in 21st century America, the prospect of monarchs and their select militias oppressing the populace is reasonably remote,” as Timothy Snyder argues in On Tyranny, maintenance of a free society demands its citizens not to pre-concede power to the tyrant. To wit, Synder also writes:

Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do.

Mr. Snyder’s example assumes there is an intentional surrender in order to appease, but his thesis is nonetheless appropriate here. Purposeful pre-conceding of power to a larger, stronger system never does any work to secure long-term freedom. Where Mencken acknowledged a man’s desire to hoist the black flag and start slitting throats, opponents of the Second Amendment’s command seem to prefer to hoist the white and expose theirs.

Neither our failure to clarify terms nor our failure to realize the long-term implications of willingly degrading a constitutional right that our nation’s founding fathers deemed inalienable serves either side of the gun-control debate. Lest we end up in a place where gun control advocates loosen their collars and sweatily admit well, we didn’t want this, exactly, we absolutely must be clear on what it is we are arguing about. Until we all agree on what exactly we’re all fighting over, no one will win. Especially not language.

Breyen Canfield is a trained philosopher and law student at the William S. Boyd School of Law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He lives in Henderson with his wife and son.