Prince Yamato
Member
"Then why don't we do away with the court system and go back to the Old West? You have a gun and I have a gun, and we'll settle in the streets."
Can I comment on this too? First off, I don't really care for cowboy culture, but for the love of God, will these statements EVER cease? Cowboys moved cows around and had guns (for the most part) to shoot varmints and the occasional poacher. The gun battles of old, rarely happened and were often sensationalized. Did showdowns at high noon happen? Probably, but it was probably more like a gang-banger thing than a common part of cowboy culture. I also think life back then was so hard that it was simply easier to make friends than enemies. Also, when you consider the frequency with which the death penalty was implemented in criminal cases, you could gather that all crime was treated as serious and that, given the orders of the constitution, due process was probably more common than vigilantism.
The other thing that angers me about these statements is that they use the cowboy term as a derogatory metaphor. It's another way to say, "primitive". It's like softening a vulgarity.