Who would win an argument between a toddler and a politician?

What is the mentality of someone who knows they are right? Not the idea of being right but the belief of being right. This self righteousness plays out across not just individuals but groups, and the first group of people I'd like to examine is toddlers. These precocious babes get upset fairly easily when they do not get there way. As creatures of routine, slight variations can ruin a moment. They've mastered simple skills like grandparents and attention but haven't comprehended the bigger picture. But Toddlers believe they are right, that simply them saying it makes it so and differing with them is a personal insult. I started with toddlers because most know the resulting tantrum. We provide them smaller worlds for them to dominate, some just imaginary, so they might exercise their righteousness without it affecting other peoples lives.

Other groups similarly act with this certitude of rightness, we as the adult public often are unable to convince them of the validity of other variations because the routine is no longer food position on a plate but the validity of existence at the table of society. Religious spokespeople that demand others adhere to their version of belief, when faced with unrepentant believers of other faiths or lifestyles, take this as an insult and threat to their own beliefs. They have mastered simple skills like preaching to the choir and damnation, but haven't grasped the bigger picture. Our history is full of the slight variations of routine that led to groups of religious believers to tantrum each other to death often due to the belief that god gave them this part of the world for dominion.

Mass shooters, generally, seem to adhere to a similar mentality that because of their inability to dominate other populations they are entitled to a tantrum. For some it is religious, others gender, still others nationality. But the presence of the uncontrollable variation, provides the inherent justification for there violent domination. They have mastered simple skills like violence and manifestos, but they fail to see the larger picture. But let us now turn our eyes not to the isolated individual mass shooter, but the greatest claimer of the legitimate use of violence the government.

Government is a belief in the existence and preferablity of our values. That within the government the variations of our actions can be resolved and justice enacted to keep righteous the interference of our dominions. Equality before the law is an ideal and the practice has tended to arc, although long, towards inclusivity and justice. But beyond this belief is the politician, the personae of government. These precocious folk get upset when they do no get their way. As creatures of routine, even slight variations in ideological orthodoxy can cause the most apoplectic fits and the denunciation of individual or even groups of people. Because most politicians consider themselves right, and avatars of righteousness, any disagreement on their acts or values is taken as a personal affront. They have mastered simple skills like patriotic cheer leading and identifying existential threats, but they haven't grasped the bigger picture. Our world is covered in wars and policing actions based upon the dominion of our 'way of life.'

So what if the way to stop mass shooters was to end our wars and policing actions that we do the other variations of humanity, you know the ones that displeasure us with their very existence. We end at the highest levels the belief of our dominion and end the cultural zeitgeist of grasping the mantle of righteousness, so that on the lower more individual levels their is no longer an appeal to the justification of violence, as a right, to remove that which we can not control. I do not hold out hope for the toddlers, but I do extend hope to the teenagers and adults whom I believe can comprehend the picture bigger than their own instantaneous surroundings. Some might ask though, What is the bigger picture? If I told you I would be claiming to be right, based upon my beliefs. So perhaps the bigger picture is if we discuss it, in the realm of ideas, than we can converse about it without insult.