And two hundred years ago, a "firearm" meant something you needed either a match or a piece of the right kind of rock to touch off, and which, by and large, you were lucky to hit your target with at a hundred yards or more. Should that definition prevail today, or can definitions change?
There is a GREAT difference between improving technologies and changing traditions.
We have been rejecting the traditions of the past without due regard for what they represent. Within these traditions is contained the knowledge of the preceeding MILLIONS of individuals.
Just as we ridicule the socialists for believing that they can succeed where others have failed, because they believe that THEY know the right way, those who push to change the constructs of society are just as conceited.
They believe that despite the thousands of years of precedence for successful society, we can change the structures because WE KNOW BETTER.
This is folly and arrogance of the greatest degree.
Hayek pointed out the problem of rejecting traditions with the modern concept of "no-fault divorce."
Ostensibly, it was argued that children would be better off if people could simply dissolve the marriage contract with far less difficulty than a business contract. People who didn't get along then wouldn't have to put up with each other, children wouldn't have to see their parents fighting all the time and everything would get better.
Instead, children now grow up in multiple parent households bouncing between father and mother.
These children CAN grow up to be well-adjusted, but they do not have the best environment for it.
But, instead of arguing how it is better for the children, people now say "they will adjust."
This is the problem: marriage is NOT about the two people deciding to be together until they get tired of it. The reason we recognize marriage and wish to encourage it is because it creates the best environment for well-adjusted children. Argue if you like, but I think the relationship between criminality and a lack of a father at home is well-documented.
This is why we should not encourage gay marriage and under no circumstances should we allow them to adopt children. To willing place a child where they will grow up without either a father or a mother is selfishness and cruelty to the child.
This is why we fight against redefinitions of marriage. This is why tradition is important.
In fact, this is only the obvious reason for the tradition- the problem with rejecting traditions is we don't know what knowledge they represented until we have lost it.