Taking freedom to an incredible level, the state of Iowa is giving gun permits to blind people, according to USA Today. Companies can sell caviar to a person whose taste buds don’t function properly, and it’s the same freedom of consumer choice that allows gunmakers to sell firearms to the blind.
No Iowa citizen can be denied the right to pack some heat–and the state certainly doesn’t want to be accused of discrimination. Denying the blind the right to carry a firearm would run smack into the Americans with Diabilities Act, which protects the rights of differently-abled Americans–whether they are wheelchair-bound, tastebud-challenged, hearing- or sight-impaired. Spotify and Apple are similarly free to sell unlimited amounts of streaming music to the deaf, for instance. And the deaf are free to buy it. Going forward, the practical realities of gun ownership by the blind should be an interesting test of the working realities of the concept of rights broadly protected without individual exceptions. Even for the blind and vice-presidents.