Our collective response to mass shootings and their aftermath has become familiar. There’s the impotent resort to “thoughts and prayers” in their immediate wake; the demand from the Right that we not “politicize” what is an intensely political issue; the calls for gun control measures and better investment in mental health; the righteous speeches from politicians; and, at last, all of this anger and sorrow slowly dissipating as nothing is done. Soon, we’re ready to repeat the cycle all over again.

One aspect of this ritual is the insistence, again from the Right, that nothing can or must be done to prevent any future mass shootings lest our Second Amendment rights be infringed. Prominent conservatives have weighed in with this message over the past few days, calling for Americans to keep a cool head and not panic, and warning that such incidences of violence are simply the cost of living in a free, open society. One can be totally safe, and one can be free of government intrusion, but one cannot be both.

And to an extent, they’re right. Privacy and civil liberties campaigners have been making this same point for years about the impulse to curtail various civil liberties in the wake of terrorist attacks. We don’t want to live in a world of constant surveillance by law enforcement and arrests for pre-crimes.