The Gun and I
Guns are scary for very good reasons. You should harbor a certain level of fear for guns simply for your own safety, however, it is possible to be irrationally afraid of guns. We are irrationally afraid of a lot of things these days. It is easy to blame the Media for our irrational fears, but there is much more to it than over-saturation of media biases and hype. We cannot simply place blame on media without considering other factors, such as education, culture and our own intellectual failings.
I didn’t grow up around guns, but I lived in a rural area and we played with BB guns, knives, illegal fireworks, fire and all sorts of dangerous things. We sometimes got hurt as children, but we learned from those mistakes. I lived all my life in a very progressive state. Guns were seen as bad no matter what arguments you provided and usually, I did not provide any, because I did not want to be seen as some kind of backwards hick. Thats how people shame you into supporting their position. Now, I live in a different state, one that has a strong “gun culture” and is fiercely proud of it.
A while back, I decided to get a concealed carry permit. I didn’t even own a gun yet, so I had to rent equipment from the gun range to complete my course. I remember being in a small classroom filled with people who had handguns of all sizes and styles holstered to their hips. The experience made me fearful for some reason and I could not really pinpoint why. I decided to let my brain do all the work and tried hard to shut out my fears long enough to let the brain work through the facts. Here were the simple facts I decided to evaluate in that room.
All of these people have guns because they want to protect themselves.
The people around me are likely no different than me in terms of their willingness to commit murder. That is, they cannot even imagine doing it because it is abhorrent not to mention the terrible consequences of murder, such as community retribution and revenge.
If there is a crazy person who wants to murder people, he is in the wrong room for that activity because of item one above.
We tend to think of the second amendment as if the government has granted us this right and therefore can take it away. This is not the intent of the bill of rights. As a living human being, we all have the desire to live, therefore life is important to us and therefore we have the right to defend ourselves and those we care about. If you attack me and someone from the government steps in and says I cannot fight back, I will have to fight both parties just to survive and two against one is not good for me. I am not a prize fighter or a martial artists. I go to the gym to stay in shape, but that does not make me good at self defense. Owning and carrying a gun is a practical way for someone like me to defend myself.
If you are afraid of my gun, that means you think I am likely to pull it out and shoot you with it for no good reason. How is it possible that I am such a violent ignoramus and you are a sage, peaceful genius? Perhaps your ego needs to be checked a bit. People cite the number of gun crimes (often including suicides and excluding cases where guns are used in self defense) but fail to point out that we have millions of gun owners who own millions of guns that have never been fired at another human being. How is that possible? Well, its easy, most people, yes, even the ones we think are assholes, are inherently non-violent and for very rational reasons. There are natural and immediate consequences to violent acts. If you punch me, I will retaliate and if I am in friendly or sympathetic company, I may well have back-up if you are an obvious aggressor. Violent aggression also reduces your social standing, which is important to most people for economic, social and sexual reasons. That is not to say there aren't people out there for whom these consequences are meaningless, just that these people represent a very tiny and almost unmeasurable segment of the 300+ million people in the USA.
When progressives suggest that banning guns is a way to stop gun violence, they ignore some important facts. First, they ignore the fact that for most people, the desire for self-preservation is not a government granted right, but one inherent to our existence. They think that the government protects us, but murderers do not wait 8 - 12 minutes so you can call the cops and to give the cops some travel leeway in case they hit traffic along the way. In fact, murderers won’t even give you time to find your gun in the sock drawer, because they are not interested in fairness, or your right to self defense, or the fact that the cops are coming to defend you, no, they're only concern is continuing their rampage of death. Knowing how to use a gun in a life-or-death situation is arguably more important than simply knowing how to use a gun, because the chances of a murderer attempting his craft in front of police officer who is ready to intervene is very unlikely.
When people say that banning guns will keep guns out of the hands of bad people, they assume bad people give a flying shit about their rules. They don’t want to follow the murder and assault laws already in place, why would they bother to follow gun laws? Look, I am for the legalization of all drugs, not because I want people to destroy their lives, but because people are already destroying their lives and then we put them in prison just to make matters worse for them and perpetuate the cycle. Drugs are sold on the black market. There are no age limits, there are no volume restrictions and you do not need a note from your doctor. The same exact people who sell drugs, sell guns and pretty much anything else you want. There are hundreds of millions of guns out there, and there always will be, because frankly, they are not that hard to make. Cody Wilson and others are using 3D printing tech to make guns. Guns are not that complicated. People think that semi-automatic is a special form of gun technology, but really, its just a simple action involving two opposing forces, two springs and a controlled explosion.
People who want to confiscate guns don’t seem too keen to sign up for the task of collecting them. Do you want to be the one at the other end of an angry citizen whose rights have just been trampled by a fifteen year old’s irrational fears? Whose lives do we sacrifice on an effort that will likely result in people simply hiding their guns from authorities, retaliating against gun collectors and possibly starting a civil war? Hell, half the cops I know are in the NRA and have extensive gun collections.
It is time to remind those folks that are irrationally afraid of guns why their fears are irrational. The overwhelming majority of humans on this planet actively avoid conflict out of self-preservation. People own guns for self-protection and their right to do so stems not from government dictate, but from the very fact that they are alive and wish to remain that way. Most people, including gun owners and that asshole down the street are not inherently violent people because it is psychologically abhorrent to them and because of the natural consequences associated with such violence. The few people who do commit crimes do not care about your gun laws and so the more restrictions you place on guns, the more you restrict the majority of people from being able to defend themselves from the people who will simply ignore your gun restrictions.