By LC Judas
Reading one of the posts at TTAG today, I had an epiphany. If gun grabbers claim that places like Chicago and California suffer from seepage of guns from other states that causes their crime rates to rise, then why do the places the guns originated from have lower crime rates? Here’s why: it doesn’t matter where a gun comes from. Chicago and California have higher rates of crime because those areas are more conducive to criminal activity. Slow police response (if any at all in certain areas of the South Side of the Windy City) and unarmed civilians make those places criminal-friendly zones. The laws there keep people who abide by them unarmed and helpless, but they don’t stop bad guys . . .
Criminalizing the ownership, use and carriage of firearms increases crime to those areas. It’s proven that an inability to resist criminals is what they seek when looking for a hunting ground. Chicago makes it so difficult to arm and defend yourself that criminals have no trouble finding victims. It’s a simple equation.
Marching on Capitol Hill will not stop criminals. Laws passed with emotional fervor and tears won’t stop criminals. Making law-abiding citizens into criminals will not stop criminals and actually creates MORE of them. Yet that’s exactly what’s being proposed in so many ways with new gun control legislation.
Is the math not clear? Law abiding gun owners aren’t part of the problem. They’re one of the elements of the solution. Trying to disarm millions with gun propaganda designed to smear firearms owners as unstable psychopaths and declaring that carrying a gun “escalates a situation” are ludicrous propositions. A situation where you need a gun is already a matter of life and death. I doubt anyone is worried about additional ire from their attacker at that time. It can’t escalate any higher and isn’t the fault of the victim. You don’t have a duty to care about or reason with someone who’s trying to harm you.
Many of the people arguing for more gun control laws are asking for “real solutions” but don’t seem to understand that there’s not – and never will be – a substitute for lethal force when lives are at stake. The main reason that police are effective at all is that they’re armed and travel in groups. It’s standard procedure for any call with any possibly armed threat.
Bloodshed is not stopped with words, declarations or edicts. Not even the presence of badges stops bloodshed. The imminent threat of bodily harm and inflicting said bodily harm is all that there is, has been and will be when faced with people bent on harming others senselessly. If there was another solution then calling the police wouldn’t be needed.
There’s no reason to deny the innocent the ability to protect themselves to the best of their ability. No matter how many people claim women on the whole can’t use guns to prevent rape, no matter how many people claim that weapons need limitations, none of it is justifiable. It only takes away from the fact that bad people hurt good people. Guns don’t make good people go bad, or bad people any worse. They’re the only thing that a good person can count on when faced with a deadly threat. Begging won’t work and police rarely arrive in time. When seconds count, it feels like an eternity. I wouldn’t force that on anyone but taking away weapons in common use claiming its commonsense is exactly what that leads to.
You can’t decrease the lethality of a gun. You can’t strip it of features, lower its ammunition capacity, pad it with foam and declare it safe for the masses. That only makes it less effective but still just as lethal because bullets cause trauma wounds that cause organ failure, exsanguination and nervous shutdown to ultimately kill whomever it’s fired at. They have done that since the invention of the musket and will not change anytime soon.
Certain firearms do it more often than others. Any firearm fired at someone can do it. That’s why they’re useful to those who serve and protect, why only state of the art firearms are used by security personnel protecting politicians and why we as citizens (because everyone is a citizen) deserve access to the best. Trying to legislate firearms advances back a century or so won’t make this country any safer. It will only make armed self defense less effective by forcing the law abiding to use inferior tools. It won’t stop criminals, it will only impede those bound by the law who choose to comply. Which will not be cops, soldiers, politicians and their security details, or criminals. Just your average citizen.