At the risk of alienating everyone on both sides, I would dare suggest there might be a reasoned path forward. First, for the sake of discussion, we set aside partisan rhetoric. Second, except for what the Founding Fathers signed onto as our “inalienable right to life,” we disregard for the time being our supposed legal rights and focus instead on the logic of the issue. Then, we each try to answer this simple question, “Why, as a nonmilitary, non-law enforcement, private citizen, do I want or need firearms?” Some possible answers:
1. I want to off the rats getting into my corn crib, the skunk getting into my henhouse, or the raccoon getting into my garbage can. (IMHO, if you’re so inept at handling firearms that you think you need an AR-15 for this purpose, you probably shouldn’t be allowed to touch one.)
2. I like/need to hunt game.
3. I enjoy target shooting.
4. I collect historical weapons.
5. I want to be able to defend hearth and home against intruders.
6. I want to be able to intimidate or to kill anyone I perceive to be threatening me, whenever, wherever.
7. I want to be able to intimidate or to kill lots of people rapidly.
8. I am keen to participate in the imminent civil/race war.
9. I want to be able to take out machine guns, tanks, Black Hawks, drones, or whatever weapons the government might try to deploy against me.
How you answered the question would logically determine what kinds of firearms would be appropriate for your wants and needs and when, where, and under what circumstances it would be appropriate to carry and use them. If you concur with answers 6-9, you need read no further. If you believe that there might be a better way of resolving differences than trying to kill each other, please read on. …
“But wait,” you say, “the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” Rubbish! It’s certainly not the only way, and as the social experiment of the last several decades has proven, it’s not a particularly good way. Deregulation and proliferation of firearms in this country has only resulted in ever-increasing gun violence, in sharp contrast to other English-speaking, gun-loving countries such as Australia, New Zealand, and the UK, where regulation has drastically curbed gun violence.
“Well, if public carrying of guns is outlawed, only outlaws will be carrying guns.” Precisely! If someone with an assault weapon was waltzing down the street, towards a playground, school, political rally, or peaceful protest, into a restaurant, bank, library, church, clinic, or city council meeting, it would be presumed that he was up to no good. Those whose jobs it is to serve and to protect us (law enforcement), could and should confront him, disarm him, and arrest him.
Then no one in government need bother about our guns safely kept in our own homes.
— David Webb, MD in Gun Violence – A Possible Path Forward?
