feelings are important...
strtbottomjim said:
Grabbers back their opinions with "feelings".
hmmmm....I believe you support carrying a concealed weapon because it makes you "feel safer?"
Similarly, we both lock out doors at night because it makes us "feel safer." Sure we can all cite statistics and historical precedent, etc, but in the end, we do it because it gives us a sense of security....a "feeling"...regardless of whether it actually makes us safer. Locks only deter those criminals not prepared enough or not committed enough to circumvent them. The analogy can be extened to this debate, but I'll get back to the point.
I don't thik it's any less valid for "grabbers" (as you call them) to feel less safe by there being MORE gun-totting strangers on the streets. I'm sorry. I will not "feel safe" by ADDING guns to the streets. So here's what it comes down to. YOU "feeling safe" makes me "feel unsafe." Lock your door all you want. Take martial arts if you want. Install a security system/alarm wherever you want. Those things affect YOU and ONLY YOU. Bullets are FAR less selective.
Here is the basis of my personal "feelings:"
1) Accept that more guns on the streets (REGARDLESS of who has them) will result in more shooting.
2) Accept that all of those bullets will not hit their intended target(s). As hard as it may be to imagine, people who shoot guns sometimes MISS, and the bullets don't stop and decide not to hit anything or anyone else.
3) Accept that some fraction of those shootings will NOT be lawful and will NOT be just for legitimate "self defense." (regardless of peoples' pleas after the fact.) They may also not be used exlusively by the persons licensed to carry them. Let's just call all these potentialities "errors" for succinctness.
4) Accept that lives WILL be lost as a result of these "errors."
5) Accept (after all of this) that the greater the number of guns out there--held by law-abiding citizens--the greater the number of "errors" will be made.
Even POLICE make "errors", often, and they have plenty more training/experience/infrastructure built around their right to carry arms (and fire them) than the general public ever will.
You will never convince anyone who's not already a "gun-nut" to readily dismiss these possibilities. They fear being someone's "error." Sadly, I suspect nothing short of a real-life personal "error" would make a pro-gun lobbyist rethink their position, however. (But hey, as long as it's not you or anyone you know, who cares, right?
🙄 )
Aside:
You can't compare guns to doctors, hands, pocketknives, PCs, etc. They're weapons. They cannnot build, they cannot heal, they cannot create productivity or wealth. They're also not designed to "instill fear" (else you'd use a fake one and end the debate) or give their owners self-confidence. They are designed to injure and/or TAKE life. Only thing is, they don't care whose life gets taken, and no one can predict, stop, or undo the outcome that is so easily brought to bear.
