Wednesday, October 4, 2017

Reconsidering my stance on Gun Control

I am someone who took the typical NRA stance up until the Election of Trump.
Some back ground, I shot 1000 yard competitively as well as Bullseye Pistol. I have more guns than most people have birthdays and I used to love every aspect of the firearms game, however things are changing.
If we look at this event in Vegas where we see 59 massacred and hundreds injured in minutes. To make matters worse we hear about a mass shooting every damned week. We are giving people the ability to slaughter dozens of people to anyone with a frigging drivers license who has never been to jail, that is pretty much it.
Why? Well I, like you and others supporting the Second and chest beated about "To stop us from a tyrannical government" But here we are with a mentlally unstable madman as president and what happens? Well tens of thousands of his supporters willing to do whatever he says at the drop of a pin. In other words we now have those paramilitary groups we always talked about in third world countries, so what now?
Well we need to sit down and have a rational discussion. The second Amendment certainly is not more important than the first, nor any of our other "Rights" However conservatives ignores literally every other single right and focuses on this one, why is that?
Is your ownership of a security blanket more important than your ability to speak out? To be protected from unreasonable search and seizure? Will it save you from Due process or will the mighty firearm give you medical aid?
I can say all this has changed for me, all of it, especially since my Sister who lives in Vegas missed this shooting while driving by the concert with a friend and simply deciding "It probably is sold out lets just go find someplace to eat" So what then?
She is a firearms owner, hunter and a damned good shot, so what would it have helped her, or anyone else at the event? Answer it did not.
There were firearms on the Bus of those who were performing at the concert, those firearms were not used as those who owned them knew it would potentially make them a target by police. This was the case during the BLM protest where five officers were killed last year. Police literally had to stop all the tough guy morons who were open carrying to make sure they were not the bad guy.
So wher are we now? Well we need to sit down and have a big boy discussion and decide if this is who we want to live.
I am not ok with it. I have back packed all over the world, including a warzone where I was arrested. It was a story I riveted many people with, however I now realize we are that warzone.
Your next point
As someone who worked with Explosives I am here to say you can mix Amonium Nitrate and diesel all day long and not have much of an effect without knowing what you are doing. There is more to it which I will not elaborate to for the mental instability area as you mentioned.
Now if he had known and done it, would it have been horrific? Of course, monumentally so.
But he did not, he used the easiest weapon to cause mass damage with, an "Assault Rifle" (Yes I argued that term for years myself too)
So again, now what?
How much longer do we defer and pretend we do not have a problem?
Is it only a problem when it is our own family and friends involved?
Yes we need access to mental care and badly.
But hey, the Conservatives voted against eliminating more certain groups of people with firearms from purchasing. THat ends that argument.
I think we need to sit down and look what other countries have done. While the NRA lied their damned asses off to us for Years and said "Australia cannot own guns" It turns out not only do they own firearms, they have IDPA matches too. However you have to go through extended safety training and leave certain weapons at a club, why is this not reasonable?
Lets talk, lets be rational, and lets leave the immature BS arguments and parodies on SNL where they belongs.

1 comment:

  1. Awesome column. I was never a hard core gun advocate, but I have been shifting my opinions over the last several years almost all the way to the other side. I would neither rage nor cry of guns were completely outlawed.

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