by Selwyn Duke
There is no issue today that is demagoged more than that of whether or not people should
have a right to bear arms. Around this issue swirls a political maelstrom, in which a battle is
occurring that pits those who seek to protect freedom and the right to self-defense, against those
who have a visceral but irrational fear of firearms. The latter include those in academia, opportunistic
politicians and the most powerful political-action group in the country: the American media.
The media can shape public opinion, and their conduct with respect to this issue has been
scandalous; in fact, it is nothing short of malpractice. Every time there is a high profile massacre
in which the perpetrator used a gun, the media set their propaganda machine in motion and there
is a drumbeat for more gun-control laws. Their reporting is designed to manipulate people's emotions,
but it is long on scare tactics and rhetoric, and short on facts. I'm now going to separate the wheat from
the chaff.
I wish to issue a challenge to the proponents of gun-control: I'm going to give you an
opportunity to win me over to your side, all you have to do is answer two questions for me
satisfactorily, and here we go.When crimes committed with the use of guns occur, the gun-
control side makes the claim that the problem is that people have too much access to guns. This
claim was made during and after the spate of school shootings that occurred in the mid and late
1990's - they said that the problem was kids' access to guns. Well, let's examine that thesis
logically. Many years ago kids had far greater access to guns, for a number of reasons: there were
infinitely fewer gun-control laws. Most boys were taught to shoot while still preteens, and the country was
a lot more rural so many boys were taught to hunt as a matter of course. Even in New York City in
the 1930's and 40's, some kids would take guns on the subways [imagine the reaction if you did
that today] because they had target-shooting practice after school. Yet, these rampant incidents
of gun violence are a phenomenon of modern times - they weren't a problem in the days of easy
access to guns. So here's the first question for you gun-control people: in light of these facts,
how can you possibly attribute these problems to the access to guns? The answer is that you
can't. It makes no sense.
The second question pertains to the logic, or lack thereof, behind what is central to the idea of
gun control. How, gun-control advocates, is it logical to say the following: we're going to make
a law that you can't buy guns, to stop those who don't follow laws from getting guns? Again, it
makes no sense. Making something illegal is NOT synonymous with making it unavailable. Just
consider drugs and prostitution: both are illegal, but both are also readily available. In fact, even
totalitarian regimes like the Nazis, who weren't constrained in their law enforcement by the
moral imperatives of civil rights such as due process, weren't able to prevent the French
partisans who opposed them in occupied France from obtaining firearms. The fact is, that gun-
control laws only encumber good citizens, because they are the only ones who follow the law in
the first place, and these people are not bent on using guns for evil. It has become a cliche, but it
is true: if you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns.
These are questions that need to be answered logically by the gun-control side before we
accept their prescriptions and allow any more of our freedoms to be legislated away. But don't
hold your breath waiting; they won't be answered logically, because they can't be - they're
irrefutable. The gun control lobby doesn't have the truth on it's side, so it CAN'T argue based on
the facts. This is why it resorts to other tactics;sometimes these are deceit or character
assassination aimed at those who oppose them , but most of the time the strategy employed is to
present only half the story. Now, as legendary radio personality Paul Harvey would say, "Now,
for the rest of the story."
Whenever some miscreant does evil with a gun, the media will disseminate the story to the
ends of the earth, but they report nary an incident where a firearm is used to thwart a crime. Or,
the media might relate a statistic and frame it in the following light: guns kill so and so many
people every year. Based on such reporting, one would think that guns were never used to
counter evil, and that they were capable of locomotion and meandered about blowing people
away of their own accord. The truth is, according to the FBI, that 600,000 to 2,000,000 crimes
are thwarted each year by good citizens wielding firearms. The inexactitude of this statistic isn't
surprising by the way, because such things are difficult to ascertain with precision. This is because
just as a good percentage of crimes go unreported, an even higher percentage of attempted crimes
go unreported. Moreover, no one knows exactly how many crimes were never even attempted in
the first place, because the criminals were wary of encountering an armed prospective victim.
Evidence for the fact that this occurs is not absent; for instance, a survey of inmates at a
prison was conducted at one time, for the purposes of determining what criminals considered to
be the greatest deterrent to crime. The consensus among the convicts was, that the greatest
deterrent isn't the police or the prospect of jail time, but rather, the prospect of their target being
armed. Even more convincing, is John R. Lott Jr.'s book, "More Guns, Less Crime", in which
the author presents statistics demonstrating that the areas that have the highest gun ownership
rates, also happen to have the lowest crime rates. One notable but regrettably ignored example of
this phenomenon is Kennesaw Georgia, a town where gun-control only means hitting your
target. This is because in 1982 the town enacted a law requiring every head of household [with a
few exceptions] to own a gun. Yes, you heard right - EVERY head of household MUST own a
gun, and what were the fruits of this measure? Well, after the law took effect in 1982, crime
against individuals declined 74% compared to 1981, and the next year it dropped another 45%,
and remains unusually low to this day. This is why the father of our nation George Washington
said,"The atmosphere of firearms everywhere helps to restrain evil interference."
Another argument that is bandied about in order to buttress the cause of gun-control, is the
claim that nations such as England, Sweden and Belgium have lower crime rates than we do
because they have stricter gun-control laws. While it is true that these countries aren't plagued
by as much crime, it's also true that this is another example of selective reporting - of filtered
news. I say this, because the media are perennially remiss in their failure to tell people about
Switzerland, a country in which every male citizen who is eighteen years or older must keep,
maintain, and be proficient in the use of an assault rifle. And what is the crime rate in
Switzerland? The answer is that it's lower than in the countries commonly cited the by gun-control
lobby.
There is a big difference between doing what feels good, and what IS good. There's a big
difference between achieving temporary emotional satisfaction, and creating sound policy. If you
simply have a visceral dislike of guns and don't want to be bothered with the facts, and if you
are satisfied to let media and lobbying group hype shape your opinions, then ignore what I've
said. If you are happy to drink the Kool-Aid and jump on the bandwagon of the latest politically-
correct gun-control con, then ignore what I've said. But we'd better remember that ultimately we
determine how this society will be, for good or for ill; we vote for those who hold office and
create the laws that effect all of our lives, and those of posterity. If we act based on
misinformation, we'll elect the wrong people and support the wrong policies. So, if we care about
our country, it is imperative that we look the truth straight in the face and acknowledge the facts.
If a doctor makes the wrong diagnosis, he'll prescribe the wrong cure and the patient will
become sicker and perhaps die. Guns aren't the problem, because we've always drunk that
medicine in this country - the proper diagnosis lies elsewhere. If we want to make that diagnosis
and heal the patient, we're going to have to stop spinning our wheels and frittering away our
freedoms betting on wrong horses like gun-control. Because this is a horse that'll never win a
race, unless it's a race towards social decay and tyranny. Let's shoot this horse, and stop
shooting ourselves in the foot.
