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The Right to Protect Yourself #5

Do Guns - or People - kill People?

The knee-jerk simplistic answer to the Sandy Hook massacre is obvious: Just make all guns illegal. But are any laws universally effective? Obeyed 100% of the time in all places and under all circumstances? Yet criminals don't obey the law. The UK experience from banning guns - The UK is now the violent crime capital of Europe Open Page in a new Tab or Window- demonstrates that simplistic answers to complex problems don't work.

In contrast, Switzerland has far more sensible policies - automatic guns above every fireplace. Since the Swiss federation copied the USA constitution, after first eliminating its deficiencies, it has become one of the safest and most prosperous countries in the world.

1. People kill Other People

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The annual death toll from motor cars is enormously higher than deaths from guns. Yet although the British government tried severely restricting cars - the notorious Red Flag Act of 1865 - no one with any sense is suggesting banning motor-cars. That's because people kill people - the driver of the car causes the accident.

Do guns kill people? No, not really. Clarity will tell you that guns don't jump up and go on a shooting rampage of their own volition. Guns don't go into a school and kill students and teachers by themselves, it's mentally ill people who go into a cinema with a gun to shoot their innocent victims.

So no, deranged individuals and criminals kill other people, and they use guns, or knives to do so. Guns in the hands of law-abiding citizens are the secret of success - a self-defense mechanism. In Harrold School District Superintendent Thweatt's words**:

"If something happened here, we would have to protect our children ...
police officers are true, everyday heroes in my book, but one of them once told me something very revealing. He said, ‘Ninety-five percent of the time, we get to the scene late.’ I can't afford to let that happen."

2. Guns are neither good nor bad, they're tools

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Usually, a gun is a tool used by innocent citizens to defend themselves from a violent criminal. Nowadays, there are around twice as many defensive gun uses than violent crimes per year.

This valuable distinction is not just semantics, it's crucial for an effective policy. Gun control advocates self sabotage by thinking that guns kill people, yet it's actually the criminals and the mentally disturbed who kill people using guns. This is a common error by those who choose not to defend themselves, yet deny others any right to that same choice.

But statistics have clarity, they count the number of homicides per hundred thousand people, not per hundred thousand guns. This is because a gun is an inert object, just like a knife or a motor-car. Knives, cars and many other objects can and have been used to kill people, but no one with any sense is suggesting banning knives or cars. That's because people kill people, the gun or the knife or the car is the instrument they use. Far more frequently, a gun is the instrument that stops any killing.

Whenever someone misuses a gun to kill people, as in the Sandy Hook school massacre, then he's misusing it. You'll change your life by understanding that guns are protected under the US constitution for self-defense, not so you can kill other people. And when someone uses a gun to coerce you, then you have the right to protect yourself with a gun. The right to own a gun enables you to defend yourself.

3. What is Gun Violence?

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The control-guns-at-any-cost advocates have invented the term "gun violence" to blur the distinction between self-defense and murder. Crucial question: If a police officer had arrived at the Sandy Hook school sooner and shot the deranged killer, would anyone say that the killer was a victim of "gun violence?"

Did Jeanne Assam, the former police officer who stopped the New Life Church shooting spree, engage in "gun violence," or just defend the church members? Such meaningless terms tend to obscure the obvious solution to violent crime and make rational discussion more difficult. So does the misunderstanding that guns kill people - rather than understand that defensive guns defend innocent people far more often from a violent criminal.

4. How to Reduce Harm?

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If reducing harm is the goal, how many crimes - murders, rapes, assaults, robberies - are thwarted by law-abiding armed citizens who have the foresight and ability to learn to use a gun? Criminals will often flee the scene when they discover that their intended target is armed. With no shots fired, no injuries, and no suspect in custody, yet another incident successfully prevented by your right to protect yourself is ignored and not catalogued.

When an armed citizen shoots an assailant or holds a rapist or robber until the police arrive, the chances are that more than one crime has been prevented. If the criminal had not been stopped, he likely would have targeted other citizens later. The bottom line is that gun owners stop a lot of criminal mayhem every year.

Food for Thought

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"As long as men are free to ask what they must, free to say what they think, free to think what they will, freedom can never be lost."

- Marcel Proust, 1871-1922, influential French novelist and critic.

** Your Next Step **

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  • Do the police or the government have any legal duty to protect you [The DC Court of Appeals says No! Open Page in a new Tab]
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The violent crime reductions benefit everyone when law-abiding, responsible citizens are encouraged to be able to defend their families and themselves from violent criminals, rapists, refugees, and terrorists. When women and seniors are armed, they can defend themselves from attacks by usually young, male and stronger violent criminals.

Of course, there’s no sanction or penalty if you choose not to be able to defend yourself. Despite misrepresentation and media misunderstanding, Discouraging Criminals is neither Mandatory Gun Ownership nor Compulsory Gun Ownership, it's simply your choice.
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This article was originally published at selfgrowth.com/articles/do-guns-or-people-kill-people-part-5-in-the-right-to-protect-yourself
* The British attempt to ban early motor cars is found at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Flag_Act

** The quote from the Harrold School District superintendent is at:

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/12/18/stop-school-shootings-by-letting-teachers-fire-back-say-texas-officials/

*** The question about a police officer shooting a deranged killer is in Tim Lynch's article at:

http://www.cato.org/blog/how-lower-gun-homicides

© Copyright worldwide Cris Baker, www.DiscourageCriminals.net. All rights reserved. Republishing welcomed under Creative Commons noncommercial no derivatives license preserving all links intact, so share this widely!

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