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I'm not a gun owner, but I thoroughly understand the argument: if a burglar comes into your house, armed with a weapon, you are perfectly within your right to defend yourself. Same if you're driving or walking alone through a bad neighborhood, or even working at a job (bank, convenience store, etc.) that criminals tend to frequent.
But these are criminals. Criminals by and large are people who want to get theirs and get out--in other words, they want to survive. And thus, they're somewhat predictable--by and large, they look for targets who are especially vulnerable. And thus, if it was just the run-of-the-mill mugger, thief, or rapist our society had to worry about, it would be a simply fix--arm yourself if and when you're in a vulnerable position, and everyone will be safe.
But unfortunately, we've seen two attacks in the last two days from people who were NOT out to steal or rape--they were simply out to shoot indiscriminately. And when someone doesn't care if they live or go down in a blaze of glory, where and when are the rest of us NOT vulnerable? Schools, offices, diners, malls, sidewalks on busy streets in broad daylight--they've all been breached by gunmen who had nothing to lose. The NRA argument, of course, is to ALWAYS arm yourself everywhere, whether you feel you're in a vulnerable position or not. And THAT, I think, is where this argument falls apart.
For every single adult person to be armed, 24/7, indoors and out, is SIMPLY NOT A REALISTIC SOLUTION. Even if we trained every single American to be gun savvy, there would be plenty who just couldn't fight back properly--they wouldn't have the courage, or the stamina, or even the eyesight necessary to return fire during a killing spree. Even with the best training, some would still be too nervous to be trusted not to whip out their piece and fire in situations that didn't call for it; then, of course, some would just be untrustworthy with a gun, period. You think about the number of drivers licenses in this country, then the number of people who abuse that privilege, and you'll see what I mean.
A common criminal would have no real reason to enter, say, an office building and begin shooting workers at random--even if there was some sort of motive behind it, there's almost no way they could survive such an episode without being downed by cops or security guards. A psychopath wouldn't care; they'd just go in and start shooting. Now, unless someone had the presence of mind to quickly identify which person with the gun was the psychopath and which was just an employee returning fire--quite difficult to do in a surprise ambush where EVERYONE has a gun on their person--the situation could very well devolve into chaos. Plus, how would the first cops or security guards to arrive on the scene quickly identify the dangerous individual? Remember, everyone is armed, so "There's a man on the fourth floor with a gun!" wouldn't suffice. In short, the situation could be made even worse than it already is. The NRA solution works wonders when one or two people are are armed in an office of 40, but doesn't the NRA want to see MORE people toting guns, not less? Don't we ALL want to protect ourselves from vulnerability?
Do I have a solution? Of course not. But there MUST be a way to eliminate the danger of a gun-toting lunatic without arming every single person at all times. Criminals can always get guns illegaly; psychopaths very often use weapons they've legally owned and used for years. Ironically, THEY'RE often the ones protected by lax gun laws, and so if they snap (as a tiny, tiny minority do), the majority of us have absolutely no protection from them--especially when they're our neighbors, coworkers, or even friends. If you're paranoid enough, you'll want protection from EVERYBODY--and paranoia often leads to sprees like the one in Pittsburgh.
I want to start a dialogue on this, in a main forum--some, I'm sure, will disagree with me. But it seems to me that our society has very little defense against people whose minds have snapped--and many of these are people who, long ago, bought a weapon for the exact same reason the sane among us purchased them: protection.
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