Quote:
Originally Posted by cgjackson222
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The very first paragraph of your first link, in its entirety:
"After I pulled the trigger and recovered from the recoil, I slowly refocused my eyes on the target. There it was—a tiny but distinct circle next to the zombie's eye, the first bullet hole I'd ever made. I looked down at the shaking Glock 19 in my hands. A swift and strong emotional transformation swept over me. In seconds, I went from feeling nervous, even terrified, to exhilarated and unassailable—and right then I understood why millions of Americans believe guns keep them safe."
Well maybe we can agree here. I think people like this have no business owning a firearm. This is an op-ed from a person who should not own one. Anyone who feels this way from firing a gun needs to see a psychiatrist.
It is comparing the number of 'gun deaths', which are ~60% suicides every year and include people killed by the State that is free of firearm regulation in every proposal I have seen, and also self-defense shootings to an anti-gun study from the 1970's and 80's that even this writer admits is flawed and uses crude odds that concluded that guns in the home led to more shootings, homicides, and suicides.
Even ignoring the many problems, that the author appears to be a little unhinged and extremely biased, this is of course, probably absolutely true. You can't have a shooting without a gun. As this study draws no line between responsible normal citizens and the mentally deranged or criminal, obviously this is the result.
There is absolutely nobody on the other side of the debate from you that thinks that guns owned by anyone make people safer. I do not like speaking for anyone but myself, but I think I can make a common sense case here. We do not think suicidal people should have a gun, or gang members, or violent felons, or the mentally unhinged. We think responsible Americans have the right to do so, as is enshrined in the foundation of our law. I certainly thought that, when I was the victim of a home invasion, the gun in my home increased my safety rather than decreased it. Perhaps I was wrong, but I strongly doubt it.
I'll get to the second and third if they are better than this and there is a reasonable basis here.