Has anyone here ever witnessed a shooting?

[Ron Obvious]

45. It was very dangerous

Especially as we were stupid twenty-something year old boys who went into the desert to drink, smoke weed and look at the stars (which ARE fantastic that far away from any city lights and in that thin desert air).

The situation I described occurred twice, and nothing ever happened, but my friends from the area seemed to think this was normal. I (who had moved there) assumed at the time they were just trying to impress me and I wasn't more than mildly worried at the time. I found out years later that they had found several mass graves in the area, and of course, we all know how brutal those Mexican gangs are now, so I think back to these times and feel very different about it all.

I've mixed feelings about guns. I've never owned any and don't want to. Unless you're highly-trained, they're almost certainly more likely to make your life far more dangerous, not less. But I also saw the occasional ranch out there in the desert, maybe 50 miles from civilisation, and realised that those people were way beyond the protection of the law and had to depend on themselves for protection.

I'm also not entirely immune to the right to self-defence argument, but I certainly feel a lot safer in countries that aren't as gun-obsessed as we are.