*snicker* Gun-rights activist Adam Kokesh arrested in Herndon

[Decoy of Fenris]

79. I could get into a point by point debate with you,

but to be blunt, it'd serve no purpose. You've had your experiences, and I've had mine.

I've had guns pointed in my face and been (mostly) unafraid. I've bought and sold firearms legally and made good money. I've got target shooting solely for the sake of shooting. I've never hunted. I store my guns in a secure case, with no ammo in the room and the firing pins in a separate location. Safety is -paramount- in my home, because I couldn't live with a death that I had no intention to cause. (You break in and threaten my fiancee, though, and I will have every intention to harm you as much as possible. )

For you, security is a lack of guns. For others, safety is the -presence- of guns. We had an unarmed maniac running around the forest not too long ago and threatening rural residents, but the police felt he was enough of a threat to call the entire area code and have us on a "shelter in place" sort of deal. I will tell you that in that moment, nothing made me feel more safe than the bolt-action mosin-nagant with a full clip aimed at the only door in or out. It's a collector's piece; it's incredibly valuable, it's a firearm equivalent of "Batman first issue." I had absolutely no reservations about ruining it's value if need be, and I've never felt safer. Likewise, I hope I'm never in that situation again. Nor would I wish anyone to be in that same situation, but unable to defend themselves because of overabundance of gun control laws.


As always, we differ. My voice is a minority on DU in this regard, and I do understand that. I see your point of view, and I do respect it, and although you raise good points, I cannot agree with some or indeed most of them. Every negative symptom of gun ownership that you have described is a result of irresponsibility, recklessness or criminal activity. Take those same factors and apply them to almost any other inanimate object, and you will have accidents, and likely have deaths as well. It's hard for me to get worked up about gun deaths when gun controllers ignore the 150,000 people that die a day. The normal interchange is something along the lines of "Someone got shot today!" "Seventy thousand people starved. But yeah, someone got shot somewhere, I guess."


Anyways, I'm rambling. My apologies for the delay in the post, and my apologies too that we cannot truly reconcile our differences. You see guns as an unnecessary evil, and I see them as a necessary good. There's very little common ground, but the best we can do is meet somewhere along the lines of "True Neutral."