About Gun Control vs. Personal Responsibility

To both my readers,

As usual, I'm preaching to the choir on this one. I hope you enjoy anyway.

Imagine that you are in a room with nine other people. Of the ten people including you, nine of them are nice people. These nine are well-balanced, caring individuals that want to get along and be peaceful with each other. The tenth one is a sociopath. Number ten wants nothing more than to hurt others and generally be a jerk.

Let's imagine that there are no weapons allowed in the room. Of course, nine of you will comply and not have weapons. The tenth doesn't care what the rules are, and brings a gun in with the full knowledge that there are nine sitting ducks. It is possible that between nine of you, you could eventually overpower the tenth, albeit through some calculated bloodshed and collateral loss.

Now imagine if you will that weapons are welcome in this room - encouraged in fact. When our sociopath is in this room with nine other people who are well-armed, well-trained and well-practiced. Sure, he can bring a weapon in as well, but he has cause for concern in actually acting on his evil impulses. If he should choose to act on dark intentions, the other nine would be ready to quickly restore the peace.

If it should come to a firefight, nine responsible people would:
1) treat his or her weapon as if it were always loaded.
2) keep the weapon pointed away from each other.
3) keep his or her finger off the trigger until the perpetrator was in the sights.
4) not take the shot unless it was a clear one.

The fact of the matter is that people don't refrain from violence because it is illegal, or for fear of the repercussions. Good people refrain from violence because it is not right. Bad people don't refrain from violence because they don't care what is right or not.

Instead of a room of ten, let's put this scenario into the statistical scope of reality. According to the FBI, in the year 2007, there were an estimated 466.9 violent crimes per 100,000 people. This amounts to you being one person in a room of 214 people, of which one is an asshole. Keep in mind that this is a number on ALL violent crimes, not just gun-related violent crimes. That one person in 214 could be prone to pushing an old lady down the stairs, raping your sister, or any one of a number of atrocities including shooting another human being in cold-blood. Would you feel more or less comfortable if the other 213 were well-trained, well-practiced and well-armed?

This is why a well-armed society is a polite society. Not because everyone needs to have the threat of death hovering over their head - just the bad guys. Anyone who would consider gaining the training and practice, and arming themselves will get my encouragement and support.