Guns
By
Gun control
advocates usually state that if you have a gun in your house you are more
likely to kill your family with it than you are to kill a burglar with it. If that
were true then half of the families in Texas should have died last night, and
tonight the other half will die, since statistics show that EVERY OTHER
HOUSEHOLD IN TEXAS (1 out of 2) HAS A GUN IN IT RIGHT NOW! I am sorry, but if
you are THAT paranoid-schizophrenic then you don't need a gun anyway. You will
probably wind up killing your family in their sleep with a butter knife.
Some gun
control advocates point out that statistics show that in fifty percent of all
cases where an armed person confronts a burglar in his house, and shots are
fired, it is the home owner that gets shot... usually with his own gun. This is
true because most armed homeowners cannot bring themselves to actually pull the
trigger and the street-hardened criminal knows and senses that and lunges for
and disarms the homeowner.
In the other
fifty percent of the cases, where shots are fired, the burglar gets shot. The
statistic that the gun control advocates always FAIL to mention is that this is
ONLY true in cases where SHOTS WERE ACTUALLY FIRED.
A recent
California study showed that in ELEVEN (11) out of every TWELVE (12) cases
where an armed home owner confronts a burglar in his home, THE BURGLAR EITHER
RUNS AWAY, OR HE GIVES UP COMPLETELY AND WAITS CALMLY FOR THE POLICE TO COME AND
TAKE HIM AWAY... WITHOUT ANY SHOTS AT ALL BEING FIRED!
However, once
again, I am NOT advocating that YOU get a gun. But if you decide to get a gun,
then PRACTICE WITH IT UNDER COMPETENT INSTRUCTION FROM A PROFESSIONAL
INSTRUCTOR. I know of one fool who bought a gun for protection, dropped it into
her purse and carried it for years WITHOUT EVER FIRING IT. That is just plain
stupid. If you own a gun, you must learn every thing possible about it, and you
must practice with it until it becomes an extension of your own body. You want
to be able to use the gun by sheer instinct, with incredible accuracy, with
very little, if any, warning, and under any condition (which will most likely
be the most nerve-racking conditions you are able to imagine in your WORST nightmare).
The gun is
NOT a magic talisman (just having it is not enough). The gun is a tool designed
to drill holes through things with reasonable accuracy from a distance.
Sometimes those "things" turn out to be people. Sometimes those
"things" accidentally turn out to be the WRONG people.
There is much
more to home defense to consider than just snatching up your pistol at 3:00
A.M. and John Wayne'ing it through your house blazing away at the shadows just
because you heard a creaking sound. Think about it, if it is a burglar, he is
wide-awake on an adrenaline high, hiding, laying in wait to ambush you. You on
the other hand are still half-asleep, having just gotten out of bed, and
therefore only HALF committed to the search-and-destroy-mission (which cops
call "house clearing") because you are still groggy. And after all,
the burglar (rapist, or whatever) KNOWS WHO HE IS, and KNOWS WHO YOU ARE. You,
on the other hand, think (and fervently hope) it was only a mouse that you
heard.
In this
scenario, the burglar has a tremendous advantage. Besides, with you stumbling
around in the dark spraying bullets, chances are good that one or two of them
will go through the walls into your children's room and very soon you are going
to be too busy grieving over your dead child to worry about the burglar
escaping with your stereo. Definitely another point to consider. You don't know
WHERE your stray bullets are going to go, and one thing is for sure... standard
sheet rock walls will barely even slow down a bullet, much less stop it.
And for THAT
matter, how do you safely store your weapon so that your children do not get
hold of it and kill each other? OK, so you decide that, for the sake of your
children's safety, you will never allow a gun in your home. Good! Why don't we
ALL just bury our heads in the sand. That strategy will not protect your
children from the guns that may be laying around at their FRIEND'S house, where
they are spending the night -- or for that matter, any of the other guns, and
dangerous tools that they will come in contact with throughout their lives.
Ignorance is never the solution to a problem. I believe that the only way to
GUN-PROOF your children is to EDUCATE THEM about guns, SATISFY their curiosity,
and TEACH them to handle guns and ammunition properly and safely, and to always
respect the inherent dangers in this potentially lethal tool. If they are too
young to learn, tell them that if they see a gun laying around, to not touch
it, and immediately tell an adult about it. Once again, there is a good book on
this subject, "GUN PROOF Your Children!" -- by Massad Ayoob. Here are
a couple of general safety concepts about guns:
1)
A gun is NOT A TOY, so never treat it as such.
2)
ALWAYS treat the gun as if it is loaded, whether it
really is or not.
3)
NEVER, NEVER, NEVER let the gun point at ANYTHING or
ANYONE that you are not FULLY WILLING to shoot -- right then, without
hesitation.
4)
A corollary to that last one -- ALWAYS know exactly where
the gun IS pointing. For that matter, you should also know where the gun
happens to be. You would be surprised how many imbeciles are so nonchalant
about their guns that they forget where they put them.
5)
Never shoot the gun -- or for that matter, never even
put your finger on the trigger -- until you have
FULLY IDENTIFIED your target. Is that REALLY a burglar hiding in the shadows
with a gun? ) Or is it just your child playing hide and seek with a water
pistol?
Most burglars
DO NOT want to run into anyone, armed or not. Usually, if the burglar knows
that someone is home, he (or she) will just hit some other place instead.
However, the nighttime intruder may not just be a burglar. A lot of rapists
work this way. In any case, the simple fact remains that these people do not
care about you. They are ruthless, vicious criminals who would slice your
throat as casually as you would change a channel on your TV set. No matter how
well trained and prepared you think you may be, to stand toe-to-toe with someone
like that, and beat them at their own game, and emerge the victor, means that
YOU (for however brief a time) must be just as ruthless and vicious as they
are. You would have to "go crazy" on them attacking with everything
you have without hesitation. Could you slug someone down, leap upon them, and
bite their throat out with total abandon?
If you are a
decent, upstanding, law-abiding citizen, both appreciating and participating in
the social contract which we all share so that we may enjoy the freedoms and
opportunities that this society offers us, then you will be repulsed at the
idea of lowering yourself to the level of this unworthy, groveling slime-mold
of a sociopath standing before you. Therefore, you will probably NOT be able to
follow through with what MUST be done, even if you have planned well and
acquired the tools and skills to do so. You may only be fooling yourself.
So, in spite
of the fact that 11 out of 12 burglars give up or run away at the sight of an
armed home owner, your best bet is probably to insure everything you own and if
someone breaks in, call the police (911), get your children into your bedroom
with you, and ONLY DEFEND YOUR BEDROOM FROM ENTRY.
One last
time, I am NOT advocating that YOU get a gun. I AM advocating that you THINK
about self-defense from a realistic perspective. You should hope that the
situation never gets to the point of a confrontation, armed or not. Prevention
is the best medicine. Take a good, hard look at what you CAN do to prevent
crime BEFORE it takes place.
