I Have a Gun
I drove around with a gun today. I had a loaded pistol in my car as I drove to work, to lunch, back to work, and I will have it on the drive home. Everywhere I went I found myself thinking that I could use it on somebody if they made me too mad. I also thought that I might be able to use it in the event of a robbery or shooting. I wondered if I would be able to get it out without the other gunman seeing me and shooting me dead. I didn't question whether I would be able to hit him if I tried. I didn't wonder if I would hit someone else accidentally, or if my bullet would go through him and into some unsuspecting citizen behind him. My thoughts were mostly "I don't want to leave my kid without a father because I got myself killed or imprisoned because of this."
When I am driving is when my anger gets the most out of control. During that time I was thinking, "would I be able to even hit the car in front of me shooting with my left hand? How bad would it be to shoot out the windshield so I could shoot at it with my right hand? In an emergency, if it meant saving lives, how mad would my wife be if I shot out a window of her car? How expensive would it be to replace? Would the window shatter if I shot it, or would I have to kick it out before I could shoot accurately?"
You may be wondering if I'm crazy. Welcome to the club, it's free to join. You may be wondering WHY I had a gun with me today. It's not every day that I go to work packing. This morning it was announced that the LAUSD was closing all its schools in response to a terror threat. My kid doesn't go to a LAUSD school, but her school was on alert anyway, and many schools in the area were on lockdown in the interest of better-safe-than-sorry. If something happened at her school and I had to rush there, which I would without hesitation, I would rather be prepared for extreme measures without having to stop home first. Then there's the general sense of unease in the wake of such things as the San Bernardino attack. My employer has had many people on its payroll over the years, and many who have been let go. With all the attention killers get in the media, it's easy to imagine that someone with a grudge might get the idea to use violence to make themselves feel better, or to make other people feel worse out of spite and feelings of powerlessness. It's sad to think that some people's answer to feeling like they're not being heard is to throw their lives away.
So if someone picked today to come in and shoot up my workplace, well I just hope they're bigger than a soda can because I'm pretty good at missing those even at a distance of only 15 or 20 feet.
Does carrying a gun change your mentality? Absolutely. Does it necessarily cause you to use it against your fellow man? No. But it certainly puts the idea in your head.
I plan to make it home without shooting anyone or anything. But carrying a gun isn't for plans, unless you are a hunter or a terrorist. Carrying a gun is for the unplanned, the unexpected, the unfathomable and unforeseen.
I have no problem with someone keeping a gun in their home for protection. I have no problem with someone keeping a gun in their store for the same reason. Not because you want to use it, but in case you have to use it. I worry about people who are looking for someone to shoot. That is a problem in our society. Most of those people are police.
Making certain guns illegal will not stop criminals from getting guns. But face it, it will make it more difficult than going into your local WalMart and putting it on your credit card. When things are illegal and must be acquired through the black market or other shady methods, they are significantly more expensive. That alone makes them harder for a lot of people to get. Then there's the fact that if having them is illegal it gives the courts a chance to put them away before they start killing people.
The mantra of "take the guns away from citizens then only criminals will have guns" is absurd on a number of levels. First of all, no rational proposal is saying to take all guns away. There is always the lunatic fringe; there isn't anything you can't find somebody saying. But President Obama is not trying to take all our guns away. He has not proposed or signed anything saying we can't own a gun and keep it in our home to protect our family and property. Secondly, if we ban high-capacity magazines and fully-automatic firearms, we weaken the supply chain to the criminals. We make it harder for them to get the guns, and we can arrest them just for buying/having them. People who sell such weapons will face serious penalties, which will make fewer people want to sell them. It won't stop everyone, but the fewer sellers you have, the more the price will go up. The more the price goes up, the more elite the criminals must be to obtain them. Then you won't have every run-of-the-mill disgruntled jackass off the street armed to the teeth and able to mow down a dozen people in two seconds. "If they want it bad enough they'll find a way to get it." Yes, I believe this is true. But then we at least weed out the ones who don't want it that badly, who are just having a bad day. If it's easy for them to go home and get their gun and come back and start shooting, they miss out on the chance to sit down, take a breath, and watch some cute puppy video that makes them rethink all the anger and hate and vengeance they feel. If it's harder, and they have to find an arms dealer and pay exorbitant prices and get the guns home without being caught and without being killed by the shifty sort who sell illegal weapons to people with hateful agendas, I really believe fewer people will resort to such violence. Maybe they can go home and write a blog about it instead.
Mass shootings will happen. I don't believe that arming everyone is the answer. The more people are armed, the more people will get shot. Some people believe in the mutually-assured destruction principle of the Cold War, as though if we all had guns and we all knew it, nobody would want to use it in fear of being shot themselves. But accidents happen. People are shot accidentally all the time. Just by sheer numbers alone the rate of accidental shootings would go up. And a lot of people, very often those with military experience, believe that if everyone is armed, they themselves would get the drop on them and do all the killing. How many times I've heard the tough talk of the "just you try it" sort, as though everyone having a gun would somehow put them at an advantage. I don't think they are thinking it through very thoroughly. Sure, having training in using a weapon gives them an advantage. But everyone else being armed does not. Just look at the comments on controversial Facebook posts. You may say something you believe in, and you get ten people who are calling you an idiot, fifteen people who agree with you, and five who say, "yes, but..." and have a slightly different opinion than yours. Now imagine you're in public and a gunfight breaks out. You might be a Marine Corp sharpshooter, but if you draw your gun against the one you think is the bad guy and a couple people behind you think he's right and you're the bad guy, then you get shot in the back by somebody who thinks they're doing the right thing.
I probably won't continue to bring my gun to work. And someday I may find myself in a situation where I wish I did have it with me. But many more will be the times I'm glad NOBODY was armed than the times I wish EVERYBODY was.
When I am driving is when my anger gets the most out of control. During that time I was thinking, "would I be able to even hit the car in front of me shooting with my left hand? How bad would it be to shoot out the windshield so I could shoot at it with my right hand? In an emergency, if it meant saving lives, how mad would my wife be if I shot out a window of her car? How expensive would it be to replace? Would the window shatter if I shot it, or would I have to kick it out before I could shoot accurately?"
You may be wondering if I'm crazy. Welcome to the club, it's free to join. You may be wondering WHY I had a gun with me today. It's not every day that I go to work packing. This morning it was announced that the LAUSD was closing all its schools in response to a terror threat. My kid doesn't go to a LAUSD school, but her school was on alert anyway, and many schools in the area were on lockdown in the interest of better-safe-than-sorry. If something happened at her school and I had to rush there, which I would without hesitation, I would rather be prepared for extreme measures without having to stop home first. Then there's the general sense of unease in the wake of such things as the San Bernardino attack. My employer has had many people on its payroll over the years, and many who have been let go. With all the attention killers get in the media, it's easy to imagine that someone with a grudge might get the idea to use violence to make themselves feel better, or to make other people feel worse out of spite and feelings of powerlessness. It's sad to think that some people's answer to feeling like they're not being heard is to throw their lives away.
So if someone picked today to come in and shoot up my workplace, well I just hope they're bigger than a soda can because I'm pretty good at missing those even at a distance of only 15 or 20 feet.
Does carrying a gun change your mentality? Absolutely. Does it necessarily cause you to use it against your fellow man? No. But it certainly puts the idea in your head.
I plan to make it home without shooting anyone or anything. But carrying a gun isn't for plans, unless you are a hunter or a terrorist. Carrying a gun is for the unplanned, the unexpected, the unfathomable and unforeseen.
I have no problem with someone keeping a gun in their home for protection. I have no problem with someone keeping a gun in their store for the same reason. Not because you want to use it, but in case you have to use it. I worry about people who are looking for someone to shoot. That is a problem in our society. Most of those people are police.
Making certain guns illegal will not stop criminals from getting guns. But face it, it will make it more difficult than going into your local WalMart and putting it on your credit card. When things are illegal and must be acquired through the black market or other shady methods, they are significantly more expensive. That alone makes them harder for a lot of people to get. Then there's the fact that if having them is illegal it gives the courts a chance to put them away before they start killing people.
The mantra of "take the guns away from citizens then only criminals will have guns" is absurd on a number of levels. First of all, no rational proposal is saying to take all guns away. There is always the lunatic fringe; there isn't anything you can't find somebody saying. But President Obama is not trying to take all our guns away. He has not proposed or signed anything saying we can't own a gun and keep it in our home to protect our family and property. Secondly, if we ban high-capacity magazines and fully-automatic firearms, we weaken the supply chain to the criminals. We make it harder for them to get the guns, and we can arrest them just for buying/having them. People who sell such weapons will face serious penalties, which will make fewer people want to sell them. It won't stop everyone, but the fewer sellers you have, the more the price will go up. The more the price goes up, the more elite the criminals must be to obtain them. Then you won't have every run-of-the-mill disgruntled jackass off the street armed to the teeth and able to mow down a dozen people in two seconds. "If they want it bad enough they'll find a way to get it." Yes, I believe this is true. But then we at least weed out the ones who don't want it that badly, who are just having a bad day. If it's easy for them to go home and get their gun and come back and start shooting, they miss out on the chance to sit down, take a breath, and watch some cute puppy video that makes them rethink all the anger and hate and vengeance they feel. If it's harder, and they have to find an arms dealer and pay exorbitant prices and get the guns home without being caught and without being killed by the shifty sort who sell illegal weapons to people with hateful agendas, I really believe fewer people will resort to such violence. Maybe they can go home and write a blog about it instead.
Mass shootings will happen. I don't believe that arming everyone is the answer. The more people are armed, the more people will get shot. Some people believe in the mutually-assured destruction principle of the Cold War, as though if we all had guns and we all knew it, nobody would want to use it in fear of being shot themselves. But accidents happen. People are shot accidentally all the time. Just by sheer numbers alone the rate of accidental shootings would go up. And a lot of people, very often those with military experience, believe that if everyone is armed, they themselves would get the drop on them and do all the killing. How many times I've heard the tough talk of the "just you try it" sort, as though everyone having a gun would somehow put them at an advantage. I don't think they are thinking it through very thoroughly. Sure, having training in using a weapon gives them an advantage. But everyone else being armed does not. Just look at the comments on controversial Facebook posts. You may say something you believe in, and you get ten people who are calling you an idiot, fifteen people who agree with you, and five who say, "yes, but..." and have a slightly different opinion than yours. Now imagine you're in public and a gunfight breaks out. You might be a Marine Corp sharpshooter, but if you draw your gun against the one you think is the bad guy and a couple people behind you think he's right and you're the bad guy, then you get shot in the back by somebody who thinks they're doing the right thing.
I probably won't continue to bring my gun to work. And someday I may find myself in a situation where I wish I did have it with me. But many more will be the times I'm glad NOBODY was armed than the times I wish EVERYBODY was.
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