Letter from Mr. Conservative: The Truth About Guns – Debunking the Myths
February 17, 2013
Debunking Every Gun Myth – A Look at Gun Facts
2.5 Million times every year, or about
6,850 times per day, Law Abiding Citizens use guns to defend themselves
against criminals.
Statistically, 80 times more often guns are used to protect the lives of honest people, rather than to take innocent life.
Concealed carry laws have reduced murder rates by 8.5% in states that
have enacted them. This means, that in states where Politicians vote
against concealed carry laws, they are responsible for 8.5% of murders.
According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics & National Crime Victims Survey:
- 550 Rapes and 1,100 Murders are prevented EVERY DAY just by SHOWING a gun.
- According to the National Institute of Justice there are
approximately 2 million defensive gun uses per year by law abiding
citizens.
Connecticut ALREADY HAD an Assault Weapons Ban, so how could implementing a National Ban have prevented the Sandy Hook tragedy?
Some argue “Accidents with firearms kill kids, so we must have gun
control laws” so we looked at All Accidental Deaths between 1999 and
2006:
- There were 60,684 accidental deaths in total. Unintentional firearm deaths were 980 of these.
- 8 times more people drowned to death and 36 times more people died
in car accidents. — Ask yourself if more people died accidentally from
firearms or if more peoples lives were saved due to responsible gun
ownership?
According to the FBI:
- In 2011 323 people were killed using “Assault Weapons”
- In the same year 496 people were killed using hammers.
Guns may kill people, but evil does not exist within
the mind of a gun, it exists within the hearts and minds of those who
pull the trigger with evil purposes.
According to the FBI:
- 99.9% of all guns in America are not used in violent crimes.
- 99.8% of all guns are not used in crime at all.
- Only 1% of the time when a gun is being used in defense, does the criminal take the gun from the defender.
- Only 4% of guns used in crimes were obtained legally.
As such, if a gun ban is implemented, it could not, and will not stop
these purchases, if we banned guns entirely, we could only hope to
reduce crime using guns 4% in theory. In reality we would completely
disarm law abiding citizens and leave them completely defenseless to
criminals.
90% of crimes using guns occur in gun free zones.
We looked at over 100 different mass shootings that we
found in various media reports, we found that the average number of
people killed in mass shootings when stopped by police was 14.29, the
average number of people killed when stopped by a civilian was 2.33
In 1976 Washington D.C. passed a major gun control law banning people from owning guns in their homes.
- After this the murder rate in D.C. went up 134%
- The murder rate across the nation went down 2%.
- It’s safe to assume criminals in D.C. didn’t turn in their guns.
- The D.C. Gun Ban was later overturned by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional.
If you lived in a gun free
zone, or you live somewhere where guns are banned, thus becoming a gun
free zone, when someone breaks into your house, what do you think the
result is?
Objectively, you will be handing over the responsibility of your and
your families protection over to the government. So, you’ll call the
police. The average response time for law enforcement to reach your
house is 23 minutes across the United States.
If someone breaks into your house, to hurt you and your family, what will realistically happen to you during those 23 minutes?
A question to ask yourself:
- Is your life worth protecting?
- THEN: If it is, then why don’t you deserve the right to own a gun to protect your life with?
- SO, THEN: Why would you trust someone else(a government employee) to own a gun to protect you, and not yourself?
Is Gun Control about reducing violence, or is it about – Control?
Under American occupation, every Iraqi family was allowed to keep a
fully automatic firearm for protection. In America, fully automatics are
already illegal, the government wants to ban semi-automatic firearms,
which they define as “Assault Weapons” because they have “military
characteristics”.
Doesn’t that mean the government trusted Iraqi’s more than Americans to responsibly own firearms?
If guns cause violence, then in places where there are more guns, there should be more violence.
- In Switzerland, 1 out of every 2 citizens owns a gun, guns are carried in public freely.
- Switzerland has the lowest crime rate in the world.
Many think Conservatives are crazy for wanting to own a gun to defend
against “government tyranny”. Some people believe that despite the
above data, the right of gun owners to own guns needs to be matched with
reasonable gun control and that the 2nd Amendment provides protections
for hunters, that these guns are not for hunting.
Furthermore, others say that the 2nd Amendment was only for single shot muskets, and did not apply to any other guns.
The question is, are gun owners right in thinking that they need guns to defend against government tyranny?
Do citizens have a right to own guns that are of comparable combat utility as military guns?
An in depth analysis of the 2nd Amendment leads me to the following conclusions:
- There is no mention of hunting or target practice. Hunting was the
equivalent of going to the supermarket, families hunted. Furthermore,
back then there was no such thing as “shooting ranges”, lead used for
musket balls was scarce and couldn’t be wasted.
- There is direct mention of a well regulated militia. There are also
plenty of quotes about protection from tyranny, specifically government
tyranny by the men who wrote The Constitution.
- The 2nd Amendment definitively can be read to define that citizens
have a right to own “Light Infantry” weapons. That means they can own
guns comparable to military light infantry. The Founders wrote the
constititution, let them speak for themselves…
“I ask, Sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people.
To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave
them.” – George Mason
“And that the said Constitution be never construed to authorize
Congress to infringe the just liberty of the Press, or the rights of
Conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are
peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms; …” Samuel Adams
“Firearms stand next in importance to the constitution itself. They
are the American people’s liberty teeth and keystone under independence …
from the hour the Pilgrims landed to the present day, events,
occurences and tendencies prove that to ensure peace security and
happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable … the very
atmosphere of firearms anywhere restrains evil interference — they
deserve a place of honor with all that’s good.” – George Washington
“The best we can help for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed.” – Alexander Hamilton
“The greatest danger to American freedom is a government that ignores the Constitution.” – Thomas Jefferson
“They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” – Ben Franklin
Some argue in turn that this is from an outdated time, and that the
threat of government killing their citizens is a threat that we no
longer have to live with. They say that the constitution is out dated.
Again, we turn to the evidence…
Political scientist R.J. Rummel looked at over
8,000 reports of government caused deaths in the 20th century and found
that 262 million people were killed by their governments, only one sixth
this amount were killed in war between nations.
Recently a White House white paper was leaked to the press which said
that if an American citizen becomes a terrorist even if there is no
proven intelligence he is planning an attack against the United States
it is “legal, ethical, and wise” to use a drone strike against him
instead of risking the lives of Americans to capture him, essentially
depriving a citizen of their right to trial by jury.
The U.S. government has
assigned to itself, the right to kill its own citizens, in violation of
the constitution which was designed as law for it’s own self-restraint.
So, are Conservatives right to want to have the ability to defend themselves against government?
Obama: “If there’s one life we can save, we’ve got an obligation to try.”
If we want to save lives, we should look at the facts, and the facts
say what they say, as documented above. Share this article, so that we
don’t lose the 2nd Amendment due to media hype.
Written By Cyrus Massoumi – Editor & Founder of Mr. Conservative
