March 2021

My brother sent me a group of articles on guns. I am not fact checking, most are from sane responsible sources although they may be accused of bias. I am now biased. As a gun owner and concealed gun carrier, I am biased. I think it is time to examine seriously the corruption of America by the NRA. I am biased against the lies disseminated by groups like the NRA which lie, twist and bend the constitution to an audience that honestly believes the bullshit. I know many people who pontificate about the rights granted in the second amendment and none of them can intelligently discuss the responsibilities that all public policies and legislation represent. If you do not understand the underpinnings of the law then you are quite ill-prepared to analyze it. Like the doctors who saw lung cancer but never understood the relationship to carcinogens. Or sees a damaged liver but never bothers to explain the effects of alcohol on that liver. And worse yet, refuse to look at the scientific research that would explain the linkage. So here goes.

There have been more than 2,500 mass shootings since Sandy Hook -includes not just shootings in which four or more people were murdered, but shootings in which four or more people were shot.
Mass shootings make up less than 2 percent portion of America’s firearm deaths, which totaled nearly 40,000 in 2017 alone.
On average, there is around one mass shooting for each day in America

states with more guns tend to have more gun deaths

the US does not, contrary to the old conventional wisdom, have more crime in general than other Western industrial nations. Instead, the US appears to have more lethal violence

“A preference for crimes of personal force and the willingness and ability to use guns in robbery make similar levels of property crime 54 times as deadly in New York City as in London.”

other social indicators in 2011,… found that higher populations, more stress, more immigrants, and more mental illness didn’t correlate with more gun deaths. But he did find one telling correlation: States with tighter gun control laws have fewer gun-related deaths

http://www.gunviolencearchive.org/

one theory that researchers have widely debunked is the idea that more guns have deterred crime

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/firearms-research/guns-and-death/

The problem with much gun violence research is that the Congress forbids the federal government including the Centers for Disease Control to study gun violence. So the best we can do is extrapolate from FBI statistics.

Whichever side of the debate you stand, your ideology or your love or disdain of firearms, the truth is that we kill a lot of innocents. The law has a term, reckless disregard for the life of others, to act without regard to the risk of death or great bodily harm to others. Recklessness means the person knew (or should have known) that his or her action were likely to cause harm.

A failure to do something; a neglect of a duty, is an omission which can be the foundation of liability. We all know the lethality of guns. We know that gun violence in the hands of gun possessors causes harm to innocents. And we are guilty by omission everyday we do not explore and implement changes in our society to protect innocents!. Universal background checks on all firearm sales is the beginning and can and should be implemented tomorrow upon an act of a united congress. I know that is never happening but I write because saying nothing is just more omission, negligence and a betrayal to every innocent who will die because we did nothing.

As many of you know. I owned the DFW Gun Range in Dallas TX for several years. I have been licensed to carry a firearm since 1993 and have done so. I have many friends from my participation in the gun industry, but none have ever openly supported my advocacy of universal background checks and none has ever published in social media that I have seen, of advocacy of any gun limitations.

I have been interviewed in the news, many times on gun ownership and openly stood against most gun restrictions and argued passionately that the problem is more about mental illness and poverty than guns. I am right about that but those problems are much more difficult to address than simply putting restrictions on buying guns.

I do not believe that the safety of my community must rely upon my ability to carry a gun. It certainly should not rely upon folks who are precluded by law from getting guns but can buy one privately without limitation. We are asked throughout history to make compromises and sacrifices for the safety and welfare of the common good. Hitler and Mao may have instituted gun control in their countries before persecuting folks. But is it better to be shot at the grocery store or in your first grade class than in a gulag or prison camp?
Don’t be ridiculous. It was useful to have a gun when men tried to commit violence against me or break into my home. I have never needed a rifle, ever. My handguns were just fine.

We are dying as a democracy but it is not liberals killing it. I have said this repeatedly…I know more about gun rights than any of the pontificators who continue to assert some absolute right to have guns. I know more about gun laws, the constitution and history. Your zealousness arguing in any absolute right to guns is wrong as has been determined by every governmental authority, legislators, courts and executive branch. You continue to misinterpret the law, believe propaganda and stand on ground which you can only hold through obstinacy not morality or legality.

Wash your hands of my input. Put no weight on my experience, education and training. I guess the blood will have to flow through your living rooms to bring change.

To the rest of you, there are too many guns already in private hands to confiscate, eliminate or buy back. There are many actions which can be taken to help but if you advocate confiscation, you will fail, miserably. Safe storage, background checks and a thorough examination and study of the causes of gun violence. And please stop pontificating about gun owners unless you have insights rather than prejudices. We are as afraid of being victims as you are. Our reaction to violence has been to prepare ourselves to defend ourselves and our families. We never lived in a country that had gun control and an absence of violence. We know this country which has made blood an integral part of our history, anthem and flag. In our world where we do not harm anyone, we do not practice callousness towards others. We intend on being good citizens, helping our communities and loving our neighbors. The carnage you see was not initiated but the average gun owner. It is precipitated by hate mongers, gang members and mentally ill persons.

We gun owners sure do need to broaden our perspective, initiate, investigate and advocate for reasonable limitations on gun access and its use in murders and mayhem. Shit happens. Shit changes. We learn. Now we need to act. Let me be clear. I have used a gun to prevent felonious assaults intended against my person. How badly I would have been hurt without a gun I do not know. But when I weigh my safety against those many victims of gun violence, I submit to the better good. (I do not believe the government is my biggest threat and necessitates my owning guns. I think it is white supremacists.)