This is one of those permanently divisive issues on which I know where I stand personally, but also recognize that those who believe differently have some valid points of their own.
As for holding on to my own modest collection of antiques from another time, none of which have been fired in years, my stance is of the 'cold, dead fingers' variety: my own arms may be out of date and largely representative of a rural way of life now severely compromised by endless factors of urbanizing modernity, but I can damn well hit a target with them and would rather have them than not have them if that target ever came to be some force or faction seeking to take from me anything I would rather hang onto.
But as for that, frankly, as a means of self-defense under all but the most limited and least likely circumstances, firearms as a first and last line of personal defense are as likely to get you killed as they are to repel any serious threat.
The quote I look to there to sum up this conundrum actually comes from Humphrey Bogart in 'The Big Sleep': "You're the second person I've met today who thinks a gatt in the hand means the world by the tail." (That he had survived the first of these encounters by keeping a cool head, and now kept the pistol he'd relieved the first one of in his pocket as he defused the second such encounter with his wits rather than by superior firepower, was kind of the whole point there.)
Owning guns, and knowing how to defend yourself and your interests and loved ones, have never been identical quantities.
I'm more of a mind to avoid making enemies myself: I have long observed that most crime can be traced back to some interpersonal motive as a vector of target selection, and that those who become involved in violent incidents most often were already involved somehow before the circumstances ever turned violent. Not associating with dangerous assholes, nor being one oneself, is probably the best self-defense strategy there is, one which has served me well in a number of dangerous situations when pulling a gun was the last thing I would have ever chosen to do.
As for the spectacular exceptions to this rule, such as school shootings and other active shooter incidents, one can compare the firepower of a single assailant to that of a hundred-odd armed and trained officers outside during the massacre in Uvalde, Texas, and still have to confront the uncomfortable reality that a failure of will on the latters' part, owing to America's permanent federalism problem and its subsequent interagency ambiguities over who must assume command when the shit is hitting the fan, rendered all that firepower utterly useless and still got a lot of innocent people killed.
Owning a gun is one thing. Shooting anybody with it, or even being able to draw down on them in the first place without being overcome with horror and hesitation, is quite another. Not even to mention the post-traumatic effects that any decent person, however justifiable their motives as a shooter may have been, is going to live with the rest of their lives.
The right to keep and bear arms, similarly, is one thing, whereas the continual militant lust to go looking for things and people to point them at, is another realm entirely.
I tend to steer clear of these gunsy 2A radicals who think the Second Amendment means they have the right to have the world by the tail because they have some firepower. I prefer to think of myself as one who would never even make it known I was armed in a bad situation, and find some other means of dealing with the matter at hand out of genuine personal conviction rather than misplaced right-wing militancy.
But as with abortion and many other permanently divisive issues which beset the American body politic, it never made anyone popular to recognize the validity of the other camp's views, much less point out the weaknesses on the side one is more aligned with.
Never the twain shall meet, in other words.
I know where I stand, but have no need to assemble an arsenal and pretend to some kind of elevated moral posture just to uphold my own views. This is most often best done in circumspect silence and with adult-worthy restraint built on one's own inner character, qualities I find both sides of most such permanently divisive arguments usually lacking entirely.
This is one of those permanently divisive issues on which I know where I stand personally, but also recognize that those who believe differently have some valid points of their own.
As for holding on to my own modest collection of antiques from another time, none of which have been fired in years, my stance is of the 'cold, dead fingers' variety: my own arms may be out of date and largely representative of a rural way of life now severely compromised by endless factors of urbanizing modernity, but I can damn well hit a target with them and would rather have them than not have them if that target ever came to be some force or faction seeking to take from me anything I would rather hang onto.
But as for that, frankly, as a means of self-defense under all but the most limited and least likely circumstances, firearms as a first and last line of personal defense are as likely to get you killed as they are to repel any serious threat.
The quote I look to there to sum up this conundrum actually comes from Humphrey Bogart in 'The Big Sleep': "You're the second person I've met today who thinks a gatt in the hand means the world by the tail." (That he had survived the first of these encounters by keeping a cool head, and now kept the pistol he'd relieved the first one of in his pocket as he defused the second such encounter with his wits rather than by superior firepower, was kind of the whole point there.)
Owning guns, and knowing how to defend yourself and your interests and loved ones, have never been identical quantities.
I'm more of a mind to avoid making enemies myself: I have long observed that most crime can be traced back to some interpersonal motive as a vector of target selection, and that those who become involved in violent incidents most often were already involved somehow before the circumstances ever turned violent. Not associating with dangerous assholes, nor being one oneself, is probably the best self-defense strategy there is, one which has served me well in a number of dangerous situations when pulling a gun was the last thing I would have ever chosen to do.
As for the spectacular exceptions to this rule, such as school shootings and other active shooter incidents, one can compare the firepower of a single assailant to that of a hundred-odd armed and trained officers outside during the massacre in Uvalde, Texas, and still have to confront the uncomfortable reality that a failure of will on the latters' part, owing to America's permanent federalism problem and its subsequent interagency ambiguities over who must assume command when the shit is hitting the fan, rendered all that firepower utterly useless and still got a lot of innocent people killed.
Owning a gun is one thing. Shooting anybody with it, or even being able to draw down on them in the first place without being overcome with horror and hesitation, is quite another. Not even to mention the post-traumatic effects that any decent person, however justifiable their motives as a shooter may have been, is going to live with the rest of their lives.
The right to keep and bear arms, similarly, is one thing, whereas the continual militant lust to go looking for things and people to point them at, is another realm entirely.
I tend to steer clear of these gunsy 2A radicals who think the Second Amendment means they have the right to have the world by the tail because they have some firepower. I prefer to think of myself as one who would never even make it known I was armed in a bad situation, and find some other means of dealing with the matter at hand out of genuine personal conviction rather than misplaced right-wing militancy.
But as with abortion and many other permanently divisive issues which beset the American body politic, it never made anyone popular to recognize the validity of the other camp's views, much less point out the weaknesses on the side one is more aligned with.
Never the twain shall meet, in other words.
I know where I stand, but have no need to assemble an arsenal and pretend to some kind of elevated moral posture just to uphold my own views. This is most often best done in circumspect silence and with adult-worthy restraint built on one's own inner character, qualities I find both sides of most such permanently divisive arguments usually lacking entirely.