A Responsible Gun Owner took offense to my use of the hashtag #GunsAreTheEnemy on Facebook and wrote defending his right to own a rifle which New York State now bans. RGO included a list of FBI “facts”:
If you're worried about being shot here's some fbi facts: in 2011 in the US these following "weapons" accounted for a number of MURDERS:
Knives - 1,694
Hands or feet - 726
Clubs or hammers - 496
A rifle on ANY type - 323
This is my reply:
"Guns may be useful for self-defense, as well as for hunting and sport, but they also have a unique potential to facilitate death and destruction and thereby to destabilize ordered liberty. Your interest in keeping and bearing a certain firearm may diminish my interest in being and feeling safe from armed violence." - Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens
In my opinion your right to own a perfectly good Remington 30.06 does not trump the lives taken in San Bernardino yesterday, nor that of the woman killed yesterday in Savannah, nor the lives taken at Umpqua Community College, nor the children killed in Sandy Hook, etc.
The easy availability of firearms (which includes the legally obtained ones in daddy's nightstand drawer) facilitates turning murderous urges into mass killings. Decreasing the overall number of guns will make it less likely that kids and the mentally ill will be able to get their hands on one.
Please understand that whether or not you agree with the NRA, which states that we should arm elementary school teachers, your argument (the elevation of your individual right above the well-being of society) serves their cause.
Finally, if you plan to continue this discussion here, please refrain from quoting intentionally misleading statistics like the numbers above citing death by device. Whoever compiled it intentionally limited the last item to rifles only (why not steak knives only, I wonder?) and you are clearly more than intelligent enough to see that. I know that tactic fools some people and satiates others (because that's what they want to hear), but it is intellectually dishonest and I have no time for that.
RGO's response began, "It is too early to speculate on what occurred in the shootings of San Bernardino, Savannah, or the Umpqua community college."
I replied,
No speculation involved: innocent people were murdered, and in every instance listed firearms were the murder weapon.
It is not too early to speculate that easy access to and social acceptability of firearms is and will continue to be a contributing factor in the scourge of mass killings. It is, sadly, far too late that we as a country are finally waking up to this.
Finally, yes: guns don't kill people, people kill people. Since we can't get rid of people, I suggest that we make these most efficient killing facilitators far less ubiquitous so that future murderers can instead implement their rage using their hands or feet.