The recent, horrific, detestable shootings of police officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge will have the gun community in a crisis of their own making. To be clear, I am not in anyway apologizing, rationalizing, or in any way supporting those who would visit harm on others. As I understand from many conversations with people who believe in their right to own/carry firearms, the rationale breaks down into several different arguments.
First, the argument of self protection in the face of dangers from some would be assailant. This is addressed here, here, here, and likely a host of other sources. But that is not the crossroads that I think is the issue.
I often hear the statement that “We need our guns in case the government goes ‘bad’”. Or “if the government tries to get me, I need to protect myself with the same type of weapons that they have”. This is the crossroads/crisis that the pro-gun side is now facing. The assassins (as that is what I believe they are/were) of Dallas and Baton Rouge could argue that they were defending themselves against a “rouge” government. The exact reason that many who reflexively support anything a law enforcement does gives for their need to own ever expanding arsenals. Those that truly support owning firearms to protect themselves from that “rogue” government, must, if they are to be consistent, accept the possible rationale that those horrific acts were committed by people that felt that the government was corrupted and they needed to act. Again, I condemn those acts, believe that they are completely unjustified, and those that committed them and those that would be inspired by them must be dealt with severely.
This is a natural consequence of the extreme availability of weapons that have no other purpose than to inflict vast amounts of injury in as short as a period as possible. And those that would advocate for their ease of access to them must accept the danger that they are exposing their beloved law enforcement to.
So when you hear someone say that they need some weapon to be used in case “they come for me”, remind them that the same weapon can be used to ambush and assassinate their law enforcement. The same law enforcement that will likely be the ones knocking on their door to “get” them.