Bit More On Guns

There is a balance to be found between all or nothing. Reasonable laws, properly enforced, can save hundreds, even thousands of lives each year. The idea is to make it more difficult for would-be shooters and criminals, without it being too restrictive overall.

Gun proponents generally have lame arguments. Here are their common tactics. The purpose of the below argument methods is to derail any intelligent discussion on guns and to remove compromise as an option.

• Change the Subject! Talk about traffic accident fatalities. Bring up drunk driving, or drugs. Discuss all the ways people die other than by guns. Win by misdirection.
• Dominate the conversation! Just keep talking. If something can be said in 1 sentence then better to say it in 20. Introduce unrelated topics (see above). Overwhelm the discussion like you’re a high volume clip on full auto. Win by force.
• Zero Sum! Accept no compromise. Any gun control is bad gun control. Regardless of what level of gun control is being proposed, escalate the argument into all or nothing. Win with absolutes.
• Insult! Question your opponent’s patriotism. Guns are the American way! The founding fathers said so! Question your opponent’s intelligence. We have to fight tyranny! Quote criminals and dictators to illustrate their gun-love. Make your opponent appear selfish and stupid. Win by belittling.
• Can’t beat ‘em! Crime will never go away. Violence will never go away. People with guns kill people so we need more people with guns. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. Win thru demoralization.

We should always be working towards reducing shootings and gun violence. The contributing factors are many. Including societal, cultural, socioeconomic, family, relationships, mental health, and access to guns. Save for guns these factors are nuanced and multi-faceted; gun control is more straightforward and tangible. Let’s get some reasonable nation-wide laws on the books, enforce them, and then move on.

Some people hear of a shooting and imagine if only they could have been there with their own gun and killed the shooter. Other people hear of a shooting and imagine if only there was not a shooting in the first place.