Responsible Gun Ownership

Whatever your political stance, whatever your beliefs, however you feel about guns and gun control, stating that "I never saw a body with bullet holes that was more devastating than taking the right to arm ourselves away," is absolutely insane (Ben Carson's response to the mass shooting at an Oregon community college).

Any human being with any bullet holes is devastating; I don't care if you love or hate that person, that level of violence is horrific. I am so tired of this entire damned discussion. Guns are used to kill people. "Guns don't kill people, people kill people." Yup, and they like to use guns to do it. A person with a knife can't take out as many people as a person with a gun. A child with a knife is far more likely to cut themselves than they are to shove the knife through their skull. Yeah, i went with the horrific and devastating visual.

I am not interested in perpetrating violence, nor am I interested in taking away the right for an American to own a gun. However, I think that we as a nation should do our damnedest to keep guns out of the hands of crazy people. As a gun owner, how do you feel about a crazy angry person going to a garage sale, buying a gun, and walking into a school? You might not do it, but some crazy person will. And I don't care what the reason - anybody who'd walk into a room and shoot a bunch of people sitting around praying or watching a movie or studying their lessons or watching tv or cowering under a table crying with their hands on their head is bat shit crazy.




Gun owners and pacifists and Republicans and Democrats and Libertarians and Socialists and right wingers and leftists and and everybody else should be doing our damnedest to make sure that crazy people don't have guns. I'm not saying that we should remove all the guns from all the citizens in the country. What the hell is wrong with waiting a week for your gun, buying a gun and ammo through a licensed distributor, getting a background check to make sure the person hasn't committed a felony or isn't under hospitalization for schizophrenia? What is wrong with a freaking questionnaire to make sure that someone knows basic gun safety rules and doesn't want to kill, kill, kill?

Gun control does not equal gun removal. A human being whose body has been ripped through with bullet holes is not to be compared to a law. Yes, there is a connection, but stating that the tragedy of a human being who has been senselessly murdered is somehow less devastating that a law is beyond comprehension. Why on earth does everything need to be one or the other? We're talking about basic human compassion here. If someone can't see that a human being who has been gunned down is the most devastating thing possible, how on earth can they be expected to be responsible with a gun?
A comparison like Ben Carson's is so raw that it I wonder if I should change my beliefs about gun control. Someone who would use a human being whose life has been violently and painfully cut short and create a visual image of that person's body ripped and bleeding as proof that PEOPLE SHOULD HAVE GUNS is seriously messed up!

Hell, I'm from New Jersey. You have to go to a store created specifically for selling alcohol to get a six pack, but I never heard anyone say their basic human rights were violated because they couldn't buy a case of wine at a yard sale!

If I woke up tomorrow and decided I wanted to start hunting, I could wait a week for my gun permit to go through. I could use that week to learn how to safely operate a gun, to get my hunting license, to prepare for my trip. If I woke up tomorrow morning with a burning need to hunt, I wouldn't need to run to the corner store, grab a gun that's almost as tall as I am, wave it in the air willie nillie on my way to the closest patch of trees, shove in some ammo, and just start shooting at some squirrels!
Gun ownership is a responsibility. Regardless of whether you think it's a right or a privilege or anything else, it is a responsibility, and it's not something that should be taken lightly. A gun owner needs to know how to responsibly handle their weapon. A gun owner needs to know how to safely maintain their weapon. A gun owner needs to have the care and patience to properly unload their weapon before putting it away.

Gun owners need to the strength of mind to keep control of their weapons and use them in a safe manner. This is for their safety as well as those around them. If someone is so excitable and so impatient that they can't wait a week before buying a weapon, how the hell can they have the patience to properly use a gun?

ARGH! I am sick of this crap. Who the hell thinks that taking time and care in purchasing and using a gun is somehow more important than taking time and care in making sure people are protected from that gun?

Owning a gun is hard work. It requires dedication and focus. The idea that a human being shot repeatedly is not devastating enough to have a discussion about how we can work together to make sure gun ownership is safe is too fucking crazy to comprehend.

This is not the end of this rant. I've avoided discussion of gun rights for years because it's such a damned polarizing topic. I'm tired of sitting back and reading all the hate that is being tossed around everywhere. Gun ownership and hate? What a shitty combination!

I will talk about this another time, when I'm calmer, when my mind hasn't just been whipped through with the idea that anyone would say that a murdered person isn't devastating enough to think about and talk about (insert any possible cause here).