John, I'm Not For Guns: How Does No-Guns Affect Me?

Grab a cup. This is another long one.

Of the several popular questions I take when I speak, one of the most popular is just how the Second Amendment affects Americans who don’t like guns and who won't support ownership for others.

As you’d expect, much of the pro-liberty argument begins with the Second Amendment’s being a civil right, just like the rest of the first ten amendments, but although this should be all the argument really needs, some Americans aren’t persuaded by this.

Here is my answer: It’s not about guns: the First and Second Amendments are all about self-governance, just like the rest are.

Quick summary of U.S. History: The Founding Fathers broke from the Crown because the reach of King George intruded on the lives of the Colonists much more than it did on the subjects at home in England. Settlers imagined life to be as consistent as always, and were perfectlywilling to live in the colonies as they lived at home, but there was more and more imposition, taking them further away from their way of life. The War of Independence was more about being left alone than about change as revolutions go.

This is important to understand, because today, Americans still think life is just heavenly if only we’re left alone, not stagnant, not the same thing, but free from intrusions of neurotics who believe we don’t know what’s good for us and who hand us destructive change, not positive change. In many ways, we will always be fighting this war. We’re fighting it now.

In reality and on the idea of intrusion, over-reach and interference, there is no disconnect between the harassment of then and now, no respite. There will always be jerks who won’t leave you alone, and who use government clout to impose their idea of improvement, usually encountering righteous objection and steering it with coercion. It’s increasing, it’s morally wrong and it’s suspicious.

Jump ahead to the Constitutional Convention: having just won independence, the Founding Fathers had a very good idea by then of precisely what they didn’t want any more of, and they spelled it out in a document that doesn’t empower government, but which clearly limits government. Nioce move.

Language such as Congress shall make no law... and shall not be infringed are pretty clear in delineating what was not wanted anymore, what they just got through escaping.

Jump to the present.

In running their households, couples, singles and others plan for life insurance, medical coverage, budget, vacations, everything else. We like to run our kitchens our way.

But the most neglected issue is how a household will anticipate and manage violent crime.

At present, though crime does not reach all households, crime to others affects you in terms of enforcement, incarceration, recidivism, court costs, probation, debate, redirection of fiscal assets, legislative time and energy... Well, the list goes on, doesn’t it?

More precisely, how this affects the impartial or those opposed to carrying weapons is this: a no-weapons policy for others ties the hands of everyone’s willingness to keep their own encounters with violence from escalating. This changes communities, including those in which the impartial reside. Call it a blowback if you like.

This is the point: the individual can keep aggression from escalating when they are on their own as we all are. Tying the hands of others takes the choice out of the hands of other heads of their households and removes the ability of others to de-escalate a dangerous situation. No choice.

No matter what you believe about violence, having a would-be-victim in charge of an incident de-escalates the situation.

More than 2.5 million times a year, individual citizens thwart a crime by the use of a gun, and often without firing a shot. The significance is this: most, if not all of those incidents (as reported to the FBI annually by law enforcement agencies) report citizen involvement in keeping a lid on things, which is to keep the incident from escalating.

In the life of a person who could have been murdered, this is everything. It is also just.

2.5 million times a year.

That is fifty-three times the number of persons shot by criminal activity. Not murdered with all weapons, but specifically shot. The good, practical and proper use of a gun outnumbers the criminal/accidental use of a gun 53 to 1.

Most crimes are not solved, and when they are, law enforcement commonly finds a great deal of previously committed crimes in the individual’s past.

Most murders are not solved.

And in those states which are liberty friendly, they have not regretted placing their trust in their constituents. Presently, two-thirds of the states carry weapons. Vermont and Alaska have no opposition at all, and do not require a person to obtain a permit.

How an anti-gun (anti-liberty) policy to others affects the rest of the nation is in disarming the law-abiding without ever reaching the criminal.

The important part is that about 2.5 million times a year, the citizen reaches the criminal alright (or the criminal reaches the citizen) in an encounter the citizen doesn’t permit to escalate.

This is good for the household and it's good for the country.

Indifference to the issue, being impartial, and hysteria over shoot-outs or vigilanteism permits the anti-liberty crowd (and criminals) to gain more ground every day, each making a living on the issue. Peer pressure, disinformation, media slanting of news reports, increasingly intrusive rules and impositions, and even punishing self-defense as in the costal liberal states all work against all of us, sooner or later reaching even those who thought no-guns for anybody is a good thing. It's not, because a no-guns policy (such as bans) will never stop the criminal from getting or using one. It never has and it never will.

This grants a freer hand to the criminal, because criminals don’t obey laws.

It all works to reach the household in a massive transfer of wealth in supporting anti-crime costs as mentioned above, even further as new rules punish moral response, and in personal loss, of course, when a homeowner mistakenly chooses non-resistance; the victim's overly generous mis-read of their intruder/aggressor can turn a foray for a quick snatch of CD’s into a rape or murder in a moment. Often it does, tens of thousands of time a year. The condition escalates due to non-resistance.

The net effect is that it can destroy all that you have worked for.

And it is entirely unnecessary.

How can a head of a household address the issue?

By making the more informed, practical decision on devotion to the home over the emotional, ineffectual decision of avoidance/denial of the unsavory realities, i.e. violence. Anti-conflict propaganda has turned a lot of otherwise courageous persons into advocates of non-resistance. Translation: transfer of wealth by consent. This erodes what will be handed down to our children in terms of knowledge of history, values of personal strength and general product of hard work.

By treating violent crime as an issue to be managed like any other issue for the management and well-being of your household, you’ve begun. Think eventuality, like you think eventuality or contingency in illness, unemployment and other contingencies. Households face those, why not treat violent crime the same way?

It empowers the household; indifference puts the household at the mercy not only of the aggressor, but of the misguided system as well, as PC legislation mounts without very much protest on the record from homeowners. The consequences of ignoring new legislation and of non-preparedness are painful and irrevocable.

Let’s go over some of this preparedness thumbnail. I like those classes offered by Department Of Justice certified instructors. First on the list is to be alert.

Individuals need to be aware of their surroundings inside the home and outside the home, and to develop a sense of suspicion, anticipation, and readability of potentially dangerous clues oftentimes available in nearly any environment. Learn how to develop a subtle radar and keep it on.

Going to the store could become a mugging or worse. For many, it certainly has been, and if you believe that crime can’t move to your neighborhood, or that a mugging is something you can absorb, please think again. Being alert can make all the difference in someone’s even selecting you or not.

Second is to be resolved. Being resolved means to understand the situation as a reality and to participate in mitigating it. For many who oppose violence and conflict, I strongly suggest you dump that notion fast, and understand that your personal resistance can save your life, which, itself, may play a big part in the life of another. You can effect the outcome of your encounter.

Kidnaping the head of a household is as popular as ever. Carjacking is a reality, too. The responsible adult point of view is that you have others to think of – and that you and they figure first over the so-called needs of your aggressor. What if your aggressor completes the acts he’s started? How will it profoundly change your household?

For those who believe that a mugging is a small event, understand that muggings have a way of escalating into battery, and that batteries have a way of escalating into serious injury.

Violence is often the product of moral resistance meeting aggression. Sometimes violence is also aggression meeting no resistance at all and prevailing.

Often, often enough, your moral resistance is necessary for the sake of your household, and if you have loved ones, you owe them, and your neighborhood, the resolve to take care of yourself courageously. It's one of the ingredients that makes a community a community.

Resolve means to elect to not be a victim.

What sort of plan of action do you have? You can run, which experts advocate (don’t worry about your ego, just be smart) and if you can’t run, you can resist. You can scratch and you can bite (Bruce Lee advocated biting) or you can train to carry a weapon to utilize the 21-foot rule and other conventions to protect your life.

Understand that, most often, the only language an aggressor understands is superior force; in your life, in your neighborhood, who do you want to have the superior force: the aggressors or the homeowners? Think about it.

Without your having a plan or not being alert, an aggressor's bare hands can be superior force enough for rape, robbery, mayhem or murder. Non-shooting injuries and murders of beatings, knifings, number in the millions. How many more would there be without people refusing the allow the incident to escalate?

Finally, every household needs to understand and remember its own existing legal authority in managing criminal violence. Whether it’s a gun or a shocking device, a German Shepherd, a baseball bat, or the heel of your wife’s shoe – individuals already have the legal authority in most states of the union to use lethal force under certain conditions. [One state makes it a crime to remain in your home and to resist an intruder; would you like to live there? What’s the physics behind that?? How does this affect those households?]

The household must understand that legislation seemingly aimed at reducing gun violence too often applies also to any other resistance you might apply, gun or not. This is not good for the household. In obtaining community support for such no-gun legislation, a community can unknowingly give away it's right to protect itself even without guns.

One of the biggest obstacles to utilizing this authority is the erroneous believe that only the police can do these things. Individual citizens may do many things in their own defense in the absence of police. Sometimes it’s hard to go through this within the legal system after the fact, yes, but at least the individual is alive and able to go on. And that could be everything.

Crime is not a cost of doing business in a free society.

What will you do in time of violent crime? Learn and plan what’s right for you.

Take training from weapons professionals offering courses to individuals, even though you may not wish to own a weapon. Contact Department Of Justice certified Instructors to learn about special courses in how to defend the home and person away from home. Prices are most reasonable. The courses are most illuminating, even if you choose not to own a gun or wish no one would own a gun.

Though you may elect not to own a gun, you can learn a lot about the legal and practical methods of protecting your home in time of crime, not locking doors but in managing an aggressive encounter -- what you may do and what you may not do; many homeowners do not know these among the choices they have.

What makes all of this necessary is that – as I often mention – police have no mandate to protect individuals. Never did. And to add another affirmation to the books, the Supreme Court of the United States held on June 27th, 2005 in Castle Rock v. Gonzales that we’re all basically on our own.

But then, we’re adults. Heads of households.

In the final analysis, it doesn’t matter whether official imposition is well-meaning or sinister; the net effect is the same: disarming the law-abiding will never reach the criminal, and disarming the law-abiding makes us utterly defenseless. Officials have an interest in keeping this crisis alive.

How we protect our households – the household as the stronghold of resistance to adversity – is entirely up to us. We need to do this unfettered.

Whether guns and personal resistance in keeping a situation from escalating are praised or infringed is a real clue on whether we will self-govern.

Or not.

Does that answer the question?

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John Longenecker is author of The Battle We Fight - Battling Potomac Fever To Recapture Our Homes And Communities available at online booksellers. His website is www.NationwideConcealedCarry.com

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August TALKRADIO Bookings . . .

August 3rd, 2005
KGDP/660 AM - Jim Zimmer
California Central Coast - 4 p.m. PST

August 9th, 2005, 6.am. PST
Mark Shannon, The Morning Show
WKY, SuperTalk 930
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

August 8th, 2005
Mike Thomas, Livewire on KWRE, St. Louis MO
9 a.m. Central Time

August 10th, WVKO Columbus, OH
WHAT’S WHAT with Mike Cole
2:00 p.m. PST

August 11th, 2005
WLVL, Buffalo, NY
DIALOG with Scott Leffler
6 a.m. PST

August 12th, 2005
WICH, AM 1310 - Norwich, CT -
The Mark Wayne Show
8 a.m. Eastern

August 18th, 2005 at 2 p.m. PST
Drive Time with Roy Brassfield
WKCT NEWSTALK/93, Bowling Green, Kentucky

Aug. 31st WVNE, 760 AM - Worcester, MA
Engaging Your World with Tom Crouse
10 a.m. PST

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