The struggle between Good and Evil is almost as old as time itself, yet there’s not a day goes by that Evil does not triumph over Good in one way or another. Evil has no compassion and it has no conscience. Evil cares not if Good is wise with age or as innocent as a newborn babe. Evil is deaf to reason, blind to suffering, and it never sleeps.
The world will never be a kinder, gentler place because Evil is savagely opportunistic and attacks those less able to fight back. It has an insatiable appetite fueled by greed and an overwhelming need for intimidating power. It strikes the most vulnerable when they’re most vulnerable, and though owning a firearm may never make a victim completely safe, those victims who posses a gun and know how to use it can definitely even out the playing field.
Yes, guns do kill people, but not being able to legally possess one doesn’t diminish the fact that people kill people with all sorts of weapons, even with their bare hands. And, when out of control Evil shows up in the form of someone trying to rape, maim, or take your life or the lives of your loved ones, a gun in your hand will say more than any words ever will. After all, even those who mean to do physical harm to others value their life, though they care nothing for yours.
A gun in the hands of a woman is a great leveler when her world spins out of control at the hands of one intending physical harm, and I commend any woman who takes the time to learn how to handle one safely; a woman who isn’t afraid to use it to save her life or the lives of others when threatened by those who have no respect for what is Good in the world.
Since the Terrorists attack in New York City, all Americans have lost more than they ever should have because of the underhanded manipulations within some of our own halls of congress, government agencies, and justice system. Chief among those losses is the security in knowing that the protections afforded us under the Constitution of the United States of America can be stripped from us in the name of Homeland Security, and, most recently in the name of "public use", as though the rights of the public trump the rights of an individual or their family. And we, the people, who truly are the government, allow this to happen because not to do so somehow seems unpatriotic or too greedy. What fools we are, and what Sheeple we’ve become, to be led, with Constitution in hand, like lambs to the slaughter.
It wasn’t the intention of our forefathers, who so deliberately wrote the constitution, that we, the people, should be disarmed or that our right to bear arms be diminished in any way. The Second Amendment reads: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
Militia, as in Military? No! Militia, as in founding father Richard Henry Lee’s words published in 1788, " A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves and include all men capable of bearing arms. To preserve liberty it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them…"
In 1846 the Georgia Supreme Court said in Nunn v State: "The right of the whole people, old and young, men, women, and boys, and not militia only, to keep and bear arms of every description and not such merely used by the militia, shall not be infringed, curtailed, or broken upon, in the smallest degree."
Poor old Richard Henry, who championed gun rights, and Judge Lumpkin, who wrote the 1846 Georgia decision, would probably turn over in their graves were they to know what sort of world we live in now; a world where the personal protections afforded us as citizens of a Republic are being attacked, not by terrorists, but by our legislators and the special lobby groups who would rather save bunnies than human lives.
Unfortunately, a great many senators and representatives at both the federal and state level, who should command respect by benefit of their office, no longer deserve it. So many, it seems, have prostituted themselves to anti-gun and other lobby groups and/or have forsaken the Good sense they were born with. Far too many can be bought for the price of campaign votes and monetary contributions, and paybacks are hell for those not in agreement with the scam.
Even the most witless person knows that criminals don’t obey laws, care about "waiting periods", and could give a rip about mandatory gun registration. Criminals don’t even think about signing up for a special firearms class in order to obtain a "conceal and carry permit". Criminals aren’t real fussy about where they get a gun or even what kind it is, as long as it works to get whatever dastardly deed done that they have in mind.
Whenever congress entertains the notion of diminishing the constitutional rights of responsible gun owners, they jeopardize the lives of innocent people by giving the bad guys a steady supply of unarmed victims…victims like Bonnie Elmasri, a Wisconsin woman with a legal restraining order against her abusive husband who had been threatening to kill her. She asked a firearms instructor about getting a handgun and was told there was a 48-hour waiting period. Within 24 hours of that conversation she and her two children were dead, shot by her husband who had no problem getting his hands on a gun.
It’s a fallacy that law enforcement is obligated to protect your life. They are not legally responsible, nor can they be held accountable should you become the victim of a crime. And even a call to 911, should you live off the beaten track, will do no good.
Ultimately, every American is and must be responsible for his or her own protection and those family members unable to protect themselves. A great many of us take this responsibility seriously and do what we can to have protections in place, but even those measures are not always effective.
Locks on doors and burglar alarms don’t always deter criminals, and that’s one of the reasons that at least 416 times a day a woman somewhere in our country uses a handgun against rapists. This is only a dozen more times than a rapist uses a gun in an attack on a woman. Imagine how many women’s lives would be destroyed if they were unarmed.
In truth, a gun in the home is 216 times as likely to be used in defense against a criminal than to cause the death of an innocent victim in that very same household, and, according to the National Safety Council, children under age 20 are 1,450% more likely to die as a result of a car accident than from a gun accident.
If our legislators could and would employ common sense, horse sense, and logic, they would know beyond a doubt that fewer gun laws, not more gun laws, would be more beneficial to American citizens. Further, if law-abiding citizens had no access to guns at all, a criminal would only require physical strength and size to overpower another, making children, women, the elderly, and the handicapped the easiest targets for victimization. However, in the end, no one’s life or property could be truly safe because an armed criminal would know he had the upper hand.
Women, once thought to be the weaker sex, are only as weak and vulnerable as they allow themselves to be, but none should be made to feel guilty because they own a gun and know how to use it. Mine are used to put food on the table, but there’s no doubt in my mind that I would ever hesitate to take aim and pull the trigger were someone to be so foolish as to threaten my physical well being or the well being of my loved ones and not back off when ordered to do so.
Members of sportsmen’s club should encourage their organizations to sponsor a special Conceal/Carry Class for women and actively advertise to get as many ladies, young and old, to attend as possible. When this was done at a local club in my area, the response was so great that a second class had to be offered. Not only will doing something like this help other women to help themselves when confronted by Evil, it will also help to ensure that the right to own and bear arms will be supported by even more American citizens. Something else folks might consider doing to help ensure that their right to bear arms will be upheld is to join or otherwise support the Second Amendment Sisters, as I have just done. There are chapters in every state, women, as well as men, are welcome, and more information on how to join or contribute can be found at http://www.2asisters.org/.
Dare to take a stand, dare to speak out, dare to call or write your congressmen, but, above all, guard and defend your constitutional rights because without them, the victimization will only become worse.
"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage then to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man."
--- Thomas Jefferson, quoting 18th century criminologist Cesare Beccaria in "On Crimes and Punishment", 1764
