Dear Gun Carriers

[Clames]

110. So much wrong. Where to start...

The 2nd Amendment is NOT about carrying.

If you read the appropriate SCOTUS decisions, it stipulates that it applies ONLY to home, not carry, and it stipulates that each state has a great deal of latitude in restricting firearms, so long as they don't ban them entirely in the home.

The SCOTUS hasn't made that decision YET. That is a fairly obvious point you've seemed to gloss over. So no, you can't say absolutely that the 2nd Amendment is not about carrying because that decision has not been established by SCOTUS. Well, you can but that only goes as far as your opinion goes.

The problem with your approach is that it involves taking law into your own hands, instead of opting for a civilized society where law enforcement provides the protection. Instead, we see conservatives promoting more private guns, but cutting the funding for law enforcement and for our courts. Bad choice for allocating resources.

The problem with your approach is that it fails to address the simple and established fact that LEO's have no duty to protect individuals not in their custody. Anti-gunners frequently turn to the "vigilantism" aspect to support their arguments but that only proves that they don't even know the definition of the word much less how it doesn't factor into self-defense usage of a firearm.

And the pro-gunners oppose measures intended to keep firearms out of the hands of criminals in the first place.

Of course you have absolutely nothing to cite to support this irrational statement. Maybe you've forgotten who supported the NICS legislation? Maybe you'd care to cite those specific measures then explain how exactly those measures would actually be effective in keeping firearms out of the hands of criminals. ProTip: Assault Weapon and magazine bans did nothing in that respect.

The reality is that if someone is set on robbing you, they will, even if you're armed. It isn't terribly difficult to get the drop on someone by having their gun pointed at you ready to shoot before you can get to yours. Or having a second person behind you who plugs you before you can shoot the guy in front.

The reality here is you have an active imagination and nothing stated here has a basis in reality. In fact, several incidents have been posted here where an individual has defended themselves with their own firearm despite the criminal having the drop on them. Some cases against multiple criminals. Your point actually highlights very strongly why being armed is that much better because if someone is set on criminal action then deterrent effects such as police presence certainly cannot be relied upon by itself.

The reality is that our gun culture escalates violence, where countries with fewer firearms don't have similar problems. You can try to win a private arms race, but it is a losing proposition. And frankly most of the pro-gunners have unrealistic expectations anyway about how much good their firearm will provide them.

Gun culture does not escalate violence. Drug culture and gang culture do. Funny you talk about correlation is not indicative on one thing yet you state that countries with fewer firearms don't have similar problems like it's the sole differentiating factor. You are wrong for making that assumption because there are countries with fewer guns that have higher per capita rates of violent crime because they also suffer from rampant gang and drug problems. Anti-gunners seem to have an utter lack of understanding such dynamics and as such have unrealistic expectations of the effectiveness of the gun-control laws they advocate.

If you rely too much on your firearm, you don't rely enough on alternative solutions to stay safe.

That's only if you assume every gun owner relies on their firearm to such an extent. Many in fact use the firearm as part of a more comprehensive system which is vastly better than those who simply rely on deadbolts and police response times.

I don't want to see anyone be unsafe; however the end result with our proliferation of firearms has NOT been to make us safer.

Hasn't made anyone less safe either. That's a commonly stated fallacy of anti-gunners though. Since private gun ownership has increased at the same time there has been an overall decrease in crime it's difficult to fathom why some cling to that notion. I will not state that more guns = more safety to the general population because I know there is little evidence to support such a statement just like there is little evidence to support more guns = more crime. I can support that reasoning because the CDC found exactly the same when they reviewed dozens of studies on both sides of the debate.