Are You Sure You Support a Ban?

Assault Weapons... they're evil, right?  No one needs them, right? Ban them, right!

Are you sure you want to go down that path?

First off - an Assault Weapon does not exist.  It's a meaningless term.  An "assault rifle" cannot be purchased in the United States without a stringent set of licensing and five digits worth of cash.  An assault rifle is a fully automatic, mid-range cartridge rifle stemming from the STG44 of WWII.

An AR-15 is a semi-automatic rifle using part of the same operating system as the M-16 and M-4.  It is NOT fully automatic.  If you can't figure this part out, then I mock your "superior" education and research skills.

Second... and more important: a BAN?  Really?

You might support a ban because you loathe guns.  That's ok... I can accept you loathing guns.

But do you REALLY  want a world where you can ban something just because you... or a group of people... dislike something?

Think of what could be banned:

Alcohol
Smoking
Speech
Patterns of Thought
SUVs
Twilight
Lord of the Rings
Homosexuality
Abortion
Video Games
Planking
The Duck Face
etc.

Face It... everything offends someone.  If we start banning on the basis of dislike, where does that stop?  This is not a slippery slope: there's a reason that restraints were built into the Constitution.  Those reasons stem from the fact that, once a government starts reducing rights, it never stops.

Consider this:  Every argument that can be made for banning guns could also be made for banning alcohol.  But we tried that, and look how well that worked out.


Ah, you're saying - but guns are dangerous in a way that alcohol or SUVs are not!

Really?  Statistically not so:  more people are killed - by far -by the use or misuse of alcohol or SUVs than are ever killed by guns.

The presence of guns does not increase violence.  Look at Switzerland.


Australia has imposed a total "assault weapons" ban.  Their violent "gun crime" has gone up.

Mass shootings, by the way, started AFTER the first "assault weapons" ban was imposed.  Lotta good that did, huh?

If you want to keep people in movie theaters and schools safe, lets look at what really works, not what satisfies one group's loathing.

Do you really want to push the Government further down the path of intrusiveness just to quell your own loathing?  What happens when that Government comes after you?

I want the Government out of my bedroom, my communications, and my gun cabinet.

If you can't see the connection, you need to think it through.

We live, supposedly, in a country where we are free to do as we please, until our actions prove themselves as an identifiable threat to another person (my right to swing my fist ends at your nose... right?).  If we start to infringe on those rights, before long all citizens will be subjects in straight-jackets, and no one will be swinging their arms at all.

Civil Rights exist in part because they keep the government subject to its citizens, not vice-versa.  Like it or not, the right to keep and bear arms is as fundamental as the right to vote, speak your mind, assemble, or believe what you want.

If you believe in equal rights, you should oppose a gun ban.
If you believe in women's rights, you should oppose a gun ban.
If you believe in the right to vote, you should oppose a gun ban.
If you believe in the right to pursue your own happiness, you should oppose a gun ban.
If you believe in your right to think as you please, you should oppose a gun ban.
If you believe in a free press, you should oppose a gun ban.
If you believe that you can make better decisions for yourself than your government can, you should oppose a gun ban.

IF YOU SUPPORT CIVIL RIGHTS... BE CONSISTENT, SUPPORT ALL OF THEM.