Blood on Whose Hands?

For the past several days, I have been told that, as a member of the NRA, I “have blood on my hands”, and that I should, in fact, be killed for “wanting to arm teachers.”  That stricter gun control was the only possible answer to the recent violent attacks.  Let’s examine these ideas:

Chicago, Illinois has the strictest gun control laws in the nation.  Bar none.  If gun control worked, why are there an average of 41 homicides per month in Chicago alone?  According to the Brady Campaign, “Connecticut has strong gun laws that help combat the illegal gun market, prevent the sale of most guns without background checks and reduce risks to children”, and is ranked as fifth-safest State in the nation.  So how did a school shooting happen there?

All States which have introduced right-to-carry laws have seen a reduction in crime.  More tellingly, Israel (!) has had zero school shootings since they began keeping armed staff in their schools, while the UK has seen a 40% increase in violent crime and almost 100% increase in homicides since forcibly disarming its citizens (sorry, “subjects”).  Why is this?  Because criminals, by definition, want something easy.  If there is a chance that any given person on the street could injure or kill them, they are less likely to risk an engagement.  It is the same reason that school shootings have seen such an increase since we started designating “gun-free zones”—they are easy pickings.  Even the armed security at Virginia proved nearly useless, believing that the shooter had been apprehended after killing two people.  How many lives could have been saved if the professors—hell, if the students had not been debarred from the basic human right of self-defense?

Which brings me to my next point: I am not in favor of “arming teachers”.  This came up on Facebook recently—I don’t think that people who are uncomfortable with firearms should be required to carry them, nor do I think that those who do should be required to engage in every situation.  But the more decent people who are free immediately to engage a murderer with equal force, the fewer lives will be lost overall.  And since one of the founding principles of our nation is that the basic human right to self-defense “shall not be infringed”, this should be a non-issue.

The only people with blood on their hands in this debate are the monsters who actually commit murder—regardless of the implement  they choose for their killing (box knives on a jet, for instance).  But if we are going to create a guilt-by-association for their enablers, that guilt falls on the Brady Campaign and others who would paint targets on our children.  Not those of us who would do what is necessary to protect them.