To Carry a Gun

I honestly don’t know what is happening in the world around me sometimes. It seems like I go along for extended time periods thinking that I understand people’s motivations and actions and then suddenly realize that I not only don’t understand these things, I don’t even have a clue about them. I was raised by a father that that was a certified weapons instructor. From the time I was very small, I was taught gun safety and how to use a gun proficiently. By the time I was eight years old I was a very good shot with a rifle. My father taught me sight image and squeezing the trigger, which are the two keys to accuracy with most guns. He shot competitively in pistol target matches and I spent a great deal of time with him at these events. Having five kids in a one job family didn’t exactly lend itself to expensive hobbies so my father subsidized his hobby with work. He did taxes for gun shop owners for trade in guns and reloading equipment. He reloaded ammo for accuracy that was customized to specific gun barrels. He smelted bullets from expended rounds with line type from the local newspaper and old tire weights my brother and I gathered at junkyards. I gathered brass from people who didn’t reload and dug old bullets out of dirt banks behind the targets after matches. I understood the culture of these men and numerous other police officers he worked with as well as hunters and other gun hobbyists.

In those days the rule of thumb was that you never, ever pointed a gun at someone unless you meant to kill them. Guns were the last resort and only to be used for self-defense. You did not point a gun at someone in order to control their actions. You did not point a gun at someone to prevent them from running away. The only acceptable reason to point a gun at someone was if you meant to kill them. I can well remember being sent home from an early morning squirrel hunting trip at the age of fifteen because I accidentally let the barrel of an unloaded shotgun point in the general direction of my dad as we crossed a barbed wire fence. Gun safety had concrete rules and there were no exceptions to the rule that you never point a gun at anyone, even an unloaded gun.

My dad’s instructions made a deep and lasting impression on me; one that stays with me to this day. I often think that had we kept these rules as a society we would not have the problems with gun violence that we have today. Police routinely point loaded weapons at people’s heads during arrest procedures. I never see this on TV or movies without thinking of my dad’s words. Do they mean to kill the person? If they had that thought process I believe we would see a lot less in the way of shootings as pointing a gun at someone is a guaranteed methodology for escalating danger for everyone, including the officer pointing the gun.

Our culture has undeniably changed since those days. Maybe it is our continual exposure to gun violence on TV and in movies but society as a whole seems callous to the consequences of carrying a gun; even to shooting other people. I know many people who carry handguns under one situation or another and I always wonder why. In the final analysis I wonder if these people ever think the whole situation through beforehand and I have to assume they do not because I don’t understand the value system that says it is acceptable to kill another human being unless it is a kill or be killed situation. Do people really believe that situation is going to occur on the way to the grocery store?

When I was much younger I suffered a theft of all my tools one night. I was working as an electrician at the time so my tools were the source of my livelihood. I could not make a living without them. I didn’t make a tremendous amount of money to begin with so the loss of all my tools at one time was a serious setback. I lost around $1300 worth of tools without a way of replacing them. I had to go buy more tools on credit simply to go to work that day. In retrospect I was not blameless in the theft because I left my truck parked all night at a rather seedy bar with the tools in the toolbox behind the cab. I was extremely angry at the theft and I am quite sure I would have reacted with whatever level of violence was necessary to prevent the theft if I could have caught the thief in the act. I am equally sure that I would have regretted it later. As it happened it didn’t have to face that situation but I bring it up to point out that I understand the feeling of violation and anger that goes with having hard earned property stolen by someone who it essentially taking a shortcut to get whatever it is that they want.

I have recently heard numerous conversations on talk radio and indeed with people I work around on this subject as the Second Amendment conversations seem to be on everyone’s mind these days. Without going into the Second Amendment I would simply point out those recent events have opened a window into many people’s thought processes along these lines and I find it a little disconcerting to realize my own views are so far from those of a lot of people I like and respect. I believe as a society we need to emphasize some long term perspective in these cases instead of blindly jumping on one side or the other based upon gut instincts and emotions. Unfortunately, I don't hear that discussion taking place.

For instance, if someone breaks into my house in the middle of the night there are two issues having to do with guns and home protection that immediately become paramount. The first concerns whether I have the right to defend myself and my family. The second revolves around whether it is right to shoot someone to protect my personal property. In the first case, I think we can all agree that we have the right; indeed the duty to protect ourselves and our family from others would do us harm. However, the fact remains that the vast majority of break-ins are committed to steal property that is easily converted to cash. TV’s, stereos, computers, guns, and jewelry seem to be at the top of this list of property that is usually taken in such cases. In the overwhelming majority of these cases the thieves have no interest in a confrontation with the homeowner. In fact, they would much prefer the homeowner is not on the premises when they break in. Is there not a value judgment that comes into play in these cases? In other words, is your TV worth the life of another human being? Can anyone say that with careful consideration they would kill someone to keep their TV set? I hear no conversation along these lines when this subject comes up yet this is absolutely the relative value judgment we make when we choose to shoot someone for breaking into our house as the vast majority of break-ins have the goal of gaining cash as the motive.

There have been several high profile cases involving these same types of knee jerk rationale lately yet we never seem to get to this part of the conversation. The Trayvon Martin case is one example. Leaving aside the “stand your ground” laws or even the particulars of the case on any level, there is a judgment call that was made at the outset by Mr. Zimmerman that indirectly led to a death that would not have otherwise occurred. If Mr. Zimmerman had not chosen to take a gun with him that night on his self-appointed job of protecting the neighborhood the Martin boy would not have been shot. It really is that simple on some level. Why should a neighborhood watch volunteer have a gun on their person to begin with? Three things become possible when such a volunteer decides they need to carry a gun. The first is that nothing will happen to justify the decision in which case the decision is simply a bad decision with no noticeable result. The second possibility is that the volunteer will suddenly and without warning be confronted with someone intent on using deadly force upon them and have to respond in kind. I would put the odds on this occurring roughly equivalent to winning the lottery every day for a week in a row while being struck by lightning each night. It is theoretically possible, but only so remotely so as to be negligible in any world remotely associated with reality. The third possibility is that something will occur that will lead to an overreaction or accidental shooting. Of the three possibilities the first is by far the most likely. The second is within the realm of possibility but so far removed from probability as to be nonsensical and the third is so horrible that I don’t think any rational human being could think it through and still carry the gun. I am reasonably sure Mr. Zimmerman would not make that choice knowing what he knows now but how many other people are making similar types of decisions every day without thinking their way through the possibilities?

The second case that has recently been on the news is the case of the young lady who wound up being arrested for buying a twelve pack of water. It seems that this young lady was seen with what appeared to be a 12 pack of beer in Virginia. It was actually a 12 pack of water but agents with the Virginia Alcohol Beverage Control Board approached her thinking it was beer that she had purchased as an underage person. According to the victim she was suddenly surrounded by people who did not identify themselves as agents demanding that she get out of the car. In a panic, her and her two friends rapidly left the scene and the car ran into one of the agents on the way out. Obviously, the whole incident was a huge mistake on several people’s part but the part that bothers me the most is that guns were drawn by the agents in an attempt to stop the girl from leaving. Happily, no one was injured although the girl was later arrested when she called the police to tell about the incident for endangering the agents with her car. Charges were later dropped of course but the whole incident speaks to my point.

In what world is it reasonable for agents to draw weapons to stop an underage person from escaping with a 12 pack of beer that she had bought? All the agents involved suggested that it was her age that led to them trying to question her in the first place. Why would they then draw weapons to stop her from escaping? This is exactly the kind of reasoning that is so foreign to my understanding. How can anyone possibly believe this was a reasonable response on the part of the officers? How is it possible for a reasonable person to suggest that this was not a horribly dangerous overreaction that could have very easily led to the death of either one of the officers or the girl and her friends? In retrospect, to support their actions in a logical manner the officers would have to argue that letting her escape with a 12 pack of beer she had bought and paid for was a capital offense that she should be executed for committing. People are upset that she spent the night in jail and demanding that the incident be further investigated but I have read no discussion centered around the fact that there is a basic flaw in our system wherein officers who are ostensibly there to protect the public draw weapons on an underage drinking suspect to threaten deadly force if she does not cooperate. The fact that they are trained to do this type of thing is reflective of our lack of understanding that such actions have lethal consequences and the only reasonable way to make such judgments is to consider the possibilities that our actions eventually lead to before we decide to resort to carrying a gun.

I have come to believe that we need to have a logical discussion about gun safety in this country. Whether or not people should have the right to own guns is inconsequential to the real problem that is so lethal; the literal life and death responsibility that comes with the decision to carry a gun. The discussion needs to be based on and start with irreversible value judgments that are instantly bypassed when people choose to carry guns. In split second decision events we rely upon instinct, emotion, and training to react. I seems obvious that our training is often tactically incorrect and severely lacking in perspective. Therefore, we are left with emotion and instinct to instantaneously make what is quite literally a life and death decision when we carry a gun. The irrefutable statistics of actual gun deaths in this country is a clarion call to the fact that we are woefully inadequate in understanding the consequences of our actions when it comes to the choice to carry a gun.