AP Photo/Ted S. Warren

Like the vast majority of people who are reading this, I enjoy firearms. I have them and shoot them, though not nearly as often as I’d like to. (I’d need a range in the backyard to be able to make that happen.)

However, even if I didn’t particularly enjoy shooting, I’d still have guns. Why? Because I recognize there are bad people in this world and the police won’t be able to get there in time to do more than put up yellow tape and draw an outline around the body.

Not everyone thinks that way, though. There are those who are convinced they know what we need better than we do.

The vast majority of Americans do not need a firearm, and yet they own them anyway, and continue to use them to kill.

Oh, well then. That’s settled. I guess it’s time to shut down the site and all of us go home. Some rando at a far-left site has declared we don’t need guns, so that’s that.

Dipstick.

That’s precisely how this screed begins. Not only does he claim we don’t need guns, but that we have them and we’re murdering people with them. Well, if that’s not enough to change our minds, what will?

Alright, let’s back up and listen to the writer, one Jack Crosbie, for a bit. Who knows, it might be funny.

The vast majority of Americans do not need a firearm, and yet they own them anyway, and continue to use them to kill. This is an epidemic that stems from a single source—the enormous, poorly regulated market for arms, propped up by an obscenely rich political lobby holding half of America’s electoral politics hostage.

Let’s see, that “obscenely rich political lobby” was outspent by gun control groups in 2018. If the money in the gun debate is a problem, then where is Crosbie’s kvetching about that?

Also, the firearm industry is probably the most heavily regulated industry in the United States. No other industry has to jump through all the hoops to sell a product that they do, nor is required to maintain the level of record-keeping at all levels that they do. Further, no industry faces the constant threat of being shut down by the government like the gun industry either.

If that’s “poorly regulated,” then what in the hell does Crosbie consider overreach?

Holy crap, I’m 400 words into this post, and I’ve addressed precisely one paragraph of this nonsense. The Irish don’t make nearly enough whiskey for this, let me tell you.

Moving on:

This is the starting point; the argument over whether or not we need more or less gun control is, to me, as useless as debating whether or not fossil fuels are poisoning the air. Nearly all credible research shows that we need fewer guns and better accountability and regulations for the ones we keep; the only thing left for us to do is haggle over the details.

Note how he dismisses any studies that show otherwise without even having to address specific instances. Nearly all credible research shows his position is right. He’s dismissing the mountains of research that indicates otherwise out of hand.

Further, he’s calling some seriously flawed studies credible while dismissing some damn good scholarly work as non-credible.

Those details are tricky, not in the least because a large portion of the country does not accept the overwhelming evidence that guns do, in fact, kill people—at least 36,623 in 2018 alone, including roughly 22,000 suicides. The question then becomes one of delegation: Who will make the laws that take the guns? Will it be the federal government, the states, or local municipalities?

I’ll give Crosbie credit for acknowledging that almost two-thirds of those “killed” by guns pulled the trigger themselves. I’m sorry, but I don’t see suicides as a group to infringe on an individual’s civil liberties, so I’m going to dismiss those out of hand. If you disagree, that’s fine; we can have that conversation another day.

That leaves roughly 14,000 people killed by guns.

I’m curious, where are most of those fatalities occurring? They tend to happen in urban (read: anti-gun Democrat-leaning) enclaves. You know, cities that vote Democrat year after year after year.  You know, cities that often override the rural parts of their state and pass a whole lot of gun control.

How has that worked out?

Honestly, I’m going to stop ripping apart Crosbie’s arguments here because, well, I feel like this is an unfair fight. It’s like putting a middle school kid into a UFC main event.

The truth of the matter is that Crosbie doesn’t like guns and is morally convinced he knows what you need better than you do. He makes that clear in his first paragraph. Crosbie’s smarter than us, at least in his mind, and the rest of the piece is trying to convince you he’s right. He’s already dismissed any evidence that might suggest he’s wrong.

Nevermind that the Department of Justice has already found that criminals buy guns on the black market, thus skirting all of the gun laws. I guess that’s not a “credible” study either.

Nevermind that the Centers for Disease Control itself found that citizens defend their lives about 2.5 million times per year, far outstripping the number of firearm fatalities. That’s probably not credible either, now is it? That doesn’t prove that guns save lives or anything?

Crosbie doesn’t like guns and doesn’t think you should have them. He knows nothing of your circumstances or anything else. All he knows are the progressive talking points, and he’s going to spout them with every opportunity. Who cares if they’re right or not?