One of the favorite statistics for gun control advocates trying to counter the idea of good guys with guns saving lives is the number of people killed in self-defense shootings. The number is fairly low, and they are trying to use it to argue that yes, gun control will save more lives than it will cost.

I applaud them for trying to make that case because it’s an important case to make one way or the other, but they’re wrong. For one thing, they fail to account for those who are simply wounded or who stop their criminal acts when a firearm is presented. For another, self-defense doesn’t just mean defending yourself against two-legged predators.

A pit bull attacked a teenage girl Thursday in Pittsburgh’s Larimer neighborhood, forcing a neighbor to shoot the dog, according to police.

…

The 15-year-old girl had just arrived at the home to visit a friend and, when the 17-year-old friend opened the door, the dog rushed out and attacked the first girl, George said.

George said the owner began screaming for help, and a neighbor rushed to the home and shot the dog, which was on top of and mauling the 15-year-old.

She said the neighbor was forced to shoot the dog to stop the attack and protect the teen. The dog died at the scene.

Now, I’m not going to go on about pit bulls or anything like that. There’s a lot of debate on the topic, but I’ve known plenty of pit bulls that were as sweet as could be. Further, we don’t know the whole story as to what may have led up to the attack.

However, we do know that there’s a good chance the girl would have been even more seriously injured, if not killed, had an armed citizen not acted to protect the girl.

This act of defending another human being won’t show up in the anti-gun statistics. It won’t show up as a self-defense homicide. It probably won’t show up in any crime statistic out there.

But it happened, and a young girl is here today that might not have been otherwise. Think on that for a moment.

When we talk about guns saving lives, we’re not limiting it to any one particular act. We’re not saying they just stop murders, for example. We’re saying they save lives. They’re tools that we can use to stop any number of attacks from any number of predators, be they two- or four-legged. We tend to focus on the two-legged predators because they tend to be smarter, more cunning, but four-legged ones–even man’s best friend–can also be a real threat as well.

Again, this gets lost in an anti-gunner’s mind. They ignore it. They pretend that it just doesn’t happen or that somehow attacks like this will be ended without shooting the animal. No, I don’t understand it either, but it’s true.

Then again, none of their arguments make a whole lot of sense when you get right down to it.

I, for one, am glad the girl is alright. I hope she can leave this incident behind her as much as possible.