There are a lot of gun control advocates who are pushing for laws that would make it impossible for anyone under the age of 18 to gain access to a firearm in the home. Now, on some levels, this makes sense to many. After all, kids do stupid stuff all the time and with guns in the mix, the stupid stuff can turn deadly.

Yet if these people got their way, this Texas teen and his family would likely be dead.

A 17-year-old was at a Channelview, Texas, residence when three armed men wearing masks forced their way into the home. The teen subsequently grabbed a shotgun and shot at the men, hitting and killing two of them, authorities said Saturday.

Another 17-year-old, a 12-year old and an adult woman were also in the home during the Friday night incident, said Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez.

The two men were declared dead at the scene, and the third man fled in what authorities described as a dark-colored, four-door sedan. No one else was injured, police said.

Now, I’ll admit that in theory, the woman could have gained access to the shotgun, but that would have created a deeper delay that may have been too long.

Instead, this youth stepped up and took care of business, protecting the house and the people inside of it. As a result, two dirtbags are taking up space in the morgue and the third is contemplating his life choices while praying that the police can’t identify him.

After all, it’s likely he could be charged with murder in the death of his two compatriots.

Meanwhile, the sheriff said this case was going to the grand jury, though I can’t imagine how the kid could have anything to fear. In most Castle Doctrine states, the moment they force entry into an occupied home, the presumption is that they intend to harm those within.

If that doesn’t warrant a shotgun blast to the face, what does?

But again, there are those who would decry this teen’s access to that shotgun on general principle. They might be quiet right now, but they will continue to try and push mandatory storage laws and regulations that bar providing access to anyone under the age of 18–if not 21, that is.

The problem with such policies is that they’re one-size-fits-all that don’t take into account anything else except the comfort level of people who generally live in urban environments and who don’t like guns in the first place.

They don’t consider facts like the maturity of the kid, what level of training they might have as to how to use a firearm responsibly, where they live and the average police response time, etc. They don’t think or care about any of that.

Yet this is why you can’t look at things through such a myopic lens. You have to understand the big picture.

Today, we’re talking about a 17-year-old kid killing two intruders with a shotgun. Without that, we could be talking about a mass murder with four people dead and the suspects at-large.

I don’t mind telling you that I much prefer this story to what I might have had to write.