It’s sad that so many people don’t understand the ramifications of gun control. They think they get it. They think they know what will happen if they get their way, but they really don’t.

In their mind, gun control primarily takes guns out of the hands of criminals. While law-abiding citizens might be inconvenienced or even disarmed, that’s just the price we have to pay.

The problem is that criminals don’t give up their guns. They keep getting them and will continue to do so for as long as guns are available.

This is why this gun control effort kind of left me feeling a bit confused.

Sunday kicked off the start of National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, and anti-gun violence groups in Nashville marked the day with an event titled ‘No Longer a Victim.’

Organizers of the event said they want everyone to come out and speak up against gun violence and for more gun control because so many people are victims in one way or another and it is time to do something about it.

The event, No Longer a Victim, was held at Mount Calvary Missionary Baptist Church.

Now, the “no longer a victim” sentiment is one I can deeply respect. A lot of people who have been victimized decide they won’t allow that to happen to them or to future generations.

However, we also know that gun control doesn’t actually disarm bad people. It just makes it harder for law-abiding citizens to obtain a firearm if they want one.

Criminals get theirs via theft, straw buys, or the illegal manufacture and sale of homemade firearms. At no point do new laws actually change any of that at all.

If one wants to no longer be a victim, it makes a lot more sense to purchase a firearm and to learn how to use it for defensive situations. Then you can meet a violent attacker on equal footing, something predators generally want no part of.

We’ve seen time and time again that resisting an attacker is the surest way to protect yourself and others. Violent criminals may be violent, but many are actually cowards who will run the moment they realize their targets aren’t easy meat for them.

If you want to stop people from being victims, gun control isn’t the way forward.

That’s especially true when you consider the fact that gun control is, at its best, an answer for one kind of violent crime. It does nothing to prevent violent crime using any other weapon, and many violent criminals will, in fact, pick up another weapon if they can’t get a gun.

Yet the average person is ill-equipped to take on a knife-wielding attacker with anything except a firearm.

While I get why they named this effort what they did, it’s not actually going to stop anyone from being a victim. In fact, it’ll get more people hurt and killed in the long run if the policies they prefer are enacted.

The only thing that stops a bad guy with any kind of weapon is a good guy with a gun.

Don’t like that fact? Tough. Life is hard. Wear a helmet.