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The harsh, unkind reality of gun control

AP Photo/Jim Mone, File

We here at Bearing Arms typically divide the nation into two camps, for the most part. States that favor gun rights and states that favor gun control.

Yes, I know, it’s generally on a spectrum versus being an either/or thing. Some states are pretty good about your rights in a lot of ways but have some weird blinders on others.

Take Florida, for example. It’s a state that had pretty good gun laws for a long time, then went nuts after Parkland, then passed permitless carry. They also have this strange hangup about open carry where they simply cannot allow it at all.

Gun control is, unfortunately, all over the place.

What’s more, it doesn’t really do anything positive in our nation.

So while newly-elected Gov. Wes Moore, a Democrat, eased restrictions to obtain a permit, he simultaneously tightened them — by limiting the places where one may carry.

“Gun violence is tearing apart the fabric of our communities, not just through mass shootings but through shootings that are happening in each of our communities far too often,” Moore said at a bill-signing ceremony. “We will act, and that’s exactly what today represents.”

What’s especially egregious about the new law is that in practice, it applies to only one class of individuals: the law-abiding citizen.

Criminals aren’t hampered by the restrictions — restrictions with which the law-abiding will comply in most cases.

Now, many counter this argument by claiming that if your argument is that criminals won’t obey the law, then why have any laws at all?

That’s not what people are saying. Note the exact phrasing of that last sentence. See, it’s not so much that criminals won’t obey as it is about the fact that law-abiding citizens will be the only ones restrained by the law.

Laws against murder, robbery, etc are different because most people have no interest in killing people, stealing their stuff, or anything else. The laws prohibiting that activity don’t really curtail what I do or how I take care of my family.

Gun control laws, on the other hand, are quite different. They do impact my efforts to keep my family safe. These laws are ignored by the criminals but put law-abiding citizens at a disadvantage.

For example, let’s talk about mandatory storage laws for a second.

Criminals won’t lock up their guns and don’t care to. If I’m required to do so, however, it may cause enough of a delay in my getting my firearm that someone in my family may be hurt or killed.

Gun-free zones work similarly, especially when you think about the preferred targets of mass shooters. After all, when people try to prohibit the carrying of a firearm at places like malls, churches, and schools, they’re ignoring the fact that these are three of the most popular targets for mass shooters.

Yet the mass shooters themselves have literally never been deterred by the gun-free zones.

Funny, that.

Despite the plethora of gun control laws on the books in numerous places, bad guys keep getting guns. California restricts handguns to a small number of models that have been approved by the state. Criminals can get whatever they want. Laws banning so-called ghost guns mean enthusiasts can’t build their own firearms anymore, but criminals keep right on going.

Gun control laws have never inhibited the actions of a criminal. If anything, they create opportunities for bad guys to profit. It doesn’t stop them in the least.

So yeah, no one benefits from gun control laws. No one except for the anti-gun groups and politicians who have made this their stock and trade.