Fact-Check For Georgia Gun Control Activists: Gun Rights ARE Human Rights

AP Photo/Seth Perlman, File

You're never going to convince me that anti-gunners don't get a little excited when something like the Apalachee High School shooting take place. They want our guns and we know it, but mass murders in our schools make it a lot easier to advance their agenda than it might otherwise be. Look at what happened in normally gun-friendly Florida after Parkland.

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On some level, they have to be a little excited by the possibilities in the wake of a mass murder like this.

The problem is that so many of them lack any fundamental understanding of what anyone on the other side of things actually thinks, believes, or even says that it's downright laughable.

This was brought to a head by an op-ed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution by an anti-gun advocate.

I joined Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America in 2017 when I wanted to help prevent my son from getting killed or traumatized at school. Since then, I have learned a lot about gun violence. Though more than half of gun deaths are because of suicide, gun violence is the No. 1 killer of children in our state and nation. People of color are disproportionately affected.

Last week, I wrote to my congressman, Rep, Mike Collins.

“Yesterday, my biggest fear came true. Thirteen innocent people were shot at a public school near my home. Four are dead, including two children. In response to my numerous emails requesting common gun sense legislation, you have responded that you will always proudly protect the Second Amendment right to own a gun. What about citizens’ right to live? Why didn’t you make efforts to ban rapid-fire military-style guns? Why didn’t you support Secure Storage? Why do you support concealed carry reciprocity?

“Why didn’t the FBI make sure a 13-year-old suspect couldn’t access guns? Why don’t you value human rights more than gun rights? …

“By the way, is it safe to send my son to school this morning? What have you done to ensure it?”

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First, I get asking questions about things like "military-style guns" and mandatory storage laws in the wake of something like this. Those are at least applicable to what happened, and while none of those laws would have changed a thing considering all that we know, they at least deal with the events themselves.

But what's wrong with someone saying they'll "proudly protect" a part of the Bill of Rights? Why is concealed carry reciprocity such a negative?

And yes, your son is just as safe at school today as he was the day before Apalachee High and the days afterward. In a nation of a third of a billion people, awful tragedies are going to happen and while we can discuss minimizing them, the reality is that your son might never be truly safe, but he's far more likely to be injured in a car accident than by a mass killer's bullet.

As bad as all that stupidity is, though, the part that got me was, "Why don’t you value human rights more than gun rights?"

Guns do not have rights. People have rights. Gun rights are, in fact, the right for people to have guns. It's like talking about one's free speech rights. It's the person who has the rights, not the words themselves.

Gun rights are human rights. It's the right of people to have guns, and we know from the words of the Founding Fathers themselves that they intended for us to have the means to resist not garden-variety burglars but governments themselves, be they ours or someone else's who think it's a good idea to land on our shores and get rowdy.

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Yet the fact that she can ask that question is telling.

What it tells us is just how insulated she is, just how little she understands things from outside of her anti-gun bubble. I say that because nothing I said here is new. Any pro-gun voice could and would tell her the exact same thing. She's either never been exposed to it or just flat-out refused to listen. Yet she's not unusual in that regard.

All she's doing here is echoing the typical talking point, that somehow guns have rights and that human rights are being ignored. That's a pretty popular one with Chinese government-funded media, too, it should be noted, but they didn't originate it, either.

Regardless of where it came from, though, it's idiotic and a sign that anti-gunners aren't even trying to listen.

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