Don't Bring a Gun to a Spoon Fight

So look, I'm a product of the '80s, when gun laws were so lax that you could be feel safe in the knowledge that if your daughter were ever kidnapped by Columbian drug lords, you could knock over a gun shop in the middle of the night and run off with enough destructive power to level a small island nation alone. That's just to say, I get the allure of guns.

Rent it now!

But then you see arguments that say, "Guns don't kill people, people kill people." And then there's, "Murdering with a gun is an misuse of a gun, but you can kill people with a spoon too! And that's a misuse of the spoon!"

These are stupid arguments.

Guns are effective at killing. Spoons aren't. Butter knives aren't. If you want us to control spoons to somehow be fair to guns, I'm sure we could do that, and I'm sure it would be really annoying. But looks, we don't arm our soldiers with spoons or butter knives, and while there certainly are trucks used by the armed forces, they aren't typically considered a weapon. The idea of every soldier driving a pick-up, but otherwise unarmed, is pretty amusing, but not an effective means of waging war. So, if you really think spoons and knives can be used to equal effect, then by all means, you should be purchasing those instead of guns.

Taking Spoon Control too far

Folks have said, "If somebody wanted to use a truck to kill hundreds of people, what would you do then? Illegalize trucks?" Not a bad point. Really. So, let's think about this a second. How come people don't use trucks as often to commit mass murder? After all, there was the attack in Nice, France last year that was almost as effective as the Las Vegas shooting in terms of victims. Well, first, its actually hard to pull of an attack like Nice. 19 ton trucks aren't a whole lot easier to come by than arsenals of weapons, depending where in the world you are. You also need the right kinds of conditions for that kind of attack. You need a nice long straight road where lots of people have gathered and who cannot easily run away from the truck, and you need a long enough runway to crash through whatever police barricades have been set up and carry momentum into the target crowd. But if those guys had gotten ahold of lots of guns, would they have done that instead of using the truck? I'd wager they would have done whatever they thought most effective.

Why else would people use guns rather than trucks, or the other proposed implements (spoons) of destruction? Proximity comes to mind. Unless suicide or capture is part of the plan, trucks, knives, spoons, etc. require a very limited distance from the target, and the attacker is therefore exposed to counterattack and is less likely to escape, if escape is intended. While most of the mass shooters in the states have been captured, or they eluded capture through suicide, there's no evidence that they went in expecting to get caught; apparently the Columbine kids thought they'd get out of there, too. I guess we can chalk that up to the invincible feelings maniacs get when they're holding their guns.

When you hear gun apologists go after their critics, it quickly becomes clear they fantasize of a wasteland world, where the only thing that stands between the innocent and a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun. This, of course, mostly leads us to middle aged women shooting at shoplifters in parking lots. There are a few incidents where an armed person comes to the rescue, but mostly it just adds to the confusion. Here's the deal. We don't live in the wild west. People don't walk out into the street at noon to have duels. The ironic thing about the whole fantasy is that such mythic gun slingers as the Earp brothers protected their towns by imposing strict gun bans within city limits. Correct, legendary gun fighters knew about the usefulness of gun control for maintaining civil order.

That's right, not Tombstone! Its the other Wyatt Earp movie with Costner...oh, wait a sec...

"OK, but I'm gonna come back to that truck thing! Trucks can kill people darn well! Nice! Nice! Nice!" Yeah, okay, but trucks also do other things. And here's the thing, we do indeed, as a society, make a very real choice, which is really callous in some ways, to keep using motor vehicles despite their inherent unsafety. We really could stop building freeways and start trying to have safer modes of transportation like trains. But we don't want to. We actively choose, even if we don't think we do, to embrace motor vehicles for their various benefits and despite their deficits.

"Cut it out, Kevin"

And that's kinda the same with guns, too. And to me, its the only good argument for our liberal interpretation of the second amendment (if the use of liberal in this context confuses you, here's something more your speed). Why not have stronger gun laws? Because its worth it. The deaths are worth it.

I mean, "Cut it out, Kevin."

For self defense? To save lives? No, hardly ever. Guns in safes aren't that handy for self defense in a hurry. And obviously we're losing more lives from guns in the hands of the public than we're saving (if you think that maybe the gun deaths are offset by the lack of violence that would be used if we had stricter gun laws, just look up crime statistics for similar countries to the US...maybe I'll put a relevant link here a little later). But its a right we cherish, and so we say, it's worth it. Now that's an honest answer. Much more honest than saying, "But...but spoons can kill people?" Grow up you mook! You know you're being insincere. Just say what you mean! Its worth the lives lost to protect yourself from North Korean invaders! Or from Obama's Jade Helm invasion force!


Look, there are decent reasons to keep an armed populace. Even...well I was about to use the infamous "a rifle behind every blade of grass" quote, but turns out it was misattributed.We'll just allude to the "Shoot twice and go home" quote instead. Whatever, all I'm saying is, be honest with your arguments. (and go buy stuff from my sponsors)