Agreed. I own a total of eleven firearms, encompassing several shotguns, hunting rifles, and 3 pistols -- most of which I have inherited. Also included are three World War 2 era rifles that I have purchased over the years, as I enjoy them from a historical perspective. Although I do not hunt, I do enjoy target and clay shooting. All of my weapons are safely secured -- unloaded -- either in a safe and/or with trigger locks. I think I qualify as a responsible gun owner, although many posters apparently believe that there is no such thing -- that owning a gun at all, of any kind and for any purpose, is irresponsible.
As for the issue of self protection, I am ultimately responsible for the safety of my family. As the saying goes, when seconds count, the police are only minutes away. I am fully capable of making (and have a right to make) risk assessments, to take measures to mitigate those risks, and to assume risk. Those decisions are mine and that of my family, not anyone else's. If you don't like guns and don't want them in your house, that is entirely your decision. But you don't get to make that decision for me.
Board lefties have spent 20+ pages castigating and demonizing law abiding citizens. There has not been one single acknowledgment about the issue of growing gang violence, drugs, and crime in general. My lawfully owning a gun, even more than one (the horror!), had nothing whatsoever to do with a 15 year old murdering 16 year old a week ago, apparently over some kind of slight -- whether gang affiliation or somehow being "dissed" in some way. What are the factors that led a kid to decide to kill another kid? Broken families? Glorification of violence? A diminishing value afforded to human life? Any discussion to be had about that? Or is that just too complicated?
I'm sure this sound entirely reasonable to you and, honestly, pretty much everyone that isn't strictly anti-gun. You sound responsible. Reasonable.
Here's the problem. It's a take that is 100% focused on yourself, as if the fact that you own 11 firearms exists in some kind of vacuum outside of all the other things (misinformed though you may be about them statistically) you own those guns for.
I doubt very much that the actual levels of risk by all these gangs and murderers and rapists wandering our quiet neighborhoods move the needle for you, at all, as far as gun rights are concerned. I doubt even more that the reality of how effective all your guns will be in a crisis situation, how unlikely members of your family are to find a way to unlock/use your firearms despite your safety measures - will either.
But the core of the argument is that others have guns, so I get them too. Plus I'm more responsible than those idiots and I am comfortable with the risk so leave me alone.
Every gun owner is not some unrelated, isolated entity. You have ELEVEN firearms including handguns which have only one reason for existing, and whatever else. That means other morons get that same arsenal, and at the edges far, far more. Because people like you feel justified to own those things, they reject any policies that limit access to them. And now you quote that very access by the public as the reason you need 11 firearms.
It's a cycle rooted in absolute selfishness, strengthened over decades by political fear-mongering which you've shown to be very effective. And the truth is even if you KNOW all that is true you will likely still say that your selfishness is justified, you have kids, you're law abiding, etc.
That's the difference outside of the rhetoric. In the middle ground, some people feel that the small risk inherent in any kind of gun reduction, or giving up the fun of playing with handguns, is worth reversing the total gun count for the greater good. Full stop. They recognize it will take time, they just can't comprehend watching the pace of school and public mass shooting events and understand maintaining the status quo.
The opposing rhetoric is just as bad from the other extreme, but in the "responsible gun owner" middle ground, it's just good old American justifiable selfishness.
