Raven's Gun Page

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

In plain English, the meaning of the Second Amendment should be clear to anyone capable of reading:

The right to keep and bear arms is not granted by any government; it is a pre-existing right, and the government shall not infringe upon it.
The right to keep and bear arms does not belong to the State; it belongs to the people.
The right to keep and bear arms does not depend upon the Militia; the Militia depends upon the right of the people to keep and bear arms.
The regulation of the Militia is dependent upon the right of the people to keep and bear arms.

As a human being, your right to bear arms is not dependent on the Second Amendment; nor, for that matter, is it dependent on any government, law, or regulation. Your right to bear arms is a direct consequence of your right to life. That is the same, regardless of where you live, what government claims control over your life, or what conditions you live in. As long as you are alive, you have the right and responsibility to defend that life. Therefore, you have the right and responsibility to take whatever personal measures are necessary for your defense.

Within the last couple hundred years, guns have become the most effective personal arms, both for offense and for defense - so effective that every government that has committed genocide within the last century has had to disarm its victims before it could murder them. Guns are so effective for defense that US Dept. of Justice data, compiled and analyzed in the book More Guns, Less Crime , shows that - even after accounting for all other factors - the occurrence of violent crime is directly reduced by private ownership of guns.

As I see it, anyone in a subordinate position (such as women and minorities) should, both logically and rationally, be pro-gun. It's simply a matter of survival and self-reliance. Let's take a simple, all too common, scenario to show what I mean:

You're home alone, and someone breaks into your house. Which is more certain to keep the invader from raping and/or killing you? A call to 911, which if you're lucky will bring response in 10 to 15 minutes, but is more likely to bring response in 30 to 60 minutes? Or drawing down on the invader with your pistol or shotgun and either holding him at bay until the police arrive, scaring him away, or dispatching him into the great beyond if he refuses to believe you're capable of defending yourself? Criminals, the US Department of Justice, and survivors of criminal attacks all agree the second option is more likely to save your life - whether the invader is a punk looking for some quick loot, a rapist, or a bigot who's looking to score points with his bigoted buddies.

Some of the best websites I've found on guns are:

TAO of GUN: Spiritual Sovereignty and the Hypocrisy of Gun Control
World Wide Web Gun Defense Clock: Some facts about personal defense with guns, and a tally of how many times guns have been used defensively this year.
Crime, Deterrence, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handguns: This is a PDF file of the Lott/Mustard study published in Journal of Legal Studies (v.26, no.1, pages 1-68, January 1997)
Multiple Victim Public Shootings, Bombings, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handgun Laws: Contrasting Private and Public Law Enforcement: This is an abstract of, and link to, a paper by John Lott and William Landes, which shows that concealed handguns are the most effective deterrent to public shootings (like the Luby's Massacre).
Guns and suicide: possible effects of some specific legislation: This is an abstract of a paper published in the American Journal of Psychiatry that shows that gun control laws do not reduce suicides. All they do is incline people to use other methods to kill themselves.
Armed Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence and Nature of Self-Defense with a Gun: This paper, published in Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, vol. 86, issue 1, 1995, discusses the facts of defensive gun use by armed civilians.
Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership: When you are the target of hatred by everyone from Arabs to rednecks, you either learn to fight back, or you die.
Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership: Contrary to what you would believe from the mass media, all doctors do not oppose gun ownership. Many not only support it, they themselves own and carry guns.
Gun Owners of America: "The only no-compromise gun lobby in Washington." (Rep. Ron Paul, Texas)
Women's Firearm Network: Gun Control: The theory that a woman found dead in an alley, raped and strangled with her panty hose, is somehow morally superior to a woman explaining to police how her attacker got that fatal bullet wound.

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