The False Gun Narritives Exposed

Back in elementary school or middle school you probably learned about the constitution, our government system, the bill of rights, and why these things are so important to being an American. You were also probably taught that these things are unique to America and that a lot of countries (now and in the past) haven’t had the luxury of founding documents and systems that impower the people rather than a person or group. Well, apparently 30-40% of this country slept through the class and completely forgot everything that was taught.

The 2nd Amendment.

I’m sure a lot of you know this but I want to cover the basics.

The Importance of the 2nd Amendment

The second amendment was put in place to protect citizens from its own government and other intrusive governments or organizations. It was purposely placed in the second slot, on the bill of rights, because of its importance to promote peace, prosperity and liberty.

The Modern-Day Argument

If you’ve been on Twitter or Facebook over the past few days, I’m sure you’ve seen 100’s of posts basically saying the following:

• “We need to enact/pass an assault weapons ban.”

• “Why should civilians have automatic rifles and high-capacity magazines”.

• “We need to use other country’s models (like Australia) and buy back guns to lower mass shooting and murder rates.”

I’m going to shortly tackle all three of these popular “arguments” below.

“We need to enact/pass an assault weapons ban”

This is probably the most pushed talking point of the anti-gun movement. You see this talking point everywhere.

I could probably show 100 examples of this being talking about. But what no one making the argument is talking about is what exactly an “assault weapon” is. An “assault weapon” could mean literally anything - AR-15, shot gun, baseball bat, knife, hammer, fishing pole, etc. This lack of description is done on purpose.

The anti-gun crowd wants this “blank check” in order to round up and take away as many “assault weapons” as they can. Obviously, they aren’t looking to take hammers or fishing poles from you, but they sure would love to throw hunting rifles in along with AR-15s in their “assault weapons” ban.

Also, if the anti-gun crowd wants to take AR-15s they should probably learn what AR stands for.

“Why should civilians have automatic rifles and high-capacity magazines.”

This is a pretty simple one. The last four words of the second amendment (above) state, “shall not be infringed” meaning your right to bear arms shall not be held or stopped. Banning automatic rifles and high-capacity magazines is infringing on an American’s right to bear arms. If this sort of ban is passed, then the argument can be made that handguns should be banned and home defense shotguns. Where does the “infringement” stop?

I’ve also heard the argument that the government already keeps us from owning military weapons (like tanks and planes) and that AR-15 should work the same. This argument is entirely false. Americans already can own tanks, RPGs, planes and many other military vehicles and supplies. Banning AR-15 would be the first of this nature.

“We need to use other country’s models (like Australia) and buy back guns to lower mass shootings and murder rates.”

This is a popular opinion among the anti-gun crowd and repeatably gets passed around without knowing all the facts. They yell that guns are the issue and if we buy them back from citizens, we will have less mass shootings and murders. Australia is usually the country that gets used as an example because of their buyback program implemented after a 1997 mass shooting. Here is some info:

The “result” of the buyback program was that the murder rate dropped 42% and mass shootings rarely happened (1 in 18 years or so). However, what the anti-gun crowd wouldn’t tell you is that from 1997 to 2020 the total number of guns increased each year in Australia. This means the argument that guns (or the lack of buybacks) are the reason mass shootings/murder rates are down happens to be entirely false.

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