5 Steps to Take to Support Second Amendment Gun Rights

I want to share some information about my gun rights beliefs, why I believe what I do, and suggest five things you can do today to support our gun rights. Like millions of law-abiding gun owners in America, I am a peace-loving person and honestly want to AVOID trouble at all costs. I have not fired a gun at anyone & actually do NOT have any desire to use a gun on anyone and pray I never have to draw it in self defense. I want to avoid trouble & strongly believe in the power of deterrence & peacefully and rationally talking through differences to solve problems. I accept that Only as a LAST RESORT, do we want to be prepared to defend ourselves with a gun when attacked or threatened with death or serious physical harm. This is NOT a sign of WEAKNESS and does NOT make us cowards or wimps… or irresponsible. This is a disciplined, rational, intelligent win-win way of thinking and peacefully resolving conflicts, but we are still PREPARED as a “Good Guy or Gal” with a gun, unlike criminals who use a gun illegally for their own selfish desires and do NOT act responsibly with a gun.

I own firearms to have fun with my target shooting hobby, teach others about properly & safely using them, and so that I can be PREPARED to defend myself & my family, JUST IN CASE that need arises. I don’t seek out trouble and recognize that introducing a gun into a confrontation actually escalates the encounter. I do rest easier knowing that I could immediately stop an armed robber, home invader, attacker or terrorist, IF the need arose, and that my wife could stop a rapist or murderer, rather than becoming a victim.

Sadly, we live in a real world in which we must accept that criminals, ruthless bad people, violent behaviors, & dangers DO realistically exist & will continue to exist. We want to focus on the positive & good, but must recognize that there are evil predators and we need to protect ourselves & the good things we worked for. WE WANT OUR GUN RIGHTS BECAUSE WE KNOW ABOUT THE EVIL IN THE WORLD AND WE ACCEPT RESPONSIBILITY FOR PROTECTING OURSELVES & OUR LOVED ONES.

We want to be part of DETERRENCE of evil and crime. To cause violent criminals to wonder if the next person they choose to harm may be the one that fights back, thus influencing them NOT to act. The more law-abiding citizens that are armed or who might possibly be armed in the eyes of criminals, the more worry and hesitation they will have about their predatory actions… and they may choose to NOT violently attack, kill or harm us, or rape or rob us.

The simple fact is that gun control laws don’t stop the criminal bad guys or gals from getting or using guns, but instead only disarm the law-abiding GOOD GUY-GAL citizens, making them easier targets for the criminals. If a criminal wants a gun, they will get one usually from street/illegal sources. It is NOT justifiable to deprive law-abiding citizens of their Constitutional Right to keep & bear arms for self defense, just because criminals misuse guns, just as criminals misuse knives, baseball bats, bombs, and other TOOLS. People harm others by using TOOLS improperly and the inanimate TOOL does not think and act by itself.

Simply put, GUN OWNERSHIP IS AN INDIVIDUAL RIGHT GUARANTEED BY THE 2ND AMENDMENT TO THE US CONSTITUTION and for me by Florida‘s Constitution, Article One, Section 8. Weas good guys & gals assume personal responsibility for our own individual safety through LAWFULLY using our guns as positive tools for good self-defense only if necessary.

Our nation’s highest court has ALREADY made individual gun rights clear in several U.S. Supreme Court landmark decisions, like Heller and like McDonald vs. City of Chicago. The Heller case was the first Supreme Court case to affirm the right of an individual to keep & bear arms in accordance with the Second Amendment. The McDonald decision overturned an earlier decision banning the possession of handguns by its citizens.

These decisions mean that it should NOT be necessary to argue the merits of the RIGHT to gun ownership, just as it is unnecessary to argue the merits of a person’s RIGHT to vote or be free from slavery. Gun ownership (along with our other constitutional rights) is simply NOT subject to infringement on the grounds that some members of society disapprove of that right, and feel we would be better off if the right didn’t exist or was significantly modified.

I oppose anti-freedom policies that disregard American citizens’ right to self-defense and the freedoms that our Founding Fathers fought for and guaranteed to us. My ancestor Thomas Nuzum, a soldier & farmer, fought under General George Washington at the Battle of Brandywine Creek in 1777 defending Philadelphia, PA and our freedoms and independence. Our Founding Fathers wrote the Second Amendment so Americans would never have to live in tyranny from governments. We should not undermine the fundamental liberties that our men and women in uniform have fought so bravely to preserve – and on which our entire American system of government and free lifestyles are based.

Patriotic citizens should NEVER surrender their gun ownership rights nor our Second Amendment freedom. Period, no compromise. We should not compromise that freedom because doing so means we give up some of our values and rights to meet a position that doesn’t fully support those Rights. We don’t want a LOSE-LOSE situation where everybody gives up something to a middle ground position. We want a WIN-WIN where everybody gains the preservation of their existing Rights. Giving up some of our Second Amendment gun rights may even lead to other Amendments and freedoms in our Bill of Rights being lost or compromised.

Any attempt to encroach on those freedoms is offensive to every American who has ever breathed our free air, or who has ever used a firearm to fend off an EVIL ATTACKER– whether a rapist, violent attacker, criminal breaking into their home, or in defense of their family against a tyrant on the other side of the world.

Gun rights CONTROL is not a reasonable nor rational response to crime. Interestingly, some studies indcate that there is a much stronger correlation between car ownership and car-related killings, than there is between gun ownership and gun-related killings. Most of the murders are committed by people with a criminal record who are prohibited from owning guns already. Perhaps, we should more strongly enforce existing firearms-related laws & have stricter penalties applied. Predators and criminals are NOT deterred by even PRESENT LAWS that make it a felony to commit murder, or that make it a felony for them to possess a gun due to their criminal record. Sadly, the criminal mind exists and will exist… and we must defend ourselves against it.

Some say if magazine capacity restrictions or a ban had been in effect, many mass-shooting victims would be alive today. There seems to be a complete absence of any evidence to support that. Magazines are tools available to good AND bad people. For example, Virginia Tech shooter Seung-Hui Cho was reported to have carried one hundred magazines and most active criminal shooters carry multiple firearms, making magazine capacity moot.

Our Second Amendment is freedom’s most valuable, most cherished, most irreplaceable idea. History proves it. When you ignore the right of good people to own firearms to protect their freedom, you become the enablers of future tyrants whose regimes will destroy millions and millions of defenseless lives. The ruthless Hitler believed that to conquer a nation, first disarm its citizens. He imposed strict gun registration requirements that enabled him to identify gun owners and then to confiscate all guns by house to house inspections, effectively disarming his opponents and paving the way for the genocide of the Jewish population. In China, no guns whatsoever are allowed to be carried by its citizens and we see negative results of that.

Gun bans, confiscations, and watering-down of gun Rights have proven not to work in other countries and instead only ensure that law abiding citizens (the good guys & gals) are defenseless against the still-armed criminals. This week I talked to a friend of mine in the United Kingdom. Robert is a recently retired CEO of a corporation there and told me his experiences with guns confiscation and the passing of very strict gun control laws in England, as a result of the terrible 1996 Dunblane school massacre there, similar to the one in our Newtown, CT. He told me that after the school shooting there that all guns were confiscated by requirements of the new firearms law, that the police there are unarmed, and that strict gun control laws require a very involved & costly licensure process for all firearms, with a mandatory renewal by Certificates every 5 years which require an IN-HOME INSPECTION without a Warrant visit by LAW ENFORCEMENT officers. He said he has noticed a definite increase in the UK crimes by armed criminals… and that if bad people want a firearm and ammo for crimes, they can easily find them on the streets there.

Just this week, there was a Senate Bill 5737 introduced in our State of Washington that bans assault weapons- which by their definition includes a semi-automatic PISTOL which accepts a detachable magazine with a capacity of more than 10 rounds with only 1 feature like a pistol grip- the proposed law says law enforcement officers may without a warrant inspect a home once a year for appropriate guns. You know that criminals won’t comply with the magazine restrictions & will try to avoid inspections.

Pistol shooting for SPORTING purposes has been  banned in Great Britain since 1997. As a result, the Great Britain Olympics Pistol Squad has to practice in other countries. Within a decade of the British handgun ban & the confiscation of handguns from registered owners, crimes with handguns had doubled according to British government crime reports. Gun crime is a serious problem there. A similar thing happened in Australia when the government there banned all individual gun ownership in 1996 & armed robberies rose there by 73%… there was a 40% increase in assaults and a 20% increase in sexual assaults. That has improved somewhat. So to me, these two major countries held up as models for the U.S. don’t provide much evidence that strict gun laws will solve our problems.

Given these facts, I would encourage you my fellow law-abiding citizens to TAKE ACTION  TODAY & DO 5 THINGS.  Taking these actions today or very soon may save your life or the life of a loved ones and can show your SUPPORT for our Second Amendment RIGHTS, gun ownership, help preserve our Freedoms, and benefit society as a whole. Severe Gun restrictions are happening right now…  so we can’t wait to take action.

1. CONTACT YOUR Federal-State-Local GOVERNMENT REPRESENTATIVES immediately to voice your support for our U.S. Constitution’s 2nd Amendment and if applicable the State of Florida Constitution’s Article One, Section 8 Gun Rights and to emphasize STRICTER enforcement of the many EXISTING gun LAWS we already have, rather than pass NEW more restrictive gun and ammunition laws;    Our focus should be on real solutions to the problem of misuse of firearms, such as strengthening Mental Health Care and improving the Quality of Data supporting the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). And we should encourage quicker & stricter prosecution of criminals who commit violence and misuse firearms.
2. GET INVOLVED BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE AND JOIN THE NRA to show your support for our Second Amendment Gun Rights. The NRA is the largest and most active firearms rights organization in the world, with over four million members who represent 100 million law-abiding Americans who own firearms. They lobby to influence governments and stand up for our Second Amendment Rights and Freedoms. Contact me soon at 850-484-3221 or by email at [email protected] to JOIN or RENEW and get the 29% Special Discount on memberships. I’ll take a credit card by phone.
3. TAKE A FUNDAMENTALS OF FIREARMS SHOOTING & SAFETY TRAINING CLASS to learn the proper BASICS of grip, sight alignment, trigger control, handling malfunctions, and accuracy techniques, from a certified & well-qualified Firearms Instructor. (I offer both NRA and NON-NRA fundamentals of shooting & safety courses);
4. SELECT & PURCHASE THE PROPER GUN for self-defense and your needs; and
5. GO SHOOTING FOR FUN AND SAFELY P-R-A-C-T-I-C-E YOUR SELF-DEFENSE SKILLS and become Proficient at safely using your gun– Join a local GUN CLUB to Practice.

SUCCESS and “Always Shoot Straight.”

© 2013 Col Benjamin Findley. All Rights Reserved. This article may not be reprinted or reproduced in whole or in part by mechanical means, photocopying, electronic reproduction, scanning, or any other means without prior written permission. For copyright information, contact Col Ben Findley at [email protected].