Guns

Sorry, no Foto Friday blog today — we've gotten a little off-schedule here in Far South Austin. I don't have any fresh pictures. But I do have a lot to say. Two things in particular rise above the maelstrom going on in my head.

Fortunately for you, Rick Perry, I despise talking about politics. I've only really done it once on this blog and, because I have readers and friends on both sides of the line, I don't really want to do it again. Maybe if I'm still mad on Monday, we'll dive in.

No, today I want to talk about guns.

Those of you who just know me as a journalist (and therefore, OBVIOUSLY, a left-wing-loving pinko commie) might think I am against guns, for gun control and in favor of government surveillance of every child who has ever pointed his finger at somebody and said "Bang!"

That's not true. In fact, I like guns. I only have one right now, a side-by-side .12-gauge with a heft that's just right for a lumberjack.

It is true, I'm not much of a hunter. I have killed a deer, though it'll likely be my first and last. I have taken down a few doves. I shot a wasp with a BB gun once, how's that for shootin'?

Really, I prefer to hunt beer cans. They make a satisfying "plink!" when you hit them, you can shoot 'em more than once (unless you're trying out the shotgun), and there's no hides, hair or feathers.

In fact, I'm kinda on a gun kick right now. Shannon was worried about this until I assured her that I was not going to go out and buy one or two or eight. No, I've been looking at gun safes because Bullworker said it was about time for him to pass down some of the family guns to me.

His shoulders won't allow him to shoot them, so they're moving down the family line. The gun safe is both to keep them out of the hands of the boy and to keep them from being stolen if someone breaks into the house.

There's no assault weapons or guns of considerable value in the bunch. For the most part, their value is sentimental and their nature is strictly utilitarian.

So, in the not-too-distant future, there could several times more guns than people in my house. This makes me a NRA-supporting, Charlton Heston-loving, mirrored shades-wearing, conspiracy-believing, take-it-from-my-cold-dead-hands type of guy, right?

Again, that's not true. You see, the gun question just isn't a black-or-white issue as the NRA or the anti-NRA (I can't think of who that is right now) would have you believe.

It's true that the founding fathers wrote into the Constitution the right to keep and bear arms. But the Constitution was written for an agrarian nation that was a patriarchal society. At that time, guns were tools for people who needed them and gun use and safety was taught and enforced by a male figure who was taught by his father before him.

With our trigger-happy video games and YouTube videos and so many young boys raised without a father figure, is the Second Amendment relevant to our urban society? Well, yes in some ways. But there's no question that all this bears a closer examination.

I don't think guns should be outlawed by any means. (And, if they are, you guys never saw this blog. I don't have any guns. What are you talking about?)

But I don't agree with the NRA that we have a right to whatever firearms we want. Assault weapons? Sorry. Those have no viable use for civilians. I'm just not buying it.

(And don't give me that militia crap about protecting yourself from the government. They can send a bomb down your chimney from an unmanned aircraft being piloted from across the continent. Your AR-15 is not going to do you any good. You'd be better off learning how to hack computer systems.)

All I'm saying is that this does bear closer examination. This does bear some discussion. I'm kind of running out of time on this blog, damn it I never really got to my point. But the idea that there's a clear-cut answer and everyone else is dead wrong and if you don't like it, we're gonna secede from the union is, face it, pretty un-American.

And, oh yeah, do I think we need to expand the concealed carry laws? Do Texans have a right to take their guns (almost) everywhere?

No. Not because I don't like guns. Not because I don't want to have a gun.

It's just that — and don't take this too personally — I don't trust you with guns.

Comments

[Katherine]

Sooooper genius!

You da man, Dave. Once again saying what we all (okay, me) are thinking but unable to put into words.