I've sat on this and thought about it, and revised it before I posted this here...

I've had various inquiry in private messages, comments and also people asking me about whether the rights to bear arm make sense in light of Virginia Tech shooting. This is what this entry is about.

1.) Protecting your life--Who's responsibility is it?

That's something that needs to be taken into consideration: Is it ultimately your responsibility or someone else's?

Is your life worth protecting? If so, whose responsibility is it to protect it? If you believe that it is the police's, not only are you wrong — since the courts universally rule that they have no legal obligation to do so — but you face some difficult moral quandaries. How can you rightfully ask another human being to risk his life to protect yours, when you will assume no responsibility yourself? Because that is his job and we pay him to do it? Because your life is of incalculable value, but his is only worth the $30,000 salary we pay him? If you believe it reprehensible to possess the means and will to use lethal force to repel a criminal assault, how can you call upon another to do so for you?

Do you believe that you are forbidden to protect yourself because the police are better qualified to protect you, because they know what they are doing but you're a rank amateur? Put aside that this is equivalent to believing that only concert pianists may play the piano and only professional athletes may play sports. What exactly are these special qualities possessed only by the police and beyond the rest of us mere mortals?

(SOURCE: http://golubski.blogspot.com/2007/04/bleating-for-security.html)

What about the police? Where do they fit in?

most people readily believe that the existence of the police relieves them of the responsibility to take full measures to protect themselves. The police, however, are not personal bodyguards. Rather, they act as a general deterrent to crime, both by their presence and by apprehending criminals after the fact. As numerous courts have held, they have no legal obligation to protect anyone in particular. You cannot sue them for failing to prevent you from being the victim of a crime.

If its your ultimate responsibility, and not that of the police to protect your own life, what tools and means then do you have, to protect yourself and especially of someone who want to take your life?

2.) Does Gun Control necessarily save lives?

England has one of the most toughest gun laws, yet:

"While Britain has some of the toughest firearms laws in the world, the recent spate of gun murders in London has highlighted a disturbing growth in armed crime."

Despite the anti-gun laws, we find disturbing empirical data during 2001:

Between April and November 2001, the number of murders in the Metropolitan Police area committed with a firearm soared by almost 90% over the same period a year earlier

(SOURCE: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/1741336.stm)

And also as well in 2002 of gun crimes and over all crimes:

RECORDED CRIME RISES

Overall crime: 9.3%

Gun crime: 35%

Robbery: 14.5%

Domestic burglary: 7.9%

Drug offences: 12.3%

Sexual offences: 18.2% Source: Home Office

(SOURCE: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/uk_news/politics/2640817.stm)

In 2003, despite being into the fifth year of English total gun ban, gun control still did not produce its desired effect but rather:

there are more and more guns being used by more and more criminals in more and more crimes.

So much crime increase that,

According to a UN survey from last month, England and Wales now have the highest crime rate of the world's 20 leading nations.

So what does England do? Pass more laws:

Now, in the wake of Birmingham's New Year bloodbath, there are calls for the total ban to be made even more total: if the gangs refuse to obey the existing laws, we'll just pass more laws for them not to obey.

(SOURCE: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2003/01/05/do0502.xml&sSheet=/opinion/2003/01/05/ixopinion.html)

If they won't obey the laws already, what makes them obey a total gun ban by passing another total gun ban?

3.) Gun Control: Who benefits and who loses?

We have already seen who are the victims of gun control, especially a total weapons ban above.  There are more victims with the rise of gun control.

Should citizens try to help other citizens and defend yourself when there are criminal activies that victimizes people with the use of gun?

When you disarm the citizenry, when you prosecute them for being so foolish as to believe they have a right to self-defence, when you issue warnings that they should "walk on by" if they happen to see a burglary or rape in progress, the main beneficiaries will obviously be the criminals.

(SOURCE: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2003/01/05/do0502.xml&sSheet=/opinion/2003/01/05/ixopinion.html)

Taking away a law abiding citizen's deterrent, it makes law abiding citizens easier to target, because law abiding citizens will abide with the gun control laws while the criminal will not.

Having disarm the population, those who are armed (the totalitarian state, criminals, etc) will benefit.

4.) Does responsible Gun ownership protect lives and property?

Did you know that yesterday, on April 20th, there was an:

armed robbery of a convenience store in Hoopa that ended when the suspected robber was shot.

(SOURCE: http://www.eurekareporter.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?ArticleID=23108)

And on the same day somewhere else, it saved the life of a victim of an armed burglary that ended with the criminals shooting and wounding the home owner?

One of the robbers shot at him, hitting him in the neck. He ran into the street. The robbers followed him outside.

The homeowner told police he fired at the robbers. As the robbers returned fire, two retreated into the house. The third, Price, continued to exchange gunfire with the homeowner.

(SOURCE: http://www.kansascity.com/115/story/77569.html)

Or, in the hands of a citizen working as a security guard, it ended a robbery?

A suspected robber was shot and wounded by security guards after he and another man allegedly robbed a business in Hyde Park on Monday, Gauteng police said.

(SOURCE: http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=15&art_id=nw20070416164408862C252156 )

Imagine being a mom eight months pregnant with a two year old child, and someone is physically being aggressive towards you and is now heading towards your two year old:

The store surveillance tape shows the suspect aggressively confronting Susana while her 2-year-old daughter sits nearby.

"She walked to just right to her quick ... and went to attack her right away," said Joe. "My wife has a big stomach like this, she's eight months pregnant."

The two women struggled briefly at the counter...

When the suspect appeared to move toward their daughter, Susana shot the suspect in the shoulder blade, near the collarbone.

(SOURCE: http://wcco.com/topstories/local_story_098095821.html)

Imagine a place where every body has guns.  Some people believe that with more guns, we:

would soon become a place where routine disagreements between neighbors would be settled in shootouts.

But is this necessarily true?

In March 1982, 25 years ago, the small town of Kennesaw – responding to a handgun ban in Morton Grove, Ill. – unanimously passed an ordinance requiring each head of household to own and maintain a gun. Since then, despite dire predictions of "Wild West" showdowns and increased violence and accidents, not a single resident has been involved in a fatal shooting – as a victim, attacker or defender.

The crime rate initially plummeted for several years after the passage of the ordinance, with the 2005 per capita crime rate actually significantly lower than it was in 1981, the year before passage of the law.

Prior to enactment of the law, Kennesaw had a population of just 5,242 but a crime rate significantly higher (4,332 per 100,000) than the national average (3,899 per 100,000). The latest statistics available – for the year 2005 – show the rate at 2,027 per 100,000. Meanwhile, the population has skyrocketed to 28,189.

(SOURCE: http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=55288)

In summarizing the above, this town mandated everyone to own a gun and this have a dramatic turnaround in crime reduction.

Contrast to its sister city of Morton Grove, which was the first city with a law to ban guns for those who are not officers:

More significantly, perhaps, the city's crime rate increased by 15.7 percent immediately after the gun ban, even though the overall crime rate in Cook County rose only 3 percent.

(SOURCE: http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=55288)

Does the good outweigh the bad, in having guns?

firearms are used defensively an estimated 2.5 million times every year, four times more than criminal uses. This represents some 2,575 lives protected and saved for every life lost to a gun. According to the national Safety Council, the loss of life to accidental firearm death is at its lowest point since records were begun nearly a hundred years ago.

(SOURCE: http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/daily/opinion/48570.php)

I just hope that those who are swept by the emotions of anti-gun rhethorics in light of the tragic incident in Virginia Tech might take the time to take into consideration the four factors I've stated.

Will having more weapon mean that violence will never happen? I don't think so, and I don't know anyone that does argue that.  Its because of the sinfulness of man's nature that violence are born.  But taking everything into consideration, more gun control is not the solution.

THE END.