This site is dedicated to the book I wrote in search of a way forward on public policy based on facts and logic. I had a conversation with someone recently that opened my eyes to the idea that facts and logic may not provide the definitive foundation I was hoping for. When it comes to gun regulations, facts only get you so far before you end up at crossroads that can only be determined by what values you hold.
In my chapter on Gun Control, I believe I have laid out a compelling, and frankly unassailable, argument that it’s the easy access and massive proliferation of guns that is behind the uniquely American experience of mass shootings on a weekly, if not daily basis. This clearly makes the case for implementing reasonable gun regulations, including the banning of weapons of war (i.e., the AR-15), which are the implement of choice for those unstable individuals intending on the tragic random mass shootings we’re repeatedly enduring.
Logically, the next step is to elect politicians who are willing to cast their vote in ways consistent with the facts, not ideology detached from reality. But not so fast. There’s one more thing to consider that maybe I need to add into the chapter. The first phrase of the 2nd Amendment focuses on a “well regulated militia”, with the intent of defending America not just from external forces, but from corrupt and tyrannical forces from within. Our nascent country just went through a revolution against tyranny, and this was a mechanism to ensure that we wouldn’t end up realizing Pete Townshend’s admonition: “Meet the new boss; same as the old boss.” In the event that the government turns tyrannical, the Second Amendment ensures that the general public will be prepared to defend itself and bring democracy back from the brink.
Here we are, nearly a quarter millennia later, and here’s the scorecard that being lethally armed to the teeth has earned us:
Note that Tom Toles created this cartoon 13 years ago. We’ve now got multiple billboards full of scratch marks on the right, and still no overthrown tyrants on the left. So, what are we, as a nation founded on a constitution featuring the Second Amendment to do?
On one hand, as some will argue, the general public needs access to firepower equal to the American government, just in case we need to overthrow it. This includes, based on conversations I’ve had, everything from fully-automatic weapons to Stinger shoulder-mounted anti-aircraft missile launchers to Javelin anti-tank missile launchers to tanks – whatever the American military has, so should the collective public. Disarming ourselves would only invite tyranny.
On the other hand, we have body bags pilling up like clockwork, even with standard military weapons being illegal. Adding more firepower to the mix is insane.
It’s quite the conundrum: if we take steps to protect ourselves from our current reality of the daily massacre, we may well end up with a worse situation of full-blown tyranny. Worse, there is no way for a Scientific Method-wielding scientist to draw a conclusive decision on what is the factually justifiable path forward, as both sides have facts supporting them.
This is where, the world of engineering, the System Engineer takes a step back and evaluates the risks associated with either path and conducts a trade study. With no clear-cut path forward, we must choose the one that we judge to feature the most likely path to the desired out come. We have three options:
The need to defend ourselves against the possibility of a tyrannical government supercedes any concern over the deaths and injuries from guns. We need access to firepower equal to that of the military so that we can defend ourselves from a tyrannical government.
Keep the status quo as far as accessibility of weapons. The carnage we’re seeing is the price we pay for having the freedom to defend ourselves with high-power semi-automatic rifles. The best we can do is to minimize the incidneces of gun violence by addressing the external issues that contribute to it.
Make it harder to get guns, and entirely ban what some would call Weapons of War.
Let’s address these in order. Considering what to say on the prospect of increasing the availability of highly lethal guns, or even going further with truly devistating weapons of war that have nothing to do with personal self-defense… I’m at a bit of a loss. Do I really need to make an argument as to why it is insane to put this sort of firepower in the hands of the general public? While tanks and anti-aircraft weaponry are well beyond the budget of all but the ultra-wealthy in search of a fun weekend toy, an M-16, the standard issue military rifle, is only $3,000. An RPG-7 Anti-Tank Rocket Laucher costs no more than $2,000 and each rocket-propelled grenade is a few hundred bucks. These are not prohibitively expensive weapons capable of unimaginable destruction. Put these on the free market, and how long before we’ve got mayhem in the streets? The notion that we need to have these weapons available to the general public to secure democracy from tyranny is rivaled by it’s abiltiy to collapse into chaos.
At this point, we need to lean into the fact that there will always be the loud, but fringe population on any topic. The liklihood of out-of-control chaos outweighs the possibility of having to go toe-to-toe with the American military. Even there, that’s not even accurate. We’d be able to go toe-to-toe to the limited extent of door-to-door urban warfare. But once you get tanks, drones, figher jets, bombers, etc. into the action, it’s utterly ridiculous to imagine that we’d previal in a battle of might just due to the the general public being unable to afford, let alone be proficient in using them. An F-35 fighter jet that costs $75 million. How many of these are going to be bought in an unregulated free market, while the U.S. military has a couple thousand of them with trained pilots to spare? Anyone arguing that this is the approach to securing our freedom either hasn’t thought it all the way through, or is just delusional.
OK, enough about that. Option 2: Accept that we’re not going to have an arsenal of Weapons of War, and we’ll just have to resist a tyrannical government with AR-15’s. First, good luck with that. Second, that leaves us with our current situation, which is entirely unacceptable. If you define “mass shooting” as an event that produced a minimum of four victims shot, either injured or killed, not including any shooter, then we’ve had 154 as of today, the 104th day of the year. That’s right, we’re suffering through 3 mass shootings every 2 days right now. If we want to improve upon this by reducing the incidents of mass shootings without banning guns, then we’re going to have an awful lot of heavy lifting to improve the situation. The conversation referenced at the start of this post cited the following as the path that leads to reducing mass shootings without banning guns:
Free College (4 years mandatory)
Focus Counter Terrorism on White Supremacists, Christian nationalists, etc
Allow people to be well armed without arbitrary barriers
Harden Sensitive/Vulnerable Locations
Dismantle hateful ideologies
Force cops to protect
End Poverty
The first two, educating the masses and focusing our governmental security forces on the groups trafficing in violence, I’m fully on board with. Public education didn’t always include everything up through high school. It started with elementary school, and then expanded as the needs of society demanded more education. Our needs have gone so far such that a high school diploma is not nearly enough to get a middle-class job. Increased education theoretically brings increased affluence, which brings a level of civility. As for the counter-terrorism efforts - yeah, that’s a no-brainer. Great. Common ground. But is that enough? The fact that the person on the other end of the conversation included numerous other steps suggests, no.
I’ve addressed in my book the logic associated with the second bullet point calling for all people to be well-armed. This is a lie perpetuated by the gun industry to sell more arms. An armed society is not a polite society.
From here on in, the recommendations get a bit sketchy. Harden our society. So, basically, create a militaristic society that trades our freedoms for security. Is this really the trade we want when we could just get rid of the guns? Dismantle hateful ideologies, Force cops to protect, End poverty. OK, while we’re at it, let’s just implement world peace. Wonderful lip service that is waaaaaaaaay easier said than done.
Or, we could just get rid of the guns that are behind the mass violence we’re suffering through! Oh, but that would not only leave us vulnerable to tyranny, but promote it! Let’s pause for a moment and see if this logic is supported by the evidence across the world. Great Britain has been a democracy since 1832, and even with 2.3% of the number of guns that we do, they have somehow been able to avoid backsliding into tyranny over all this time. Across the world, with a few exceptions, democracies have been able to survive indefinitely with a tiny percentage of the gun ownership that the U.S. has. It seems, according to the data, that gun ownership is not the crucial factor needed for maintaining democracy. Those few exceptions all have their unique stories (e.g., Germany’s pre-existing condition of the fall-out from World War I) that differentiate themselves from the U.S.
Given the three options we have before us, #1 is just insane. #2 is unacceptable and the remedies within the confines of #2 are utopian. #3 has existance proof that democracies are able to survive in the absence of abundant gun ownership. If we are to chart a path forward, it’s clear, to all that are clear-eyed on the topic, that restricting the access to gun ownership, especially for those that fall in the Weapons of War category, is the one most likely to produce the result we are begging for.