Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Guns Are Designed to Kill (And killing is legitimate in some circumstances)
American Thinker ^ | 01/09/2013 | Kenneth Bennight

Posted on 01/09/2013 6:38:08 AM PST by SeekAndFind

Edited on 01/09/2013 6:40:30 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]

Would-be gun controllers argue that guns are different from other dangerous commodities. Guns are uniquely are designed to kill, they say, and therefore lack the utility of other dangerous things. Take automobiles, for instance: automobiles kill more people than guns, but automobiles' primary use is peaceful, and automobiles are not designed to kill. Why, gun controllers ask, should we tolerate guns, which are dangerous and have no material utility other than killing?


(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: banglist; guncontrol; guns; secondamendment
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-28 next last

1 posted on 01/09/2013 6:38:16 AM PST by SeekAndFind
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

Headline/comment: “Guns Are Designed to Kill (And killing is legitimate in some circumstances)”

Reminds me of Dirty Harry: “Some folks just need killin’”


2 posted on 01/09/2013 6:40:49 AM PST by rockinqsranch (Dems, Libs, Socialists, call 'em what you will, they ALL have fairies livin' in their trees.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind
Had to be said.

Now let's see if the will to kill can be said also.

3 posted on 01/09/2013 6:41:04 AM PST by knarf (I say things that are true ... I have no proof ... but they're true)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

My packing tape gun is not designed to kill. Neither is my nail gun, nor staple gun, nor caulk gun.

Were swords designed to slice bread? Undoubtedly there have been swords so used in the past.

Gotta love all these semantic arguments.


4 posted on 01/09/2013 6:44:16 AM PST by Olog-hai
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind
Take automobiles, for instance: automobiles kill more people than guns, but automobiles' primary use is peaceful, and automobiles are not designed to kill.

There are 300 million guns in America, but only 240 million vehicles. Yet the object who's "primary purpose" to kill is less efficient at killing Americans than the object who's primary purpose is "peaceful."

Time to ban cars. Or at least ban "High Velocity Capacity" cars such as Mustangs and Corvettes.

5 posted on 01/09/2013 6:44:41 AM PST by Yo-Yo (Is the /sarc tag really necessary?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind
Sure that is a reason. But what about those of us into the shooting sports. I love 3 gun competition and other forms of timed, accurate shooting.

Then there is harvesting of animals for consumption. Notice the operative word harvesting not killing. What narrow minded propagandists.

6 posted on 01/09/2013 6:45:44 AM PST by mosaicwolf (Strength and Honor)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

A Nation of Cowards

Why the Gun is Civilization


Pacifism: The Ultimate Immorality by Raymond Kraft

Last week, Jack and Jill Pacifisto were walking home through the park after dinner with friends, during which they had spent a few hours discussing the immorality of violence and war and their commitments to send more money to progressive activists over the next year. Suddenly, Tony Thug stepped out of the shadows and pointed a pistol at Jack and said, “Give me your wallet,” and, pointing the gun at Jill, “Your purse.”

“What?” asked Jack, incredulous, “Hey, we don’t want any trouble. We’re pacifists. We aren’t going to hurt you.”

“Not my problem,” said Tony, “Gimme your money.”

So Jack and Jill did, and then Tony said, “And now gimme your watches, rings, jewelry, everything worth anything.”

“Hey,” said Jill, “This is my wedding ring!”

And Tony said, “Not my problem.”

Jack and Jill handed over their wallet, and purse, and all their jewelry and Rolex watches, and then Tony shot them both twice in the chest and picked up the loot and stepped back into the shadows.

As Jill lay dying she whispered, “Jack? Why didn’t you fight back? Why didn’t you have a gun?” Those were her last words.

“I couldn’t,” whispered Jack. “I’m a pacifist.” Those were his last words.

A few days later, Bill Thaxton and his wife were walking home through the park after dinner, when Tony Thug stepped out of the shadows.

“Give me your wallet, your purse,” said Tony, pointing his gun first at Bill, and then at his wife. He did not know that Bill was an old lawman, and had been a Marine sniper when he was young, and was active in the Single Action Shooters Society and had a concealed-carry-permit. Tony assumed that the old man was just an old man with some money and a few credit cards in his wallet walking home from dinner.

“Sorry, friend, I don’t like guns, and I don’t want any trouble,” said Bill.

“Not my problem,” said Tony, “Gimme your wallet, your purse,” he said, waving the gun at Bill’s wife, “Rings, watches, everything.”

“And what if I don’t?” asked Bill.

“I’ll shoot you both. Her first,” said Tony, pointing his gun at Bill’s wife again.

“Well,” said Bill, “Okay, honey, do what he says.”

She tossed down her purse. Bill reached slowly for his left lapel with his right hand and then, like lightning, did a cross-draw with his left and came out blazing with his trusty little 9, nailing Tony three times.

As he lay on the sidewalk dying, Tony Thug was heard to mutter, “Damn, I shoulda stuck with the pacifists . . .”

An acquaintance wrote me last week to tell me proudly how he had been a pacifist since the ‘60s. His letter set me thinking about pacifism, which is the ultimate and vilest form of immorality.

If you are Hitler, or Saddam, or Osama, or Ahmadinejad, your desire to kill those you dislike is at least honest and open. You wear you hate on your sleeve and we know who and what you are. But the Pacifist wears his refusal to resist evil as if it were a badge of honor, and claims it as a sign of his or her absolute moral superiority. The Hitlers and Osamas are at least honest about who they are, the Pacifist is not. Not even to himself.

The German Pastor Martin Niemoller wrote a poem circa 1946 about the quiescence of German intellectuals in the face of the Nazi rise to power that has become famous. Translated, it reads:

When they locked up the social democrats,

I remained silent,

I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists

I did not speak out,

I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews

I did not speak out,

I was not a Jew.

When they came for me

there was no one left to speak out.

The Pacifist says something like this, but, unlike Niemoller, without apology. He says:

When you come for my allies

I will not fight you,

for I am a Pacifist.

When you come for my countrymen

I will not fight you,

for I am a Pacifist.

When you come for my neighbor,

I will not fight you,

for I am a Pacifist.

When you come for my mother,

my father, my brother,

my sister, I will not fight you,

for I am a Pacifist.

When you come for my wife,

my husband, my son,

my daughter, I will not fight you,

for I am a Pacifist.

When you come for me,

I will not fight you,

for I am a Pacifist.

The Pacifist claims that he (or she) is too good to fight against evil, and this is the catastrophic intellectual and moral failure of Pacifism. In the guise of being too good to oppose evil, the Pacifist invokes the ultimate immorality by aiding and abetting and encouraging evil, on the pretext of being too pure, too wise, too sophisticated to fight evil, thereby turning the pretense of goodness and purity into an invocation and license for evil to act without opposition.

The moral stance of the Pacifist is, unwittingly perhaps, homicidal, genocidal, fratricidal, suicidal. The Pacifist says, in effect: “There is nothing good worth fighting for. And there is nothing so evil worth fighting against.”

The Pacifist is willing to give evil free reign, because he or she thinks or feels that fighting against evil is even worse than evil itself . . . an intellectual and moral equivocation of monumentally staggering proportions. In order to be a Pacifist, one must hold that Nazism or Islamism or Communism or any other puritanical totalitarian ideology that seeks to slaughter or oppress all the Jews or all of any other race or tribe is no worse, is not morally inferior, to the existence of Jews and Judaism, or whatever other race or tribe is the whipping boy of the day.

To be a Pacifist, one must hold that acquiescence to a Jihad that seeks to destroy Western Civilization is no worse than Western Civilization, even though the Jihad seeks to extinguish intellectual freedom, religious freedom, political freedom, and ultimately even the freedom to be a Pacifist.

As the English philosopher Edmund Burke said, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” The Pacifist replies, “I am so good that I will do nothing, I will hurt no one, even if that means that good will be destroyed and evil will win. I am so peaceful that I will not discriminate between the goodness of good and the badness of evil, certainly not with enough conviction to take up arms, literally or figuratively, against the triumph of evil over good, of totalitarianism over freedom, of barbarianism over civilization.”

And so the Pacifist, perhaps unthinkingly, unwittingly, mistakenly, is deeply mired in his intellectual confusion, but surely and unequivocally, the epitome of evil itself, For the Pacifist devoutly believes that by refusing to fight against evil he is affirming that he is good, too good and pure to oppose evil, too good and pure to fight evil, to good and pure to kill evil. But in the end, he is the enabler without whom the triumph of evil would not be possible.



7 posted on 01/09/2013 6:48:21 AM PST by EdReform (Oath Keepers - Guardians of the Republic - Honor your oath - Join us: www.oathkeepers.org)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

Yes, guns are designed to kill. But designed to kill whom?

Tyrannical governments and the tyrants and despots that makes them up, that’s who.

They are used to kill others, but guns are not “designed” to kill them.


8 posted on 01/09/2013 6:58:28 AM PST by C210N (When people fear government there is tyranny; when government fears people there is liberty)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind
Why, gun controllers ask, should we tolerate guns, which are dangerous and have no material utility other than killing?

It's not something you are in a position to "tolerate".
You don't want a gun - don't own one.

9 posted on 01/09/2013 6:59:44 AM PST by grobdriver (Sic semper tyrannis!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

Here we go again, somebody is accepting a premise that is inherently false. Guns are designed to push projectiles out of their barrels at a relatively high rate of speed.
Killing has to do with the intent of the person holding the gun. Intent with a baseball bat or a car is exactly the same.
Do not accept the false premise of the left. This is not a defensive action. They are assaulting our very rights of freedom!


10 posted on 01/09/2013 7:23:40 AM PST by Steamburg (The contents of your wallet is the only language Politicians understand.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Steamburg

RE: Guns are designed to push projectiles out of their barrels at a relatively high rate of speed.

But for what purpose?


11 posted on 01/09/2013 7:31:14 AM PST by SeekAndFind
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

Fun mostly.

My hammer was designed to drive nails but for what purpose? If I hit someone in the head with it they will most likely die.


12 posted on 01/09/2013 7:36:34 AM PST by Resolute Conservative
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: Resolute Conservative

RE: Fun mostly.

Well, the next question liberals will ask would be this — Do you really need an AR-15 to have fun?


13 posted on 01/09/2013 7:40:39 AM PST by SeekAndFind
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

Yes.

Do they need: starbucks, fag tv, dope, iPads, frisbees, booze, tobacco, fast foreign cars, fag clothes made in Cambodia, trips on those evil polluting aircraft to foreign countries... ad naseum?

Fun is in the eye of the entertained. I love putting rounds into old washing machines and stuff.


14 posted on 01/09/2013 7:51:04 AM PST by Resolute Conservative
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

guns are force multipliers. nothing we build just has one sole purpose.

guns prevent crimes.

openly displayed guns deter crime. just ask any criminal seeing armed cops around.

guns keep the peace.

a gun drawn out of its holster and seen by a criminal is 93% of the time al that is needed to cause that criminal to break off their attack.

a gun is just one of many weapons free people have as “arms” to secure their freedom and remain free.

guns are equalizers and give weaker, older, less powerful, outnumbered, and ambushed people a better chance at defending themselves from multiple, bigger, armed attackers.

guns are a natural crime deterrent. crime stats before and after ccw laws prove it, everywhere they exist.

guns are not just made for kiling. they are a tool of defense. defense doesn’t always mean shooting the gun, as 93% of the time a private citizen pulls their gun it is not even fired to stop a criminal assault.


15 posted on 01/09/2013 7:51:35 AM PST by Secret Agent Man (I can neither confirm or deny that; even if I could, I couldn't - it's classified.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Resolute Conservative

Do they need: starbucks, fag tv, dope, iPads, frisbees, booze, tobacco, fast foreign cars, fag clothes made in Cambodia, trips on those evil polluting aircraft to foreign countries... ad naseum?

So, I should be allowed to buy a bazooka or dynamites as long as I want to use them for fun and not to harm others? (I’ve heard that argument too).


16 posted on 01/09/2013 8:10:48 AM PST by SeekAndFind
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: All

What do you mean “has no utility use”? You ever tried opening a can of beans without one?!


17 posted on 01/09/2013 8:23:24 AM PST by rockrr (Everything is different now...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

I don’t see why not. If it really does not hurt anyone or others property. You can do more damage with a truck load of fertilizer and some chems.


18 posted on 01/09/2013 8:23:54 AM PST by Resolute Conservative
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 16 | View Replies]

To: Resolute Conservative

RE: I don’t see why not. If it really does not hurt anyone or others property.

Well that’s the point, with that kind of freedom, we also have to run the risk that an Adam Lanza can get hold of the bazooka and dynamite and use it.


19 posted on 01/09/2013 8:46:21 AM PST by SeekAndFind
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 18 | View Replies]

To: SeekAndFind

We also run the risk of a nutjob coming loose in the cockpit and running his Airbus into something or a gas delivery truck driver from running his rig into a store or school. Do we ban Airbuses and gas delivery trucks or try and do a better job of identifying and preventing nutjobs from twisting off?


20 posted on 01/09/2013 8:51:24 AM PST by Resolute Conservative
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 19 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-28 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson