A peek into a liberal's mind

April 15, 4:06 PMDenver Gun Rights ExaminerDan Bidstrup

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My sister, who lives in a large east coast city, is a dyed in the wool liberal, or as they prefer now, progressive.  What makes her wonderful is that she is very intelligent and widely read, and is willing to hold forth on long conversations regarding difficult topics.  Our e-mails sometimes run on for pages.  Recently we have been discussing gun control.  I put a question to her that I thought would crystallize our differences and it did. 

My question: Would you kill to avoid being killed?  That is the acid test.  If you answer no, then all that you profess makes sense for you.  It doesn’t reflect the value most of us have of self preservation however. 

Her answer: " I think that most any creature, if faced with a life and death situation, would instinctively try to save itself.  This is instinct, not reason.  That is why I would never carry a gun.  This way I don’t have to make horrible choices.  [With] My luck I would kill an undercover policeman and then live in horrible, health deteriorating guilt for the rest of my life.  I’d rather just take my chances and hope for the best in people.  I loved the story of the guy who shot his way out of custody at the court house and killed one or two others before ending up taking refuge in a house with a woman.  She was a Christian and talked him into giving himself up to the police.  Can you imagine the outcome if she had had a gun?  They would likely both be dead."

I am charmed by her firm grip on a world where good intentions make for good laws, and even if someone who has committed a crime shoots their way out of the courthouse killing police on the way out, there is still the chance for peaceful resolution.  Rather than looking at the aggregate of all such conflicts and their usual outcomes, she pins her hopes (and life) on being the one in a thousand who didn't get killed. She has no quarrel with people owning or carrying guns as long as they have all been carefully screened and exhaustively trained and licensed by the state.   Of course this would require nationwide licensing and a federal database of permits and owners.  I haven't been able to make her see that all the regimentation in the world of the good guys doesn't affect the behavior of the bad guys. I haven't been able to convince her that the 90 million or so gun owners in the country do a very good job of not shooting each other or anyone else.  Most of all I haven't been able to convince her that the legal guns in the hands of law-abiding citizens do any good.  She rejects the estimated figure that  2.5 million times a year, guns in law-abiding hands have averted crimes, often simply by being displayed by the would-be victim.  We continue to talk, and while I haven't modified her position yet, it gives me a peek into a progressive's mind.  We have civil discourse.  It's refreshing.