Oddly enough, this thing starts out very un-HuffPosty by acknowledging that the 2nd Amendment does protect private gun ownership:
The Second Amendment is highly contested. There is no doubt that people do have the right to carry and have a stockpile of guns (“the right of the people to keep and bear arms”) and a state has the right to organize a well-regulated Militia. But, the main issue is on the right to self-defend with a firearm.
It’s still worded sarcastically, but that does seem like the author reluctantly agrees with the people’s right to keep and bear arms. Now here is where things become unhinged:
The main problem with the notion of self-defense is it imposes on justice, for everyone has the right for a fair trial. Therefore, using a firearm to defend oneself is not legal because if the attacker is killed, he or she is devoid of his or her rights.
There are an awful lot of flaws with this argument, the first being that a violent attacker hasn’t been arrested or charged yet when they are trying to commit a terrible act. They aren’t due their day in court until they are formally charged. In addition, a person committing an unlawful act forfeits certain legal protections.
Second, the Bill of Rights only limits the power of the federal government, not the people. The Constitution doesn’t lay out all of our rights, just the ones the feds can’t mess with. We have other rights besides what is in the document, and one of those is the basic human right to live.
Third, nothing in the Constitution forbids the people from defending themselves against a deadly attack. There is no clause in the 6th Amendment that says a person cannot defend himself or herself with deadly force because it interferes with a criminal’s right to a fair trial. There have also been no Supreme Court rulings in this area.
And if you thought that was idiotic, check out the other reasons why the author thinks we can’t use guns in self-defense:
Therefore, if we ponder and meditate on the recent events in news about guns, it would be obvious that the current state is incorrect. A gun for civilians is a weapon for a revolution and not for ordinary use. The belief that a gun is a useful tool to protect one is counterintuitive because guns get into the hands of people who use them for horrible reasons.
That’s almost like a cohesive thought, I guess. Basically this guy is saying that guns are only for overthrowing the government so they cannot be used for defense or hunting or target shooting. Plus, since criminals use guns for crime, law-abiding people can’t use them to stop crime.
