I copied this from one of the yahoo gun group forums, I'd like to share with yall. (Thats "you all", for people who don't speak Kentuckian)


*When Guns Are Outlawed ... Only Government Will Have Guns*

*by **_John Bowman

_* http://www.lewrockw ell.com/orig10/ bowman3.html


Author R.J. Rummel has produced a significant body of work including
numerous essays and several books that deal with the subject of
democide, a term he coined to describe a widely-accepted legal
definition of murder that applies when perpetrated by government upon
its own people. After examining about 10,000 sources over many years,
Rummel estimates that governments of the world have murdered (i.e.,
committed democide on) approximately 262 million people in the 20th
century alone. That shocking figure is no joke and, as Rummel points
out, is about 7 times higher than the combat death toll from all wars
fought over the same period combined. 20th Century wars were the worst
in man's history and killed almost twice as many people as "ordinary"
civilian criminal murders across the globe over the same
one-hundred- year span. Yet, even though "the 20th century is noted for
its absolute and bloody wars," war was not the 20th Century's biggest
killer. Democide was. Or rather government was. And the comparison was
not even close.

It should come as no surprise that the hallmark of democide according to
Rummel is authoritarian government. It should also be no surprise that
virtually every monstrous genocide or democide event in modern history
was conducted by collectivist or socialist-style dictatorships, with the
lion's share of atrocity garnered by the Marxist variety ? those great
saints who do everything "for the good of the people" and who without
any sense or shame hold offices and/or comprise significant political
parties in most "civilized" nations today. In fact, the results of
various flavors of socialism are what prompted other historians to
invent the word "genocide" in the first place.

To put the 262 million murders in more conceptual terms, consider that
if one takes a random walk through the entire set of murdered men,
women, and children, more than 9 out of 10 murders across all times and
all nations, were perpetrated, not by civilian criminals, but by
criminal thugs operating under the auspice or directive of government to
murder its own people, generally those who oppose the government or who
oppose the politically well-connected or who own what the government
covets for itself. If deaths due to war ? what many currently believe is
the greatest threat to life and limb ? are included in the set, then
still over 4 out of 5 violent deaths (83%) are the result of murder by
the host government with the remaining 17% comprised by 11% war
casualties and 6% civilian murder^ 1
. Yet, while
totalitarianism, foreign invasion, and civilian crime ? the primary
historic threats to everyone's safety ? all arise for a vast array of
reasons, there is, fortunately, at least one thing that is proven to
prevent or mitigate all of these to a very high degree: widespread gun
ownership by the civilian population.

Therefore, if one cares about one's own personal safety or that for
one's children, family, and neighbors, then there is no substitute for a
well-armed society. This is not rocket surgery. A well-armed society is
a civil society. A well-armed society is also a serious deterrent to
foreign invaders and modern technology such as satellites, planes,
missiles, and tanks has not changed that. And finally, most importantly,
a well-armed society has never yet, not once, been the helpless victim
of democide to any significant degree, and it takes no great imaginative
leap to understand why. When guns are outlawed, only government will
have them, and look at their sorry record. The figure would be supremely
monstrous and unacceptable if it were a mere 1 out of 100, yet more than
9 out of 10 murders committed on planet Earth were orchestrated by the
victim's own government. In fact, major events of democide unilaterally
occur to people who are disarmed, usually (ludicrously) within months of
disarmament of the population, which of course was promoted and ordered
for their own good and safety, and often made possible by
government-maintain ed registration or licensing records.

Today, we are continually bombarded with propaganda relating to the
dangers of gun ownership. This propaganda shamelessly claims stiffer and
stiffer gun control is necessary to "protect the children" or some other
nonsense about personal safety. At the same time, depending on age
range, children are more likely to die from drowning in their own toilet
or bathtub, from falling off a ladder or heights, or from bee stings
than they are from intentional or accidental death from a gun wound. And
lest we forget, these same gun control advocates think nothing of
putting their children in cars, which kills tens of thousands every
year. Why? Because it is clear the great utility of vehicles justify the
small yet deadly risks. Yet, wide proliferation of guns (with zero
controls) also has great utility, namely prevention of the worst crimes
in history as well as the run-o-the-mill variety. Furthermore, guns have
a lower risk factor to law abiders than do cars, so where is all the
clamoring from the "I-want-my-children -to-be-safe" crowd for bans on
automobiles? There ain't any because this brand of stupidity is
emotional, not rational.

On the other hand, democide appears to expressly target children.
Children whose parents if not unarmed would have long ago overthrown the
tyrants who impoverish them to retain or regain their own property and
means of feeding and rearing their children. That is why gun control
advocates horrify me, especially those who are well-meaning and
passionate about the issue. They genuinely believe removing guns from
law abiders will solve social ills, while ignoring the consequences. To
remove guns from the hands of law abiders is the tyrant's dream, the
criminal's dream, the warmonger's dream. And it is the law abider's
nightmare. To remove guns from the hands of law abiders unleashes every
horror conceivable, and some that are inconceivable. And for what? To
prevent some perceived threat that, even if realistic, is 5 or 6 orders
of magnitude less likely to cause harm than the nightmare with a long
and distinguished pedigree that may ensue if they get their wish?

It is as though gun control advocates seriously believe it is desirable
to rip up the parachute, use the material to sew a windbreaker, then
proudly proclaim they've prevented the skydiver from catching a cold on
his trip down. It would be comical if not so deadly serious. To be fair,
yes, many die from gun wounds. Yes, that is tragic and senseless.
Without a doubt, guns can be quite dangerous, but the same can be said
of cars. Of electricity. And even of love, a major player in crimes of
passion and suicide, the latter of which takes more US lives every year
than all reported gun violence and is in fact responsible for over 70%
(higher in many other countries) of what is included in the gun-related
death figures ? a component that heavily skews these figures, yet is
rarely considered by gun control advocates as if these suicides would
not have occurred but for the availability of guns. Are there not
consequences to banning any of these things: cars, electricity, love? Or
of banning guns? Consequences that apparently go well beyond the narrow
horizons and lack of historical knowledge of the typical ban advocate.

On the lighter side, one beauty of widespread gun ownership is that
members of the adamant "I'll-never- touch-the- things" crowd do not have
to own one. They need only pray that their neighbors do, because those
law abiding, gun-toting neighbors will protect them from the true
heinous threats to their existence and livelihood, even if they are
unwilling or unable to do so themselves or even oblivious to the
dangers. And consider further, that the protection afforded by
widespread gun ownership by law abiders can extend across national
borders as well as neighborhoods. For example, while Canada does have a
relatively significant number of guns, many Canadian gun enthusiasts
have noted that much of their personal safety can be attributed to the
fact that the populace of their closest neighbor maintains so many
firearms.

As a final, more mundane thought, basically everyone knows or has heard
that there is a correlation between gun control and crime. In fact,
areas in the US with virtual gun bans, like DC, have not only the
highest crime rates, but also a disproportionately higher amount of
violent crime, whereas areas with few gun regulations tend to show much
lower crime overall, with most of it of a non-violent nature such as
property crime like theft, instead of violent crime like assault, rape,
or murder. Gun advocates tout these statistics, while gun-grabbers are
completely mystified and so go in search of some rationale to explain it
away, or they focus on other issues, usually something like the safety
of children.

I earnestly desire that everyone in the world becomes or remains a
staunch advocate of widespread, unregulated gun ownership. There are
few, if any, paradigms one could adopt to better ensure personal safety
and peaceful pursuits. Such a paradigm would mitigate crime, reduce
warfare, and, by far the most important, provide the ultimate backstop ?
when unalienable rights and Constitutions fail ? against the most
heinous danger all inhabitants of the world face: democide. It is
neither a joke nor the subversive tripe you have come to expect from the
phrase to say, support gun ownership! If not for yourself, do it for the
children.

*Note*

1. Please note, I understand this is a contentious subject, and mere
statistics or numbers can never sum up these atrocities. Moreover,
the figures I use are 35 million casualties of war in the 20th
century and 20 million (probably too high) 20th century
civilian-perpetrate d murders worldwide, which appear to be widely
accepted figures. Again, these are estimates, believed to be
accurate, so please do not write me to suggest these figures are
either too liberal or too conservative or otherwise incorrect
unless any are off by one or two orders of magnitude or more
because unless that is the case, it does not change in any way the
thesis of this note ? that widespread gun ownership by a civilian
population will significantly improve the safety of said civilian
population from every colossal threat, especially the most serious
of all: democide.

/June 1, 2009

/
/John Bowman [send him mail
johnwbowman@ gmail.com] lives in Washington State./

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