I recorded a show called “Guns in America” on the National Geographic channel last night. I was really hoping to see some sort of positive representation of guns, gun ownership, and gun use. What I saw when I watched this morning was a bad attempt at pretending to perhaps provide a fair story in the topic. They certainly did showed positive aspects of gun ownership, but always managed to inject some disparaging comment from the anti-gun camp.
I could go on and on about all the idiotic things they said pretending to be neutral. But this commentary really got me ROFLing…and then crying:
“This is a family of law abiding gun enthusiasts. Still, if this cache of weapons ever were stolen, chances are they would make it into criminal hands.”
I suppose they meant they’d be sold to gangbangers and such. But I just can’t see how Peter Coyote (the narrator) could have uttered that line and then not complained to the writer, Patrick Prentice, that he’s going to sound like a moron. After all, a gun stolen is a gun already in the hands of a criminal.
More importantly, this logic is one of many tells of the anti-gunners. They love to see laws that blame the gun owners when a criminal breaks into your home and steals your guns.** They even want laws that allow prosecution of the original owner of the gun (i.e. the one that it was stolen from) if the gun is used in a crime.
These mindsets are clearly aimed and persecuting gun ownership. Unless the owner of the gun that was stolen is criminally negligent, for example leaving their gun lying in the street, why are they to blame for being a victim of theft? Do we try and charge typical burglary victims with conspiring to sell stolen goods when their DVD player or TV shows up on the black market? No! Why is a gun any different?
** Don’t get me wrong, I certainly don’t intend to not report a loss of any of my property, much less my guns. By reporting it, there’s a remote chance I’d get it back if it’s found. And I’d need a report to file an insurance claim. These sorts of laws do nothing for deterring criminal ownership a they don’t worsen the crime for illegally owning a gun, nor do they help identify illegal gun owners as there list likely not going to be a way to trace a located stolen gun back to it’s earlier illegal owner. Therefore, the only use for these laws is to hassle lawful gun owners.
