4 Jun 2022 6:34 pm
I live in about as perfect an area as I could ever hope to: off the beaten path in a rural area, my only neighbors wildlife and like-minded, self-reliant friends. Casual looky-loos just don't come out here unless they're hopelessly lost.ScottMon » 03 Jun 2022, 9:25 pm » wrote: ↑ I live in a very nice neighborhood. Quiet. No violence. Just elderly folks. However, I do love live music and if I were to attend one like those folks did in LA, I'm a sitting duck. That guy killed 58 people from a hotel room. No way to eliminate all soft targets and having a gun is unlikely to save my life as per statistics.
I made the decision a long time ago to not attend big open-air events of any kind. Too much to go wrong. My wife and I prefer quiet evenings at home and weekends in the mountains, hiking and camping. It's a relatively idyllic existence, to be completely honest... but we both have worked in the law-enforcement and security fields, and being armed is as second-nature as breathing to both of us. We've seen what happens to innocent people who like to pretend they're not at risk and even if they were there's no point to trying to do anything about it because, well.... statistics.
My predilections here notwithstanding, if a person simply doesn't want to own a defensive firearm I shouldn't try to force my viewpoint on them. There are, after all, plenty of legitimate reasons why someone would make that choice. But when someone simply says: "I don't need a gun." it's hard not to respond with: "You HOPE you're never going to need a gun."
But... I have to remind myself it's not my place to tell anyone else how to live their life. My biggest complaint about gun controllers is that I'm fine with them making the choice to NOT own guns; where I get irritated is their desire to not only tell me how my choice is wrong, but how I should be forbidden from making my own choice on the matter. But, then I realize that sometimes I get in your face too much, and imply that YOU shouldn't be able to make a different choice than ME... and I apologize for that.