So I read an article yesterday about some guy bringing his gun to Haborfest in Norfolk, Va. When it turned out he wasn’t a cop and didn’t intend to take his .45 and go home, the police arrested him. Since this is Virginia, the news has been greeted by armed citizens and the Virginia Citizens Defense League, who are arguing for the man’s Second Amendment rights and claim that state carrying laws trump an event’s wish to ban firearms.
I’m not going to argue for or against the man’s arrest. The gun ownership advocates will give that argument greater (or lesser) justice. My argument is against guns rights groups and their half-assed interpretation of the Second Amendment.
If you read the Second Amendment, it grants the right to bear arms–not just guns–in order to maintain a militia. The question is not whether groups like the NRA and the VCDL are endangering the rest of us by handing out guns with mortgages, but why aren’t they fighting to uphold the Second Amendment’s real meaning as the framers intended?
The whole point of the Second Amendment is to allow citizens to form militias to protect all of the other rights in our constitution should any government–foreign or domestic–attempt to take those rights away. Ignoring the fact that any repressive government would repeal the Second Amendment, rendering any gun owner unconstitutional and the NRA and VCDL moot, these arms must deter or combat essentially any standing army, including our own.
(For those already snickering, this isn’t a literal satire advocating the amputation of arms from infants. Jonathan Swift was so-o-o 262 years ago.)
Guns are not enough to stop Army Strong (even if it is an Army of One). Our individual owner’s rights should include all arms for waging war on the United States, including–but not limited to–swords, crossbows, howitzers, tanks, plastic explosives, stealth bombers and tactical nuclear warheads. Anything less would abridge my Second Amendment rights to keep and bear arms for my antidisestablishmentarian militia.
(Now recruiting: the Rick Snee Antidisestablishmentarian Militia. Join our Facebook group!)
Since the NRA and VCDL focus only on guns, I can only make one of two logical assumptions about them: either 1) they’re in the pocket of anti-nukes politicians and special interest groups in order to keep us from uprising, or 2) they can’t read.
The NRA has an out, of course: they’re the National Rifle Association. However, they also advocate private ownership of handguns and shotguns, so my assumptions apply.
The VCDL has no excuse. Virginia’s citizens need every possible arm attainable to once again gloriously uprise against the wussy liberal North. No one wants another embarassing Appomattox because the Antidisestablismentarian Militia didn’t have an adequate missile shield.
It’s time to stop giving groups like the NRA and VCDL any form of legitimacy. They aren’t really fighting for our Second Amendment rights, not completely. They’re just like liberal environmental groups that want to promote hybrid cars for cleaner air, yet let the cows and their methane farts–the real culprits–live. Until they win my right to own my own fully-armed Apache attack helicopter, they’re just hogging the spotlight and accomplishing nothing for the rest of us.
Hey, Rick~
As a firearm-carrying, CCW permitted Virginian, I’m grateful that we have the VCDL there to stand up for those who pay their dues (which I don’t). Here’s my two cents on their defense-of-only-guns thing: it’s an escalation. We fight for the right to own firearms without ANY laws hindering us because the Second Amendment says “shall not be infringed.” When we’ve gotten to the point where noone dares infringe on the right to own GUNS, then we can start on our right to own rocket launchers, let alone body armor, helmets, and QuickClot (most manufacturers of these won’t sell to civilians). If we come out guns-a-blazing and demand the right to own a tactical nuke because the Second Amendment says so, we’ll be labeled as crazy(er) people by society and domestic terrorists by the government (they’re already working on this–have you SEEN Bush’s recent Executive Order?). So we start small, pray that the Federal District Court’s ruling on the D.C. gun ban holds, and try to convince a bunch of complacent sheep people that the government can really be dangerous and we might need these weapons to fight them someday. And if they don’t like that, try to convince them that they might get robbed and want the ability to defend themselves.
/rant :)
Shiloh C.