No one wants to violate anyone’s rights. But there’s not a reason in the universe why we can’t severely regulate the purchase and use of guns in this country just like we regulate the use of any number of other things, even everyday things like cars.
If you want to drive a car in this country you have to study for, take, and pass both a written and practical exam; the same should be true for guns.
If you want to drive a car in this country you have to register it with the state and pay a registration fee; the same should be true for guns.
If you want to drive a car in this country you have to renew your license for it every 4 years; the same should be true for guns.
If you want to drive a car in this country you have to have it inspected for safety periodically; the same should be true for guns.
If you sell a car in this country you have to notify the state that you’ve done so by transferring the title to the new owner, even when the transaction takes place between two private individuals; the same should be true for gun ownership.
You aren’t allowed to drive a car in this country if you’re mentally incompetent to do so; the same should be true for gun ownership.
I think it’s reasonable to require that all guns be registered and their serial numbers entered into a national database so they can be easily tracked to their owners.
I think it’s reasonable to have gun ownership forbidden for convicted felons who haven’t had their convictions overturned, for people with mental illness, and even for people who have a mentally ill person living in their home.
And yes, I want to see an outright ban on all assault, automatic, and semi-automatic weapons. You don’t use them for hunting and they’re completely overboard for home protection. We don’t let you keep plutonium either; you’ll survive.
The Fourth Amendment says I have a right to privacy, and the Supreme Court interpreted that to extend to my physical body, thereby making my absolute right to an abortion completely legal in all 50 states.
But you rightwingers think nothing of setting up extraordinary restrictions that in many states have now made it literally impossible to exert my right to obtain a perfectly legal medical procedure. You think nothing of regulating the size of the janitorial closets, or hallways, or exam rooms themselves; of requiring all doctors to have privileges at the nearest hospital knowing the hospitals have refused to grant said privileges; require women to wait 72 hours between the first counseling session with her doctor and the abortion; be subjected to invasive transvaginal ultrasounds; to be lied to about an increased risk of suicide — the list of outrageous regulations and restrictions is abominable.
But you claim to be doing it all for the sake of this so-called “human life,” which in nearly all cases is little more than a few cells no bigger than an apple seed, with no nerve endings, no vision, no emotions, no nothing.
Well dude, some of us would like to protect actual living, breathing, sentient human beings from very real, grisly, terrifying deaths as they attempt to live their lives with the freedom to congregate in malls, movie theaters, churches, and schools; the freedom to play the music in their car as loud as they damn well please; the freedom to walk home no matter whether the self-appointed neighborhood vigilante thinks they belong there.
Your freedom to own a gun stops when it infringes upon the rest of our freedom to live without fear of being shot to death while attending a political rally or going to a spa.
You may have certain guns, but you may also have to start living with some restrictions on them, just like the rest of us do with the restrictions you place on our rights.