Gun Control Is Based On Propaganda

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I realize that this is a radical statement.  Of course, not all gun laws are bad.  I don't want felons to have guns.  Ditto for the mentally ill.  However, we already have laws on the books to deal with these kind of situations.  I'm not talking about these laws or minor adjustments to them - I am taking about the typical gun control arguments we have all heard many times.

What is propaganda?  Is it not when you simply make stuff up in order to justify a public policy? Nearly all gun control arguments are based on PHONY INFORMATION - and I can prove it.  .  I urge you to check the following facts out for yourself.  Specifically these are prime examples of the phony information gun control arguments are based upon, none of which are ever questioned by the mainstream media: 

Phony Facts (i.e. Lies):

Gun control advocates frequently speak of the "epidemic of gun violence".  They do so because they want you to believe that gun violence is increasing - and it is working.  Most Americans believe that gun crime is rising.  But what are the real facts?

The real facts: GUN CRIME, INCLUDING GUN HOMICIDES, ARE DOWN BY NEARLY 50% SINCE 1993.   Even more significant, the nations gun supply doubled and concealed carry massively expanded during this same time frame!  Yep, more guns and more concealed carry resulted in a 50% drop in gun crime!

This information does not come from the NRA, but from official government statistics - reported by the highly regarded public research organization PEW RESEARCH.

Pew reports that this propaganda has largely succeeded.  Indeed, their report is entitled, " Gun Homicide Rate Down 49% Since 1993 Peak; Public Unaware".  Even more significantly, this drop has taken place with the number of firearms in the hands of the public as doubled and "shall issue" citizen concealed carry has expanded from a handful of states to 43 states.

Does it bother you that the American public has been successfully deceived by the gun control movement and the mainstream media?  It should.

And this is but one example.  Other phony facts include: Firearms are infrequently used in self defense, mass shootings are never stopped by armed citizens, gun free zones save lives, most Mexican crime guns come from US gun stores and many people are killed with so called "assault weapons".  All of these so called facts are completely false.  



Phony statistics

First, I invite you to check the sources of data used by pro-gun rights advocates.  You will find that organizations supporting gun rights almost exclusively use official government data.  The exception is when government doesn't collect data - such as defensive gun use.  They can do this because the actual facts support their pro-gun rights arguments.

In contrast, gun control organizations usually do not do this.  Instead, they simply make up their own terms and statistics that provide false support for gun control.  No greater example exists than their oft used "gun deaths" statistic.

As we have seen above, criminal use of firearms is down - so gun control advocates create their own statistic - not used or issued by any government agency.  They add gun homicides, gun accidents and gun suicides together to create the largest number possible.  However, when the use this figure in the media, they almost never tell you that they have done this.  Why? SIMPLE: THEY WANT THE PUBLIC TO THINK THEIR PHONY FIGURE IS THE GUN HOMICIDE FIGURE!  Indeed, most in the media never dispute this - instead, they too speak as if it is the firearms homicide figure.

Many Nations With High Suicide Rates Ban or Nearly
Ban Firearms - Yet This Doesn't Stop Suicides.
People Who Really Want To Kill Themselves Will Find A
Way.  Note that the UK and The US Have Nearly Identical
Rates of Suicide In Spite Of Draconian Gun Laws in The UK.

This is important because the majority of their "gun deaths" (about 60%) are not homicides, they are gun suicides.  When they are forced to admit that their phony figure is mostly composed of suicides, they argue that more guns equal more suicides.  They point to comparisons between cherry picked states to support this argument.  They reject the argument that someone who really wants to kill themselves will find a way - but what are the facts?

Well, we can look to three nations that are very similar: The US, Canada and the UK.  All three are English speaking, they share a common history and even, to a great extent a common media.  All three are modern industrial nations.  They do differ widely in one area: Firearms ownership.  The US has firearms in a bit less than 50% of homes (if not more), Canada has firearms in a bit less than 30% of homes and the UK has firearms in less than 4% of homes.  If firearms availability is a major factor in suicides, than the suicide rates in these three nations should vary widely.  However, this is not the case - their suicide rates are virtually identical, PROVING THAT THE AVAILABILITY OF FIREARMS DOES NOT AFFECT THE SUICIDE RATE.

Of course, if firearms are available, they will be used to commit suicide - but if they are not available  people will simply choose another method.  That is why many nations with actual or virtual bans on private firearms have much higher rates of suicide than the US, the UK or Canada.  Clearly, other factors are at play here.

Gun control advocates know full well that combining firearms suicides with firearms suicides is dishonest.  They simply do not care.  They are quite willing to make up phony statistics to support their positions.


Phony Comparisons

This is yet another way in which the gun control movement uses propaganda methods.  The perhaps most well known, of these false comparisons is comparing the number of suicides and homicides with the number of justifiable homicides.

The propaganda is presented as follows: "You should not own a firearm because a firearm in the home is 43 times more likely to kill a family member than an intruder.  THEREFORE YOU SHOULD NOT OWN A GUN."  Remember, this is the whole point behind this phony comparison.

Boy, it sure sounds like a gun in the home is a really bad idea doesn't it?  It sounds like the self-defense benefit is far outweighed by the danger, right?  WRONG!

The problems here are many:

Phony, invalid comparison: Is the purpose of a defensive firearm in the home to kill intruders?  NO, IT IS NOT.  The purpose of a defensive firearm in the home is to protect the occupants.  In the vast majority of cases this can be done without firing any shots.  When confronted with a firearm, most intruders will run.  In the minority of cases were shots are fired in defense, no one dies.  Justifiable homicides are only a tiny minority of defensive gun uses.   By including only cases where an attacker is killed, the anti-gun propagandists intentionally eliminate the vast majority of successful defensive gun uses.  Even the most conservative figures (sadly, no official figures are available) on defensive gun use result in dozens to hundreds more defensive uses than deaths.

What we do know that is more LEGALLY OWNED firearms results in less crime and fewer legally owned guns results in more crime:

US Gun Ownership and Crime Rates

UK Gun Ownership and Crime Rates

Notice that in the US, where more guns have been added to the civilian supply, crime is down.  In the UK, where government has actively worked to reduce gun ownership, crime is up!  Even within the EU, countries such as Sweden, Finland, Norway and Switzerland - where gun ownership is common, have low crime rates, while the country with the fewest legally owned guns - you guessed it - the UK - has the highest crime rate.   Simply checking official figures on Wikipedia will confirm this.

Inflated death figure: As we have seen above, firearms ownership does not causes suicides.  Again, gun control advocates, without disclosing it unless asked, combine suicides and homicides to massively inflate their death statistic.  In fact 87% or 37 of the deaths in this statistic are suicides.

While suicidal people will use firearms if they are available, they quite clearly will use something else if they are not - therefore, these deaths are not as a result of a firearm being present and should not be counted.


Mixed data set: So, at this point our invalid comparison is reduced to six domestic deaths for each justifiable homicide.  However, even this figure is not really accurate.  

In compiling this statistic, no effort was made to distinguish between firearms legally owned by law abiding citizens and firearms owned illegally by criminals, drug abusers and the mentally ill.  Obviously, these people are much more likely to kill - intentionally or unintentionally.  They are much more likely to leave a firearm unsecured where a child can find it.  In short, a huge number of the deaths must have come from this group. 

Additionally, no effort was made to distinguish between homes in which domestic abuse and/or alcoholism was present and those homes without such problems.  Again, common sense and experience tells us that the risk of domestic violence is much high in these homes than in healthy homes.

So, of what use is this phony 43:1 statistic to a healthy, mentally stable, law abiding citizen who lives in a home without substance abuse or domestic violence?  Answer: IT IS OF NO USE AT ALL.  It completely irrelevant to such a person.  It does not predict the risk for such a person or household - and yet, this is exactly how the gun control advocates use it.

Of course, this is but one example.  Simply ask yourself when a comparison is made: Is this a VALID comparison?


Phony Terms

The gun control movement loves to make up phony terms of their own.  The reason is simple: Once the term has been vilified in the eyes of the public, the gun control movement can then expand it's definition (because it really doesn't have one), while the opinion of the public at large does not change.  In short, the reason the that gun control advocates use phony terms is to deceive the public.

"Saturday Night Special", "Cop Killer Bullets", "Gun Show Loophole" and "Assault Weapon" are but a few examples of the phony terms used by gun control advocates.  Currently, the most used of these terms is "Assault Weapon", so let's look at the history of this term.

The gun control advocates initially chose the term "Assault Weapon" because it is so close to the real term "Assault Rifle" that the two are easily confused.

What is an "Assault Rifle"?  Invented by the Germans during WW2 and named by none other than Hitler himself, assault rifles are standard equipment in most of the world's armies.  To be an assault rifle, a rifle must have all three of the following characteristics:

1) Intermediate cartridge - It must fire a round less powerful than a full power rifle cartridge and more powerful than a pistol cartridge
2) Fed from a detachable magazine
3) Capable of BOTH semi-automatic and fully automatic fire

Legally, real assault rifles are machine guns.  As such, they are very tightly controlled and cannot be purchased in a typical gun store.  In fact, the number in civilian hands is so small that legal fully auto weapons cost tens of thousands of dollars.

A machine gun is legally defined as any firearm that fires more than one round per pull of the trigger.  In other words a machine gun can spray bullets.  In contrast, a semi-auto firearm, examples of which have been around for more than 110 years and are commonly used in hunting, can only fire one shot per trigger pull.

What civilians can and do own - in very large numbers - are semi-auto versions of the military rifles.  These are functionally no different than rifles that have been around since the early 1900s - but they look nearly identical to their military counterparts.  This provided an opportunity for gun control advocates to introduce confusion.

In the late 1980s, they coined the term "assault weapon" - and initially employed in only against guns that had fully automatic military versions.  Even though these firearms were FUNCTIONALLY IDENTICAL to all other semi-automatic firearms, they convinced many in the public that because of their appearance they were uniquely dangerous.   They were

The Rifles Above Actually Have The Same
Internal Parts - They Are Functionally
Identical - Yet The Bottom Firearm
Could Be Banned Based On Looks 

helped in this effort by a few police and media outlets that showed the fully automatic military versions being fired on full auto, and then referred to the civilian versions AS IF THEY WERE THE SAME GUNS.  Of course, they weren't - but by now you know that lies are the gun control movement's stock and trade.

So, initially the gun control movement said, "We just want to ban these evil military rifles, not sporting or target guns."  (Never mind that the number one target gun in the US is the AR15.)  So, in my native State of California, these were banned in the late 1980s.  Next, having convinced the bulk of the public that "assault weapons" were terrible, they expanded the definition.  Now, any semi-auto rifle with a

The ONLY Difference Between These Rifles
Is The Stock - In CA The Bottom Rifle Is
Banned While The Top Rifle Is Not

detachable magazine and some much as one of five "evil, military features" (none of which affect the functioning of the firearm) was an assault rifle.   This expanded the ban to hundreds of more models.  Finally, in 2014, gun control advocates in the California legislature expanded the definition to include any semi-automatic rifle with a detachable magazine.  This would have banned virtually all semi-auto rifles - by calling them "assault weapons".   This was too much for even Democratic Governor Jerry Brown - who vetoed the bill.  However, you can bet your life that it will be back.

That is the pattern: Create a phony term, demonize it then, after the public thinks that type of gun terrible - expand the definition.  Classic deceptive propaganda.


Phony Solutions

By this I mean that in response to a tragedy - such as a mass shooting - gun control advocates rush to push gun control measures that would have not stopped, or even slowed, the tragedy.

Over the past three years, as we have been going through a cycle of mass murder incidents (historically, these horrible incidents do happen in cycles).  In response to every one of these incidents, gun control advocates have said the same thing every time: "This is why we need to close the 'gun show loophole' and establish universal background checks!"

Of course, there is only one problem: Every single gun used in these mass shootings was purchased at a gun store - where the buyer (usually the shooter) passed a federal background check!  None of these guns was purchased at a gun show.  None of these guns were purchased from a private party.  None were purchased by someone outside the shooter's household.  Some were purchased in states that required background checks on all sales and had their own system in addition to the federal system (such as California).  None of these measures stopped the shooters from buying a gun through legal, retail channels.

 

This attempted mass shooter (and murderer) should have been in the background check database - both because of criminal charges and a mental health commitment - but he passed a federal background check!  This is how every recent mass shooter obtained his guns.

Why is this?  Simple: The system's database is terribly flawed - and the only groups that seems to care is the gun industry and gun rights groups!    Gun control advocates do not care that the system's database is flawed - but they want it expanded to all gun "transfers".  This is why so many think the goal is not to stop criminals from getting guns - but to provide a paper trail for other purposes, such as future confiscation.

The fact that expanded background checks won't stop mass shootings is so firmly established that even a leading gun control advocate had to admit it!

However, you can be sure that the fact that it did not stop the mass shooter from obtaining firearms will not stop gun control advocates from proposing any and all "solutions" on their wish list.


Conclusion

I think I have firmly established that most gun control arguments are nothing but propaganda.  However, you can only fool the American people for so long before the see through you - and the good news is that more and more Americans are seeing through the phony gun control arguments.  That's why support for gun control is at an all time low.

One final thought: If gun control advocates have to habitually resort to these tactics - if they are the rule and not the exception - if they are used, not by individuals, but by well established gun control organizations - WHAT DOES THIS SAY ABOUT THE STRENGTH OF THEIR ARGUMENTS?