Why the fascination with guns?

Recently I engaged in a rather heated argument on a post made in a public group on Facebook glorifying gun ownership. My comment was,

What is it with you people and your fascination with guns?

Which was my genuine thought seeing many posts of the same category over and over again on the group and then seeing all comments also relating to the post, celebrating gun ownership.

Shortly after, I was bombarded with heated replies from what appeared to be a US citizen,

... you forget what you protect your borders with? It ain’t flowers and hugs...

I will change my responses slightly and add some more comments so that they speak to you and do so clearly. Here he is responding to another commentor from Australia being relieved that Americans can’t carry firearms through Airport security and border patrol. Well of course, yes. But border is protected by law enforcement, not civilians. You see law enforcement, you know they probably carry. You also know they have to uphold the law and won’t kill you unlawfully unless you’re in a very corrupted country. And if they did, they can be held accountable in a court of law, also given you live in a country that holds law sacred. It is my belief that reasons of an officer of law enforcement to shoot you also minimise in a country where there are strict gun laws since they can’t claim they were afraid you’d have a gun as the presumption would be that no civilians carry.

Then the person replies the following in order to leave the coversation however I had more to say.

Lol I’m just f**king with you, you do you how you want it’s your country. We will be there if it all gets f**ked up. I personally like my health to be my own responsibility. Agreed there are a lot of people that shouldn’t own guns but it is what it is. Nothing I can do about it.

In my mind, I’m still wondering why would any person wouldn’t want strict gun laws in their country. Doesn’t it make sense that lesser guns out there, safer you and your family will be? So I push the following.

There are many developed and civilised countries in the world where buying a gun is pretty hard. And there is no motivation for the normal civilian to buy a gun either unless you are, let’s say a businessman running the risk of theft or danger regularly. There, people get to live carefree, not having to worry about some random stranger you meet on the road being able to shoot you just because they get startled for some reason. Police don’t approach civilians with their hands on the gun thinking they’d get shot.

I would think, and I believe, a lot of people living in countries with strict gun laws would agree, that my response above does make sense. But he had more to say.

Like I said it I’d what it is, the thing people don’t realize is any civilized country regardless of how refined they think they are can get uncivil real quick. I would love to think everyone is happy go lucky and has no ill intent towards each other but that’s just not the way it works. Hope for the best plan for the worst. Venezuela was one of the riches countries in the beginning of 2000, now it’s a shit hole where common citizens can’t even get water. Rummaging through garbage to get something in their stomachs. This has happened over 1000’s of times across the globe in the past 100 years so sorry if I’m hesitant to rely on 23 minute average police response times

I do relate to or at least understand, what he’s saying here and I feel it is true of developing and under-developed countries. But does it apply directly to well-developed and civilised countries like United Kingdom, Switzerland, Australia, Germany, New Zealand and France? How soon in those countries can social structures, law and order, fall to the level where the ordinary citizen has to fire a gun to defend himself ? I believe such a country will have to go through things of the scale of a great recession, a famine, a devastating pandemic like COVID-19 and surely, fall of a government, so that the country can no longer be controlled by law enforcement. In such a volatile environment, riots, lootings, rapes, robberies and murders can be considered possible given what we’ve seen through recent history.

So, is it sensible for a citizen of a strong and well-developed country to wield arms in the unlikely event their country would crumble, leaving them to protect themselves? Especially given the more likely event of civilians who own guns feeling threatened or frightened in the course of their normal routine and killing another innocent civilian?

Just as I was about to let the conversation go, another gun-lover ambushed me with the following,

I see you enjoy being controlled and told what to do. You’ve been raised this way. Your government runs things for you. That’s not how it is supposed to be here. Till you can understand that, you shouldn’t really have much of a say. Or 2nd amendment is to protect from a tyrannical govt and well as self defense. The reason we aren’t under the rule like the of yall are with your limited freedom....is ....ya ever tell someone with a gun you cant enjoy the freedoms the founding fathers gave you? But then again the we really don’t care how yall run your place, and you shouldn’t care how we run ours....you ain’t forced to come here.

As ignorant as the comment seem, it does raise some more points that people who lobby for gun ownership, even those revered in media such as Ben Shapiro, often make in favor of their right to own guns and why the government shouldn’t enforce strict gun laws.

One of which being, those who vote against gun ownership, particularly living in countries other than United States, are oppressed and do not enjoy the liberties US citizens do. Yes, United states is around the 5th place in the Index of Freedom under the category ‘personal freedoms’. Yet, they are not free enough to jog in their neighbourhood in peace without getting shot to death.

The 2nd amendment comes along quite often in the gun debate. So often that I feel as if the only reason US citizens buy guns or push for gun ownership is simply because they are entitled to do so by the constitution. It is as if it excites them that they could own this thing that is taboo and looked down upon in other countries, because their law allows them to. Guns make weak men feel strong and intimidating because they lack those traits in their personality.

The set of people defending gun ownership based on the 2nd amendment claim they do so in case a tyrannical government comes to being. Who decides the government is being tyrannical? Wouldn’t the government dispatch their agencies, troops in causes they can justify? Suppression of a riot, raiding a sleeper cell, stopping an act of domestic terrorism, or an armed robbery. Won’t the government justify any response to such incidents as being lawful?

And then the other question rises, who should the government become tyrannical towards in order for it to qualify as being tyrannical? Towards the Whites? Blacks? Hispanics? Other minorities? Immigrants? Citizens of other free sovereign states?

Because United States, or its agents, its law enforcement officers have acted in tyranny against numerous other countries, and towards individuals of minorities residing within their own country in many occasions. Did none of those incidents make the gun-lovers think their government is acting as a tyrant?

Even if they deem the government is being tyrannical, what will they plan to do with the precious firearms in such an event? Shoot and kill officers of law enforcement when they follow orders given by the government? If someone thinks they can do so and get away quoting the 2nd amendment is surely mistaken.

Whether the constitution entitles gun ownership or not, shouldn’t strict procedures be set in place so that it is not as easy to buy a gun as buying a cucumber at a supermarket? Wouldn’t strict control and monitoring of gun sales, deep background checks, mandatory waiting periods, psychological evaluations and examination of need for gun ownership, drastically reduce the probability of guns going to the wrong hands? Wouldn’t a society where only responsible citizens, either civilians or law enforcement, carry firearms be safe on any normal day if you discount the improbable day on which your government would try to kill you?

I can not understand why any one would not try to make a safer society for their children and grandchildren to live peacefully in, without masquerading their wild fantasies of reliving the wild wild west through words like ‘freedom’ and ‘2nd amendment’.