Why I'm never giving up my guns and why you shouldn't either

Thank the Dutch!

One of the most recurring themes in the U.S. gun debate is that gun owners are selfish and awful because we refuse to give up our firearms in order to facilitate a safer society. I believe this is deeply faulty for a number of reasons but beyond that the fact of the matter is I am simply not ever going to give up my guns, and if you have them you shouldn’t give them up either.

Recent events have hardened my resolve on this question. Paramount among them has been the worldwide response to the COVID pandemic, in which nominally liberal democratic governments across the globe put several billion people on indefinite house arrest because of a virus with a 99%+ survival rate. The sheer unprecedented insanity of that decision cannot ever be overstated. It was absolute madness when it happened and the passage of time has made it no less indefensible.

Just as bad—maybe worse—was the utter compliance nearly everyone on Earth exhibited to this absurd new regime. Virtually everyone subject to this paranoid, hysterical, civil rights-shredding, epidemiologically indefensible mitigation strategy went along with it happily and eagerly. What’s more, most people became enthusiastic enforcers of the new government rules: People began screaming relentlessly at each other to “socially distance,” to wear masks, to stay away from each other. Neighbors called the cops on each other for gatherings and meetups if they occurred without state approval. Friendships were ruined, generations of family bonds severed, on the basis of whatever the “experts” in the Trump administration told people to do. Neurotic, paranoid, shrieking loyalty to the new government-enforced “expert” consensus became the norm in the span of, no joke, like nine hours.

You can see why someone would be reluctant to surrender his firearms in a world like this, one in which the government can take away pretty much everything in your life at the drop of a hat, for no good reason, and the great masses of society will eagerly acquiesce to it and even become deputized agents of the regime. We know this—we saw it happen with rapid and shocking ease. It is part of the historical record now, established and inarguable. Don’t give up your guns.

Now, one might argue that this was just a onetime thing, that governments were just responding to an unprecedented unknown bio-threat and that the unique circumstances for this kind of terrible authoritarian overreach are not likely to arise again. Consider that proposal for a second: Governments the world over in 2020 found out they can exercise near-plenary control over their citizenry, for whatever reason, indefinitely, and the vast majority of citizens will happily consent to it and become stormtroopers for the state in nothing flat. Do you think a government would just forget about that unbelievable bonanza, put that authority on a shelf and resolve never to use it again?

Moreover, and most importantly, it’s already happening again: Governments are once again subjugating their citizenry on the basis of shoddy science, overhyped fear and hysterical left-wing doom-mongering. This is from Western Europe, this week:

That’s right, Dutch police are firing on farmers for protesting severe government restrictions on farming. No, the issue here that the farmers are upset about isn’t oblique “government plans to cut nitrogen emissions;” it’s rather the fact that those plans involve shutting down Dutch farms in the name of stopping “climate change.”

The Dutch government is so terrified of some nebulous projected rise in temperatures and the theoretical meteorological effects of that rise that they’re willing to ruin farmers and potentially handicap their nation’s food supply in order to forestall it. And the police are firing their weapons to enforce it.

This is in the Low Countries, a region in which, as with its neighboring Scandinavia, police might draw their sidearms like once every nine years. And yet here they are, literally opening fire on farmers who are committing the high crime of not wanting to be forced out of business for some cartoonish climate change agenda.

Do you begin to see the kind of world we are becoming—the kind of world we already are? Who could reasonably deny it at this point? The only people who would do so are those who also want to be able to easily control you and everything you do.

So, no, I will not ever be surrendering my guns, and neither should you. The people who believe you need to do that are also, by-and-large, the most willing and enthusiastic supporters of near-total government control over effectively every aspect of your life. It would be foolish to listen to these people for advice on how to protect yourself, your family, your civil liberties and your freedom. Hold onto your weapons: Someday, you’re going to need them.