I won’t waste words with a full response to the drivel that appeared on your opinion page in a recent letter from city-slicker Ian Campbell (The Needs of the Many, Progress: Feb. 27, 2019). Such rank ignorance is typical of those who seldom, if ever, dare to venture north of the LV Speedway exit.
But I would make an observation about his interesting example of the Mesquite perpetrator in the October 1 incident. It is important to note the fact that ALL of the weapons used by the gunman in that incident were purchased legally and openly with required background checks. NONE of the guns used were acquired through private transactions. The new gun control law, that Mr. Campbell is so proud of, would have done ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to prevent that tragic incident.
Thus, in making his point, Mr. Campbell has raised just one more clear illustration of why this lame law will never deliver any of what Mr. Campbell and his gullible ilk have been convinced into believing that it will. It is a politically motivated, feel-good law put in place merely to placate city folk like Mr. Campbell into thinking he will be safer. And its only effectiveness will be in spinning off expensive unintended consequences one after another – both in the rurals and in the city.
Sheldon Worley
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2 thoughts on “LETTER: Your gun law would have made no difference”
I’ve just finished reading Mr. Worley’s interesting response to my rebuttal to an editorial published in this newspaper a few weeks back. I might mention that My grandparents live in Southern Utah. I might mention that I first mounted a horse at the age of 5. Similarly I could tell him about how I learned to properly handle and shoot a firearm under the guidance of my father and my grandfather in the sandy hills surrounding of Utah’s Dixie. I might even mention that I lived in Moapa Valley for over six years not so very long ago. But that is irrelevant to my rebuttal, as is most of Mr. Worley’s response in spite of his efforts to not waste words. I think he is certain that sticking me with his schoolyard aspersion of “city-slicker” opens and shuts his argument, so I thought I’d mention that I do have some experience of the “rural way of life”. Oddly my freezer was always full of meat without once having to fire a rifle. I guess you could say I did my hunting at Lins.
If Mr. Worley will reread carefully my rebuttal, he will find that I at no time voiced opposition to, or support of any gun control law either on the books or under consideration. Though my argument for better gun control legislation is summed up concisely by his statement that “ALL of the weapons used by the gunman in [the October 1 massacre] were purchased legally and openly with required background checks”. On that point I must applaud Mr. Worley for his acuity.
My rebuttal was a rebuttal to the argument asserted by the editorial to which I responded. In short, The argument went like this. The “rural way of life” includes participation in the sport of game hunting. Urban residents don’t understand “the rural way” of life and if they did they wouldn’t pass laws that interfere with rural residents’ enjoyment of that sport. Now mix all that up in a bowl and sprinkle liberally with a handful of home-town homily, implying that the “rural way of life” is somehow morally superior to what I suppose we must call the “urban way of life”. By extension, readers may even jump to the next logical step and infer that rural residents themselves are morally superior to urban residents. The editorial stopped short of that last one, but I’m sure many readers took that logical step if they weren’t already quietly convinced that it is the case.
My rebuttal was entirely contained in these question: Is it right to ask governments to not create better gun control legislation because rural residents like to enjoy hunting? The whole purpose of the law is to prevent one party from abridging the rights of another in the course of exercising their own rights. And, after all, as Mr. Worley so elegantly argued, it is obvious that current gun control legislation is inadequate.
Mr. Worley, I ask you this, should we allow gun violence to continue unabated because a small portion of the population likes to engage in a favorite past-time?
I’m going to put my two cents in here. Gun control is not the problem which is obvious by the fact we have gun free zones full of guns. What more proof do you need then that. The problem is not guns its the person holding that gun at that time, it does not shoot by itself. There are all kinds of checks and balances in place already and nothing stopped it from happening. Why? Because no one could tell that this person or that person had a plan to kill people. For what reasons who knows but that is where the problem lies in the minds of people that do this. In many cases you will hear how the person showed no signs of mental illness or being troubled etc. so making stricter laws is not going to prevent it. Not to mention there are other ways besides guns, they can use bombs knives all sorts of things if they are intent on doing the deed. So what is the solution? I do not know and that is the problem. Because unless a person makes known there intentions or desires to someone else that they want to do something like this, it is unstoppable. Sure you can try to make it harder but it will never stop it. Just my opinion