Here’s the thing about guns, they kill people. I know. It sounds a bit stupid to say it out loud but every day around the world people die because of idiots with guns.
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That’s not to say that everyone with a gun license is an idiot. Far from it.
In fact, my parents and I all have our gun licenses.
Here’s the thing though, in order to get your gun license in Australia you have to prove you’re not an idiot, you have to pass tests and show that you need a gun and then they give you a license. It’s not actually rocket science if you’re not a psycho.
I had never taken for granted just how scary guns were, until someone pulled a concealed handgun on me in a country with no gun laws.
All I had done was cross the road at the wrong time in the wrong neighbourhood and I was face to face with my Grim Reaper.
Luckily, I escaped that time but on any other day, I might not be here to write this piece.
Now, lots of people would say that would never have happened if I’d had a gun as well. Or you might say that gun laws are bad because now only the “bad guys” have guns but here’s what’s interesting.
Like so many other people I froze when faced with my own mortality, I couldn’t have pulled a gun out if I’d wanted to try and protect myself and shoot the bad guy.
Frankly, I’d love for a gun advocate like Robert Borzak or Phil Donato tell me how they think they’d react in that situation because I’d bet, it’s not how they think.
No amount of training can prepare you for that moment. I don’t just want you to think about guns as just one type of gun because they’re not.
Hidden weapons like handguns as well as larger multi-shot rifles are more dangerous than the guns Australia has on the market legally at the moment.
If a gun can shoot six bullets then in the hand of a skilled shooter, that is potentially six people dead and even in the hands of a bad shot like me, that’s still at least one person dead if I miss five times.
Look, I understand why people like guns, when regulated safely, they’re a lot of fun.
However if we don’t want people getting shot trying to cross the street, we need regulation on them. Quite frankly, I am terrified to be living in a community where the Shooters party represent us in government and terrified of a world where they control more electorates as well.
No other party is good, I’ll admit that they’ve all got their flaws but the Shooters Party want to relax gun licensing laws, allow kids to have guns and they want to bring dangerous multi-shot weapons back onto our soil.
A revenge vote is all bloody well and good until it’s your kids that bloody revenge is being taken out on.