Life Liberty and the Pursuit
Welcome to the Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit podcast. Come join Eric and Matt who are freedom-loving, meat-eating, gun-shooting American guys as they discuss a broad spectrum of topics ranging from States' rights, culture, and the 2nd Amendment to scotch, bourbon, and cigars. Eric & Matt are both former US Army combat veterans who served together while deployed to Iraq during OIF III. Eric is most notable for his YouTube channel Iraqveteran8888 which has over 2.75 million subscribers currently as well as his outspoken and no-compromise stance regarding the 2nd amendment. Matt, founded Ballistic Ink, a branding and merchandising company that serviced 2A content creators and the firearms industry. He also is a partner of Alliance jiujitsu Roswell located in Roswell GA and trains daily and competes regularly. He is very passionate about the 2nd amendment and freedom. Come along for the ride!
Life Liberty and the Pursuit
LLP Ep133: Armed Society is a Polite Society: Debunking Anti-Gun Myths
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The Second Amendment divides Americans like few other issues, with both sides often speaking past each other in frustration. In this thought-provoking episode, Eric and Matt take on the challenging task of understanding the fundamental disconnect between pro-gun and anti-gun perspectives, addressing misconceptions from both sides of the debate.
At the heart of the discussion lies a surprising revelation: most pro-gun advocates don't view anti-gunners as evil or irrational, but rather as victims of misinformation and manipulated statistics. The hosts meticulously break down how crime data is often presented without proper context—including how "youth shooting statistics" frequently include 18-21 year olds, and how police-involved shootings are counted in general gun violence numbers despite being a separate category entirely.
The conversation takes a fascinating turn when examining the urban-rural divide in gun perspectives. Why do densely populated cities with strict gun laws often experience higher crime rates than areas with widespread gun ownership? How does the psychological impact of urban living influence perceptions of self-defense and personal responsibility? These questions reveal deeper cultural and philosophical differences that go beyond simple policy disagreements.
Perhaps most compelling is the hosts' genuine attempt to extend understanding rather than condemnation toward those with anti-gun views. "You're not a bad person if you're anti-gun and you don't have the mentality of survival," Eric notes, emphasizing that the pro-gun position isn't about forcing everyone to carry firearms, but rather preserving the right for those who choose to take responsibility for their own protection.
Whether you're firmly pro-gun, staunchly anti-gun, or somewhere in between, this episode offers valuable insights into one of America's most contentious cultural conversations. Tune in to challenge your assumptions and gain a deeper understanding of perspectives you might not encounter in your daily life.
Welcome back everybody. This is Eric and Matt and this is Life, liberty and the Pursuit, your beacon of freedom and the American way of life. Tune in every Monday for a new episode as we dive into the world of liberty and what makes our country great.
Speaker 2:Welcome back everybody. This is Eric and Matt here with LLP. I hope everybody has had a great week and today we're coming at you with a new episode here. Llp is your home for all things sane in a world gone completely mad. So thanks for tuning back in, and on today's show we're going to be discussing trying to understand gun owners from an anti-gun perspective and vice versa. Not that I'm anti-gun, but this is essentially me trying to understand the anti-gun perspective and me trying to articulate the perspective of a pro-gun person, which Matt and I both are, to someone who is potentially anti-gun. I mean, I would encourage someone who is not necessarily pro-gun to listen to today's episode, because you might actually learn something about gun owners and you might understand what our perspective is in terms of how we view you as someone who's an anti-gunner.
Speaker 2:That's kind of the goal of today's show, more or less. Now we are going to get into some other things and also did put out another Twitter comment requesting commentary from you guys on what you think are some of the biggest pet peeves you have against those that we would perceive as anti-gun. So this should be a fun show. Before we get started today, I would like to give a shout out to the show's first sponsor, and that is Allegiance Gold. You ever notice how gold doesn't get much airtime until the system starts to shake. Well, here's what nobody's talking about. Starting July 1st, basel III global banking rules classify gold as a tier one asset the same level as cash or US treasuries. That's huge. It means that central banks will now treat gold as the highest quality form of capital. They're not doing this for fun. They're preparing for something.
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Speaker 2:So we're going to get into today's show and so you guys know when we record the shows. Typically we record two in one sitting, so I've already asked Matt what his week has been like, so we have to pretend it's next week. I don't know if y'all know that Every other show is a cruel facade of reality. However, here we are and we're well caffeinated and we're ready to dive into today's subject. And it's funny before we started recording today's show or this particular second show for the day, we were kind of talking about some of these pet peeves that we have with anti-gunners and why we can't seem to just understand where they're coming from and try to find some common ground, which is very difficult because people view people who are pro-gun.
Speaker 2:You know they really do view the Second Amendment as a very important, almost kind of quasi like you know I hate to call it like this religious institution, but it's almost a moral high ground that they choose to take, more so than it is anything else. It's not about being legal or not. For them it's not about being something that's enshrined in some document. For them it is a moral undertaking, a principled undertaking, something that they view as a personal responsibility to protect their livelihood, to protect themselves, to protect their families, ultimately their communities and ultimately their country in the end. So you have to understand, if you are an anti-gun person, that it is a deeply rooted and very passionate thing for many Americans who have been gun owners for generations. Our grandpas owned guns, our great grandpas owned guns and their grandpa before them owned guns. So for us it's a multi-generational undertaking that we've always been involved in. So you have to understand it is cultural. The Second Amendment is very cultural. In the United States it is very much a part of who we are, where we came from, how this country was even founded. So before you draw the stink eye against gun owners, remember that many of us are very passionate about the Second Amendment for very specific reasons and you know, I want to try to understand where people are coming from on both sides of the equation. Want to try to understand where people are coming from on both sides of the equation and I think that a person who is truly in tune with you know their maturity level as a person and their ability to accept scrutiny and to deliver that scrutiny and do it with grace and do it in a way where they're open-minded about every conversation that they get into. I think that's where people really need to be in society.
Speaker 2:It's easy to say, well, you're simply wrong and I'm simply right and nothing that you ever say is going to change my mind. Now don't get me wrong when it comes to the Second Amendment, through very much research and observation, and know my opinion has developed very much over a long period of time that I have scrutinized every little aspect that I possibly can, everything from crime data to statistics related to guns. To you know gun ownership numbers. Who owns guns, who doesn't? How many people own guns? How many guns are in existence in America and are owned by the general public? What the militaries of the world own in terms of guns. I mean, I have studied and looked at every little random fact and statistic that you can possibly imagine when it comes to gun ownership the good, the bad, the ugly and everything in between, everything that you, as an anti-gunner, that you think you know about guns. I know it 10 times more than you, I can promise Okay, because what person who is pro-gun can be pro-gun without having looked into the eye of every little nasty statistic that is ever thrown around at the pro-gun side?
Speaker 2:The fact of the matter is that the facts are on our side, the statistics are on our side, the anti-gun side. Okay, if you're anti-gun, I'm not trying to scrutinize you or give you a hard time. The anti-gun side loves to cook data and they love to manipulate data to make a point that they're trying to make, but it's an ill-gotten point. It's a dishonest point, point that they're trying to make, but it's an ill-gotten point. It's a dishonest point. And the bad thing about it is, if you are anti-gun, you're actually sort of a victim of this whole situation, because essentially what happens is you are spoon-fed all of this data and these statistics that do not line up with the actual reality of what is really happening and what has happened. And the problem is is you accept this narrative as fact. But the actual truth is in front of you and if you accept the truth for what it is, you realize that in areas where there's higher amounts of gun ownership is actually a much safer place to be.
Speaker 2:When you look at these let's just say for better lack of a term Democrat controlled cities, right, you look at these major metropolitan areas, major cities, where they have Democrat leadership, really strict gun control, lots of laws on the books, and they basically make it extremely difficult for people to own guns in those sorts of municipalities. What do you see? You see increased crime, increased violence. You see the exact opposite of what those laws are intended to accomplish. And why is that? Because criminals do not obey laws. Hello, if you make it hard for the average everyday person to protect themselves and their communities they live in every day, well, guess what? It is a breeding ground for crime and for bad people to go about their business and conduct their business, which is crime against the populace. So you would think, in light of that very verifiable and immovable data, that people who live in those types of places and vote Democrat would go, wait a minute. This leadership has it all wrong and maybe we need to change our leadership and get some more pro-gun legislation on the books so we can all protect ourselves and this crime will end up going back down.
Speaker 2:Of course, john Lott and many others over the years have done numerous studies on crimes related to guns and really just crime in general. If you remove guns from the equation, crime in general and where crime occurs the most is in areas where firearms restrictions are the highest Right. Where do these mass murders occur? They occur in gun free zones, places where a would-be killer knows dang well. They're not going to see any sort of resistance from a gun owner, so they choose that type of environment, knowing that they can carry out whatever mayhem they choose to.
Speaker 2:Now I'm just scratching the surface, but the point is that gun owners have the facts and statistics at their back. Right, we bring the receipts. Okay, if you're anti-gun, all I would ask you to think in the back of your mind is you know, maybe we actually know what we're talking about. You may be very passionate about your hatred of guns, and that's fine. I respect your passion, but understand that this is not an emotional discussion. You can have your thoughts about whether or not society should be armed. Whether they shouldn't, that's all fine, but the data always points to an armed society is a polite society. That is irrefutably a concrete and immovable fact. What are your thoughts?
Speaker 3:Matt, I think you really did a great job of articulating kind of the mindset of the typical anti-gunner and the motives of the establishment on how they can persuade those anti-gunners to vote a certain way. It's very true, most people that are anti-gun that I've run into are actually very logical people. I've had great conversations with them and I've been able to actually change a few minds when they have a conversation with me about it, because they're logical people. The only reason they were anti-gun is because of the reasons that you said, eric. They are doing research or they're being provided information that is incorrect or skewed. You look at they come from a place of emotion. So they start looking at like youth gun shooting statistics and they don't realize that a great majority of those are 18 year olds. So when you start looking at youth statistics, how is it that an 18 year old and even there's some that are including 21 year olds into that youth category those aren't kids, those aren't youth. I don't know where you guys come from, but in Georgia 18 is an adult. You're going to big boy jail at 18. You should not be included in the youth statistics. Another good example is total defensive shootings from police. When you look at the actual data offensive shootings from police. When you look at the actual data, they don't filter out the fact that a majority of those shootings are police-involved shootings, that's the police officer defending themselves from the shooting. So that's also included. Suicides are included in that. So when you start looking at all of this data, that's not really filtered. Now can you filter it? Yes, there are options there that you can dig deeper, filter out all this other noise and get the numbers you want, but it's not easy and the majority of people don't do that. They take it for face value. If they see youth gun shooting statistics as a title and then they see a number, that's what they're going to believe. They're not going to say well, let me just dig a little bit deeper, because in their eyes they're not experienced. They don't know what they're looking for, and that's by design.
Speaker 3:You brought up another good point about blue states having a higher crime rate. That's because the criminals know that they're not going to get shot. If you're in Chicago and you're in your car jacking somebody, it's so hard to get a firearm there and even a license good luck You're. You can open a car door and pull someone out and you're not worried about you having a gun pushed in your face. You try that in Georgia or North Carolina or carolina or south carolina or florida or florida man, you pull on a door, handle in here, good night, all right, it's not gonna. It's a completely different ball game. And then criminals know that. So it's just, it's a.
Speaker 3:It's a matter of them not having any fear to to commit these crimes. And that's why you start seeing stuff in California it's like oh, they have to put signs outside of all the stores posting $950 threshold. There's literally like where it used to say no parking fire lane. You would see those little no parking fire lane signs. They remove those and they put up signs that look like that, that say over $950 is a felony. So they're just letting the people know before they walk in the store. You can steal up to $950 or $958 or $948, $9, whatever, and you can just walk out the door and it's a misdemeanor crime. You don't see that in states that are predominantly easy to get one constitutional carry, because you have Georgia, north Carolina are constitutional carry states. South Carolina is a shall issue. Alabama, florida, I believe, is constitutional carry. If not, there it's a shall issue as well. So these are all states that are very pro two-way for the most part, and they have very good stand your ground laws as well.
Speaker 2:You always notice how it's so hard to carry a gun in places where the crime is highest. Yeah, you know, you would think that those data points would cause those governments to go all right, wait a minute, we see this works in other places where people can carry guns and the crime is, of course, way less. Well, why wouldn't we want that? Because it allows them to have control over violence. They want monopoly on violence, and that's very much a leftist tactic is for them to. You know, they cause the problem, which they then, in turn, deliver the solution for, but they cause the problem in the first place.
Speaker 2:So, but notice, they always have this perfectly picked solution, right? Oh, we need more police, we need more. So see, their idea is to expand government. So they want to make the responsibilities of government greater and the responsibilities of the everyday citizen less and less and less, and having to defer their safety to them. So it's not so much that they don't want you to be safe, they just want to be the only people who have the capacity for violence. And of course, we see that in practice that doesn't work. Oh no.
Speaker 3:Anyway, I just wanted to mention that. Yeah, no, you're right, because they're not even good at it. It would be one thing if the government stepped in and said, hey, we'll protect you and we'll be the arbiter of your protection, and they're good at it.
Speaker 2:Yeah the crime was low. Yeah, there was no crime.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but they're not. They're far from it, so much so that in fact they're terrible at it, one could say non-existent. Because even here in georgia, where they have I mean nothing against georgia, nothing against, you know, atlanta, alpharetta, roswell, milton, dunwoody, that whole area, that's a little bit of a more affluent area you still have good response times, but they're definitely not getting there in time to where you can't handle it yourself, right, and I mean it's just.
Speaker 2:You are your own first responder.
Speaker 2:ladies and gentlemen, and then you know it's so wild. So how do we, as pro-gun people, think of anti-gunners? What is our view of the anti-gun mindset, the anti-gun mentality? I have tried very hard in today's episode to articulate in the most logical way possible my viewpoint as a pro-gun person and why I respectfully think that the anti-gun mentality is a flawed mentality. I'm not going to blame you for thinking the way you do, but what do all of our fellow gun owners think? Well, I put out a message on Twitter, as I alluded to earlier. You want to go through a few comments? Yes, let's do it.
Speaker 3:While you look those up, I'm just going to give you a real quick mental image. When you said, what do pro-gunners think of anti-gunners? And literally the first thing that pops into my head is that David Hogg picture where he's standing at the podium with his hand in the air, where he's like biting his bottom lip that is like the mental image that pops into my head. Totally. It's pretty gross. I don't wish that image upon anybody, but I know Lisa is going to flash it on the screen for everybody to see the question was.
Speaker 2:What are some things that you, as a pro-gun person, are annoyed by the most with anti-gunners?
Speaker 2:Let's go here we go Everything 2A says, only hearing the negatives of firearms and never the overwhelming more positives. All they do is tell one side of the story to fit their narrative. Okay, that's true. Again, manipulating data, manipulating statistics, only reporting one side. And look, the media is extremely complicit. Social media talking heads are extremely complicit in, you know, parroting a narrative that is only half truth. They never show the positive side, they never show the good side.
Speaker 2:When a single mother protects herself from an invasion, home invasion or something, or when a single mother protects herself from a jealous ex-husband who's trying to cause her harm, or something like that, or, you know, it could be anyone who is in a situation where they need to protect themselves. So, mike Collins, right here out of Georgia he is running for Senate and, wow, that's great for him to weigh in he says simply ignorance. So, again, you can really boil this all down to ignorance. You have a couple of choices. As an anti-gunner, okay, and this is just my view here you can be willfully ignorant. You can choose to be ignorant, right? You can be insane. You can be evil. What would you choose to be? You're not evil, you're not insane. Maybe some of you are, if that's what you want to be. But I really strongly want to believe that just because you're anti-gun doesn't mean that you're a bad person. It just means you're ignorant to the facts, right. So willful ignorance can be cured, we can fix that right. So if you're ignorant, fix it, learn what's going on and understand the truth about gun ownership and I think you'll find yourself kind of, at least starting to go wait a minute.
Speaker 2:Maybe I was wrong about this. And look, it doesn't make us bad people to get some new information and go wait a minute. I was wrong about this for this period of time. And, believe me, I'm the kind of person I try to be very astute in my observations. If somewhere down the line I got this wrong. As a pro kind of person, I try to be very astute in my observations. If somewhere down the line I got this wrong as a pro-gun person, does that mean that I would change my mind and change my view on guns? If the evidence was overwhelming and damning and if I was somehow misinformed, maybe the answer would be yes, but I cannot logically bring myself to the point of seeing it any other way, because there is no other way. The facts and the statistics and the history and traditions and everything that we are as Americans is intimately tied to the Second Amendment and there's just no way I could ever, you know, go shy of that.
Speaker 3:OK, no, you know, go shy of that. Okay, no, you know, eric. That reminded me of when you said that. That reminded me of, you know, when I was growing up and my mom informed me of the difference between ignorance and stupidity, and that's kind of where I first learned that, at when they, when she said you know, you're not stupid, you're just ignorant. And ignorant just means that you don't know. What you don't know Now. The difference is, if you do know and you're choosing to not do it now, you're just stupid.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean you should be armed with the best knowledge available and to look at it just completely black and white. Remove the emotion from the situation and just look at it from its bare and white. Remove the emotion from the situation and just look at it from its bare bone facts and statistics and you'll find, wow, gun owners actually not that bad people at all as a whole. All right, freeman says the nomenclature used in their arguments. It would be one thing if they just didn't know. But most of them refuse to learn the difference between automatic and semi-automatic. Well, my view is that everyone should be able to have machine guns. So to me there's no distinction between semi-auto and full auto, because for me it should all be kosher, we should all be able to have whatever machine guns we want.
Speaker 2:But yes, it is annoying when they try to make some articulated, educated point about something and it's simply just factually wrong. Look, if you're anti-Gunner and you're watching this, if you are going to try to make an argument against a point that I would try to make, at least get your facts straight, get your nomenclature straight. But see, the problem is, if the nomenclature is straight, if the facts are straight, if the terminology is straight. Now their argument falls flat down on its face because it has nowhere to go. So they have to cook everything a little bit to make it fit the narrative they're trying to portray. Oh yes, agreed, let's see. Thomas Guzman says they frequently know nothing about guns. Some of them think that a 5.56 from an AR is more powerful than a .308 out of a bolt action. No joke.
Speaker 3:This happens all the time. You know they they because they judge the round by the weapon that is coming out of. And if you put them side by side, an AR, a decked out AR, looks a lot more powerful than a bolt action 308. So in their eyes, oh, it has to be more powerful. This thing's got a holographic sight and a bipod and a suppressor and 30 round magazine and nice quad rail. So, yes, I can see that.
Speaker 2:Inconvenient, ash says, their unwillingness to learn and research about guns and the arguments that they try to make. Totally that lines up with many of the criticisms that many of us pro-gunners have with the other side of the camp and how they feel about guns. And uh, it's crazy if you're trying to debate somebody, especially a more educated person, let's say a person who's highly educated, maybe they're really smart people but they just happen to have the anti-gun mentality. You know a lot of these arguments. They fall on their face so quickly and you can tell they get so upset so quickly when they realize that their arguments are so easily defeated. Now these people are really smart. They have to go out of their way to really articulate the lie and when you defeat the lie so simply, they really lose their minds and they can't handle it because they're just not used to dealing with that level of articulation from the opposite side of the spectrum.
Speaker 2:And you ever notice too on TV. Okay, if they ever bring someone, a conservative person, on TV to, let's just say, have a fair debate with someone on that side of the aisle, you always notice they always get someone who is not experienced being on TV and they're timid, they don't want to argue. They feel like they want to get invited back, so they don't want to push back too much on what the person is talking about. They choose those people on purpose, knowing that maybe they're going to be a little bit soft-handed when it comes to their rebuttals, to the argument. It's a tactic. Jason Anderson says that they will use seatbelts, airbags for protection and, just in case, for safety. But when shopping movies, dinner, going to the park, nah, we're fine, we don't need a gun.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's a good way to look at it too. That's a pretty fair argument.
Speaker 2:Let's see Alex Andrews says refusal to even go to a range and see one of the guns they want to ban be shot. Trying to explain semi-auto is a pain, but actually showing them or, better yet, having them shoot it themselves instantly gets them to understand what the term actually means Again. That's you know the ignorance factor, them just not knowing, and yeah, that reminds me of.
Speaker 3:I don't know who it was, it was a reporter, but they were on, they were doing a news segment and they were hacking off the barrel of the rifle on the news and they had absolutely no idea that they just committed a felony because they're ignorant of the actual laws that they're trying to felony because they're ignorant of the actual laws that they're trying to pass. There's so much so that they're breaking the laws on TV. It was insane, yeah.
Speaker 2:Again, I'm not going to read every individual comment, but here I am just scrolling through a couple. And the reoccurring theme is ignorance, their lack of simple basic knowledge of firearms, their general ignorance, along with their insistence to speak loudly regardless of their ignorance, refusal to acknowledge that nobody's coming to help you. I mean again, it's just crazy if you look at that, ignorance is the reoccurring theme in what pro-gunners have to say about the anti-gun side, what pro gunners have to say about the anti-gun side. And you know, what's crazy is there is a lot of people on that side of the aisle that are very intelligent, well-to-do, well-meaning people who they, they really, their hearts are in the right place. They mean well, they want, you know, to actually move the needle in some way towards a safer world. I mean to be fair, they way towards a safer world. I mean to be fair, they mean well, but the problem is is the reality behind what they think is going to solve? The problem is just simply not rooted in the actual, real answer that we have in front of us for what we actually need to accomplish. That We'll read a couple of more and then we'll move on with today's show, but I really want to thank everybody for providing your commentary, because this really does help us on the show.
Speaker 2:I like knowing what you guys think, so make sure you follow me on Twitter, iracveteran8888. We do have one for the LLP show, but we get a lot more feedback over on IRAC Veterans, so feel free to follow me over there and occasionally, especially on Tuesdays, look for questions. Every Tuesday, usually around noon to about four o'clock in the afternoon, I'll post these questions and these are the questions that we'll actually use on the show. So if you ever want to participate in the show, that's one way that you can do it. Let's see Again.
Speaker 2:They never know what they're talking about. You know emotional thinking not grounded in logic, fundamentally the lack of objectivity and nuance. You know emotional arguments, lying, ignorance Again same thing, same thing the distortion and dissemination of false information. I mean cognitive dissonance, lack of knowledge. I'm reading these comments this is what pro-gunners think of anti-gunners.
Speaker 2:So if you're an anti-gun person and you are ignorant to the facts about how good guns actually are for a civilized society, a high trust society, then you're choosing to be willfully ignorant. And that is how pro-gun people view you is that you're willfully ignorant. So do you really want to be willfully ignorant. I mean, is the end goal for you disarming everyone that doesn't think the way you do? Is it really worth walking around knowing that you're lying about the facts? Many people lie Now. Sometimes it's just they don't know any better. That's just what they've been told and they don't do any further research. That's okay. I'm not going to hold it against someone who doesn't know the difference. But a lot of people view it as that they're making a willful decision to just simply ignore the reality of the facts for their own convenience of being able to tow whatever political line they want to tow in terms of gun ownership, which is scary. That's not something we should be okay with as a society. I think we should do better.
Speaker 3:It's very scary. And every single one of those comments all said the same thing. They all had the same ideas as to what the problem is, and the number one thing that I heard was ignorance. And then the second thing was emotional. They love to base their entire conversation, their dissonance, over emotion, and that's personally what I see.
Speaker 3:It'll always fall onto oh, if it was your kid in that school, if it was your parents in that restaurant that got shot up, if it was yours, like yes, but it wasn't. And the fact of the matter is is that I have to be okay with making that decision, to say, well, even if that was the case, I would still be okay with it. And I'm gonna use the example of the father. There was that girl that was a victim in the school shooting and the father still came out and was like, hey, I still believe in the Second Amendment as a father to a daughter. That's a tough thing to do, man, that is very tough. And I give him a lot of credit for standing for what he believes in and not using it as a. He's not placing the blame onto it, onto what happened, onto the Second Amendment. It could have been anybody, but that wasn't the case here and that's unfortunate.
Speaker 3:Emotion drives a lot of the decisions, but the biggest thing that I see as well is the amount of mental gymnastics that they always have to jump through in order to prove their point. Mental gymnastics meaning they give you the statistics, they give you the metrics, and then they have to jump through all of these hoops as to why they believe that that's the case, even when you prove them wrong. So they brought up, you know youth shooting statistics and you know I drill down in the spreadsheet and say, no, let's remove the 18 to 21 year olds, let's remove, you know, the non-gang related shootings. And they're like well, it's still this, it's still that. They're just. It's really hard to have a real conversation with somebody that isn't willing to concede at least some part of the argument.
Speaker 3:Because, there's going to be a point in time where you have to acknowledge that the other person has a good point, and this happens in all debates, it happens in all conversations. If someone's going to make a good point, eventually, and you have to.
Speaker 2:Even the anti-gunners might even slip in an occasional point. That does make sense, and it happens all the time.
Speaker 3:And if you are unwilling to concede that and just say, hey man, that's a good point. I don't really have an answer for it right now, but let's work around that and we'll keep moving on to something else. It doesn't have to be like oh, that's the, that's the winning blow, that's the knockout blow, cause it's not about like the knockout punch. That's what they're looking for. They're like end of conversation, full stop. I'm like, but we just started.
Speaker 2:It's funny how, in that you know the crime data and the crime statistics, and when the anti-gunners always use those statistics, they'll even include police shootings in that data.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, so you're talking. Wait a minute. You mean to tell me law enforcement shot somebody and that contributes to. You're going to include that as a gun violence statistic, but then, in the same breath, you're going to say that only the police should have guns, that civilians shouldn't have guns, that the police are always there to protect you, but yet you're going to include what they do to society as part of that. You're going to try to convince everyone that part of the reason the world is violent is because the police are shooting people too.
Speaker 2:Now, objectively, that is true because you know, yeah, a cop killing somebody is still a cop killing somebody. But generally in our society we sort of accept that if we're going to pass the torch of violence over to a designated person to handle our violence for us in the form of law enforcement, that when they act out it's because it is to save their life or someone around them, it's a defensive situation or in defense of their own life and liberty and their own. You know, they want to go home to their families, just like anyone else. I mean, we want to believe that when a cop shoots somebody, that they deserve it right, that they're doing society a favor that they're doing. Something that we do not want to take on ourselves and I think the truth is is that there's actually a line somewhere in between where everyone can meet Right.
Speaker 2:There are many cops out there that they don't want civilians owning guns, because you know they want to be the designated. You know they want, they want to be the ones who have a monopoly on violence and they want to be the ones designated to carry out violence and in their mind they view that, oh, they're trained, you're not Get out of our way, let us do our jobs. Maybe they police in an area with a lot of crime, maybe they've had a negative run in with a law abiding citizen who's just trying to do the right thing and maybe didn't end up working out well. Maybe they just have an elitist attitude. No matter what their attitude is, that's their attitude, that's how they feel, and we can't take that away from them. But then, okay, you see, in other situations, there's lots of police out there who love the idea that the population is armed because it cuts down on crime, because they know the truth about statistics and they know that an armed society is a polite society and that the more people are armed in their jurisdiction, the less stuff they're going to have to deal with.
Speaker 2:So again, there's room in the middle for everybody, right? Like it's okay to say I don't want to deal with this situation. I want to defer you know, my ability to carry out violence and give it to someone else. You know I want, I want the cops to handle it. Hey, if there's something bad going on, I'm not going to intervene, I'm going to call the police. If you're that person, that's okay. I'm not even saying that you're a bad person. If you don't want to intervene in a situation, I think it's a victim mentality and I don't think you should have that mentality and I would encourage you to maybe think a little bit more proactively. That's just me, but I'm not going to sit here and say that I require you, as an anti-gunner, to own a gun and respond to a situation in kind or to seek out training and become proficient with a firearm. If you don't want to be, nobody's saying you got to own a gun. If you don't want to, if you're an anti-gunner and you want to defer your problems to the police, by all means call the freaking police. That's what they're for. That's their job. You've done your due diligence as a citizen and you've reported a crime. Hurrah, now escape to safety and let someone else deal with it. If that's what you want to do, that's fine. You are allowed to do that.
Speaker 2:Where a lot of us draw issue with that is that it's not good enough for you. You have to say well, we have to pass legislation, we have to pass laws that make it more difficult for someone who does want to carry a gun to be able to protect themselves and carry a gun on a day-to-day basis. So what's wrong with me carrying a gun because I choose to, you not carrying a gun because you don't want to? You can call the police if you want. Why don't you call the police while I respond to the problem? And somewhere in there we're going to solve the problem. Right, you're safe, I'm safe, cops are safe. No one, no one's harmed in that situation.
Speaker 2:I mean, if you don't want to have the ability to to carry out violence against somebody, that you don't have to, no one's saying you have to own a gun. You don't have to, you know. But the issue many of us take is that we do, we want to have the ability. You know, yeah, the government may may have a monopoly on violence, but we own some properties on that board, right? If someone lands on our property on that board, on that monopoly board, you better believe we're going to collect. Okay, if we have to, and it's okay. You don't want to buy a house on the board, boys and girls just keep going along the board, don't buy anything. But in our case, if we're going to use that metaphor and say monopoly on violence, I got some houses on every street, y'all I mean someone wants to check that box, baby.
Speaker 2:I got a hotel for them. They're going to pay and that's okay. Some people just do not have the mentality of survival. It doesn't make you a bad person If you're anti-gun and you don't have the mentality of survival, it's okay. You're not a bad person. Maybe you just need to. You know, become more culturally. You know educated and become more educated about history. And you know, maybe experience some bad things in your life a time or two and you realize like, wow, maybe someone isn't coming to help me when I need them. So it doesn't make you a bad person.
Speaker 2:We're not trying to sit here and say you're the scourge of humanity. All we're saying is we want you to be armed with the best facts possible so you make the best decisions. And sometimes the best decision may not be to defer your negative situation to another person, and that is objectively a fact. That has nothing to do with my stance as being a pro-gun person or your stance as being an anti-gun person. That is objectively a true statement based on many observable traits that we could go into. But the truth is, you know, it's not a good idea to defer your safety and security to someone else. That's the point I always want to drive home with the anti-gunners.
Speaker 3:I was over here chuckling when you were talking about you know, survival instincts, because it reminded me of those, those memes where it's like you see a picture of, like you know, two, two, two animals, or like a, two parents and with the kid, it's like survival instinct zero and they're just like doing the dumbest thing you've ever seen, because like they have no instinct to survive. It was like uh, it was like a oh, it was uh, yeah, it was a uh. Swan that got out in the zoo and like flew into the tiger cage and just like walking up to the tuck at six tigers and the tigers are like staring at it and it was like comments were like survival instinct zero. And sure enough, it walked into the tiger. It just just ate it.
Speaker 2:I was like, oh man yeah, I mean all we're saying is don't walk into the tiger jaws. I mean, like give yourself the best shot you have at surviving and living day to day, don't don't don't defer your problems to other people, don't always trust the government.
Speaker 2:I know that's hard to think in your heads because a lot of people who are anti-gun they tend to think that the government's always going to be there to protect them. They want to give the government a monopoly on violence. They want the government to carry out their political will. There's all these things. They think the government's role is and that's the big takeaway is, anti-gunners and pro-gunners greatly disagree on the government's role in day-to-day life. So there's also sort of this moral difference in the kind of mentality that a pro-gun person has versus an anti-gun person. I would love to change the anti-gunner's mind, but if you're asking me to conceive my point of view to your illogical point of view, I'm simply not going to do that. That's just the truth. Before we get too much further in today's show, I do want to give a quick shout out to the second sponsor in today's show, and that's MyPatriotSupply.
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Speaker 3:And then if if I know it hits the fan, you'll keep the food fresh for us when we come and get it.
Speaker 2:Matt you know, I'm glad you made that joke because it it is funny how a lot of people on the anti-gun side that they tend to kind of paint gun owners as this sort of militant group of people who are anti-gun side, that they tend to kind of paint gun owners as this sort of militant group of people who are out there to hurt people and out to take and things like that. And don't get me wrong Look, the reality is there probably are some people out there that have that mentality that they're going to be more predatory in a situation when the crap is to fan. They're going to be a little more predatory than they are actually lending a hand to help the community around them. And look, the fact of the matter is, as much as we want to pretend that the world is going to be perfect and symbiotic in a situation like that, look, there are bad people out there that do bad things and, yes, some of them own guns. And the reality is, do you really want to again, do you want to defer your safety to someone who may not be there for you in that moment? I think that if you are afraid that guns are out there in any type of degree.
Speaker 2:Look, if you're an anti-gunner, arm yourself. I mean, what way, what better way to be toe-to-toe with somebody that you disagree with than to at least have a gun yourself? I mean, what better way to be toe-to-toe with somebody that you disagree with than to at least have a gun yourself? I mean and I'm not sitting here trying to say that I'm trying to change your mind on the moral implications or the principled implications of what it means to be a deeply rooted Second Amendment supporter. Those are two very different things. I'm talking about self-preservation supporter. Those are two very different things. I'm talking about self-preservation. I'm talking about like, even though I'm pro-gun and lots of people out there are anti-gun, it doesn't mean that I still don't care about that. I don't care about your safety. You know, I want everyone to be safe and secure and to feel free and to have the tools at their disposal to protect themselves. We can worry about the minutiae and the details later, but first and foremost we have to make sure we're all safe and secure in our everyday undertaking and I think ultimately most pro-gun people, that's all they really want for anyone. They're not trying to hurt anybody, they're not trying to do anything crazy, they're just trying to go about their everyday life and have the tools at their disposal to live a safe life and to be good, contributing members of society and constructive members of society and ultimately to protect greater society and what it stands for at a holistic level in the event that things collapse and go crazy.
Speaker 2:I think most people are kind of geared towards justice and righteousness and doing the right thing and being good to their neighbors. And you know we tend to forget that. If you're anti-gun and you think that all people that own guns are criminals and bad people, that's a really bad mentality Because look, there are a lot of really good people out there. Far more good people own guns than bad people. We can acknowledge that bad people have them. Yes, they do.
Speaker 2:How do we prevent bad people from getting them? You can't. There's no law you're going to pass. There's no background check. There's no universal background check, red flags, all of that, the things that they try to parrot from the anti-gun side. Those things are going to be completely ineffective.
Speaker 2:What this is is the greater root of good and evil. Right, we want more good people with guns than bad people. That is the only way we can counterbalance or provide balance to the entire situation. Right, if we make more restrictions? Right? Who are the people who are going to adhere to restrictions? Good, honest, law-abiding people. So if you make it more restrictive to be a gun owner, guess who's going to have the restrictions? Good, honest, law-abiding people. So if you make it more restrictive to be a gun owner, guess who's going to have the guns? The bad people. The bad people are always going to have guns y'all. So you can't prevent the good people from having the tools at their disposal to be at least a stepping stone in the way of those bad people before they get to you. I think I would certainly want greater society to be armed, and knowing that the majority of people are quite good, that's true very true.
Speaker 3:I mean, that's just my observable.
Speaker 3:You know fact statistically, just by the metrics, there's way more good gun owners than bad gun owners. Um no, I I think I think that was probably one of the most truest statements that I never looked at it that way. You always look at it like oh, there's so many cities and states that are typically blue, states that are just kind of overrun with crime and have heavy gun ownership and bad hands, gun ownership and bad hands. But now that I look at it, that's not true, because even a state like you know, illinois, when you look at just Chicago and then you look at the surrounding area, like everything else on the map is red and it's just like one little dot of blue. It just so happens that that little dot of blue is where all the crime comes out of, but everybody else in red I'm sure are firearms owners. You know it is crazy, it just still happens at. That little dot of blue is where all the crime comes out of, but everybody else in the red I'm sure are firearms owners.
Speaker 2:You know, it is crazy because it always seems like it's the big cities where these things occur where the majority of the gun crime is occurring.
Speaker 3:You know, and it's crazy. Georgia is no exception, georgia is no exception. So Atlanta, macon, savannah, that's the way it looks.
Speaker 2:Those are the major cities and that's where a lot of the crap happens. And eventually you have to call it what it is, and I think that I'm not a scientist in this regard. I'm not a behavioral scientist, I'm not a psychologist, I'm not a legal authority. I'm just a guy with a camera who has a big voice. I'm a really well-known average guy. But the way that I tend to kind of look at it is when you get a lot of people and you put them in a really small space, it's almost like it creates this sort of weird groupthink mentality. It's almost like this weird group synergy that begins to occur by cramming people into this small area and I swear it changes their behavior, because we don't see those things out here where we're at in the more sparsely populated areas. We don't ever really deal with that type of mentality, where it just seems like there's just this general group psychosis that begins to occur and I can't really explain it. And it's not always that just every person you run into is a psychopath, it's not that. But there is this overbearing feeling of just kind of this general uneasiness. When you're in a city, it's like all those people together there's so many different energies. So many different people there, all different points of view, different races, religions, backgrounds. It's like you start throwing everyone in a kettle and they begin to feel a little uptight. They begin to feel like their personal space is invaded and that logically puts them in a little bit more of a defensive mode.
Speaker 2:All right, and what do people do? They get a little bit more off-putting towards each other. They might act a little bit aggressively towards each other. All right At its worst state. Each other, they might act a little bit aggressively towards each other All right At its worst state. What does that mean? All right? Well, maybe people you know shoot at people or hit people or commit crimes, and maybe they just lose faith in the overall I don't know goodness of humanity. And maybe cities are where that happens, maybe a little quicker. The sort of breakdown of general sanity seems to happen much more rapidly. When you start cramming everybody in a small area like that, people get mentally a little shook up and I think that's a contributing factor to it, all it is, and I believe the term they have for the correction on that is fatigue.
Speaker 3:You start you're like oh, whatever, whatever the issue is, when it's kind of run its course, they just they just add the word fatigue on the end of it and that settles it. That just like hey, we're tired of, we're tired of whatever is going on. And that's kind of what's going on right now. With the big cities you're seeing, especially with like the stealing, you're starting to see a lot of that fatigue set in where people are just tired of it. Whereas before people would let them walk out of the store, now they're just like no man, you're not just going to wheel out two carts full of stuff, we're over it.
Speaker 3:So now you actually have people stepping up and saying, no, that is not right, that's true stepping up and saying, no, that is not right.
Speaker 2:That's true. A transgression can only be committed for so long and for such amount of time before a person gets fed up with it, and that's where that bubble breaks and they just get completely, they just go completely apeshit.
Speaker 2:And sometimes that happens. Imagine that you ride public transportation and let's say you ride the same couple of buses on and off throughout the week and maybe you see the same people all the time and maybe there's I don't know, I'm just painting a scenario. Say that you're on the bus and there's this couple of group of people that always like, give you a hard time or maybe they're rude to you, or maybe you're a woman and you ride the bus alone and they come on to you and they bother you Eventually. That stressor yeah, it's passive, yeah it doesn't come down to them trying to physically mess with you, but that sort of stressor. Imagine that exacerbated over 10 or 20 instances because you're in so many little micro aggressive situations in the city. Imagine that those things weigh on a person. And imagine being a female and imagine feeling like, oh my gosh, like everywhere I go, I feel like you know, society has this sort of you know eye out for me and it makes me feel really uncomfortable. Imagine that if someone pulled a gun on you and used a gun against you in a crime, imagine how you'd feel. You'd probably hate guns. Of course you'd be anti-gun.
Speaker 2:So there are a lot of people in those big cities that wind up being anti-gun because the rules in the cities make it much harder for them to want to protect themselves. They're told and preached to by the anti-gunners that you shouldn't ever bother to try to protect yourself, because the police are always going to be there to help you. You shouldn't ever bother to try to protect yourself, because the police are always going to be there to help you. And then three, their anti-gun journey becomes so much more exacerbated by the fact that people who are criminals use guns with impunity. Yet the good people don't have guns because they obey the law.
Speaker 2:So it creates this downward spiral and I think the Democrats they know that. They know that it creates a situation where that lady on the bus says, oh my God, where were the police when I needed them? Well then, what does the city do? They allocate more funds and they hire more police, and that further allows them to have a monopoly on violence. And I think ultimately the Democrat sort of war plan is for them to have a monopoly on violence and they don't want people to be able to protect themselves. They want to be the arbiters of their brand of justice as they see it, not as reality sees it.
Speaker 3:Well, I agree, and I think that if we there's a couple of things that you can do to kind of resolve, that is like get off of you know, remove qualified immunity from you know, police and government officials and also um, I forgot the second thing, but I mean qualified immunity.
Speaker 2:Is a is a is a tricky topic.
Speaker 3:It is Um, but I mean, oh, police unions. So it was like, hey, if you want to, if you want to like, figure out how to, how we can resolve the police union issue with cops not being able to be fired and also qualified immunity, I think you'd see a lot of a lot of the um vice grip on violence would would change because cops would have to, would have to kind of change their tune a little bit because there wouldn't be a fear of them not losing their job or not being transferred or being sued civilly for some of the actions now the problem is if cops do their job, they get sued but it comes out of the police union, not not their.
Speaker 3:Actually like it doesn't affect the actual right like police officer. Um, I just wanted to touch on something. I know we're about to run on time here we're okay um, as far as um, you know the anti-gun sentiment, it starts at a very young age and I'll use an example here in georgia there was, uh, recently there was a school shooting, but it wasn't people, I think it was a grade school child brought a firearm to school and was showing it off in the bathroom and it went off and blew up a toilet.
Speaker 2:It wasn't malicious, it was just like an accident.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was like, oh hey, check this out. And I shot a toilet. Now that could have ended horrendously. So I'm definitely not saying it's okay, but the way that the local government kind of jumped on the never let a tragedy go to waste type scenario, they immediately kind of put out a press release and then the next day they had kids reading these notes, they were reading these letters of why they were scared and why they, um, you know, should put more security in place for these schools.
Speaker 3:But the kids were reading the letters. But as a parent of a, of an advanced child, all they did not write these letters. There was like there's words, conjunctions, verbiage in there that is way above their level of education and they were even having a little bit of a tough time reading it. But just that manufactured emotion, that tug on the heartstring of a child's voice reading this letter, like, like they're so scared. I'm there, grant, I'm not taking anything away from them. I'm sure it's a scary situation for a kid, but to kind of just hear it replayed like in a child's voice, there was a definite agenda there with that and I just I hate that they, they went that route like yeah it, like hey, never waste a tragedy. Throw these kids in there, all right, we'll end on this note.
Speaker 2:I'm sure some of you have seen the video of the. I think he was a detective and he was given a gun safety class at the school. And he picks up the Glock. He's like this is a Glock 40 and blah, blah, blah and he's talking about it and he goes to holster it.
Speaker 2:And I think about it and he goes to holster it and I think the gun goes off and shoots him in the foot or the leg or the foot or something. He shoots himself and then just proceeds to hobble around and it's like imagine how traumatized the kid would be from that. You've got this person who you view as some arbiter of all the safety that you ever know. Oh, you're taught that police are the, the absolute, utmost authority on anything gun related. Oh, if a gun, they tell you a gun's dangerous, oh my gosh, you better take that as the gospel. And then the guy shoots himself in the leg.
Speaker 2:Now, granted, it was an accident, okay, accidents happen. But here you are trying to preach about safety and then you shoot yourself in the leg. I mean, obviously the hypocrisy is pretty blatant, right? So, yes, the kid brought the gun to school and there was an accident, no-transcript gun related. If you're trying to teach somebody how to drive or how to operate a motorcycle or how to do any type of task that involves an object operate heavy machinery, operate tools, power tools right, accidents happen. You know, you drive a nail through your finger, you chop your finger off with the table saw. I mean, look, accidents happen. And a firearm, just like any other type of tool, can be a dangerous object if not handled carefully, and the firearm does not make any distinction between who uses it.
Speaker 2:All it knows is it's going to do what it's mechanically designed to do, and if you offer the correct input, it's going to do its job. Yep, it doesn't care. So anyway, I think that's a good way to end the show.
Speaker 3:Yeah, dude, I remember that video and if I remember correctly, that guy was absolutely yoked, I remember it.
Speaker 2:Yes, it was like this gigantic, he was a big guy. That guy was big and I tell you he shrugged it off. He did?
Speaker 3:he walked it off. He was like hey, it's okay.
Speaker 2:He's like he kind of walked it off and I bet, I guarantee inside he was like mother, yeah, like oh, he was mad you know he was mad.
Speaker 3:He handled it like a champ. He did handle it like a champ.
Speaker 2:I will give him that he did. He didn't puss out, he totally handled it, he owned he.
Speaker 3:Totally handled it, he owned it he owned it.
Speaker 2:But imagine being a kid in the first row and a guy cranks a round into his leg with his block.
Speaker 3:Loud too, oh yeah, loud Bang, and it's like those classrooms, it's like those concrete walls, probably rattling around, oh.
Speaker 2:God, no, it was so loud. And those kids? I promise you that none of those kids went on to do anything dangerous with a gun.
Speaker 3:I promise you that Now they learned their lesson.
Speaker 2:It just really cost them that day. Anyway, I digress, there's no laughing matter. Mistakes are not fun, they happen and it's unfortunate when people get hurt. But whatever situation, we always want to take as a learning experience.
Speaker 3:Boy. They learned that day, didn't they? We got to find him and have him on a guest. What?
Speaker 2:happened here. I guarantee you, he went on to give more gun classes.
Speaker 2:Oh 100%, he had a good heart. Yeah, yeah, he meant well. He meant well. I mean the delivery, though. Scary Guys, thanks so much for tuning in this week. Uh, we have a show that drops every Monday at nine o'clock sharp, especially now that Lisa's uploading schedule nine o'clock. Thank you, lisa. Uh, so she handles that. And a big shout out to Lisa she does all the editing for the show, she handles the thumbnails for the show. Uh, she syndicates the show. So she's the queen of LOP. Lisa, my mama, lisa my, my, my my.
Speaker 2:Lisa, my Lisa. So big shout out to Lisa. And we got many more on the way, so you may be watching this on YouTube. We also post the audio everywhere you can find all your favorite podcasts Stitcher, spotify, apple podcasts, et cetera. Anywhere All your favorite podcasts can be found, you can download the show as well. If you just want to listen to audio form or if you want to see our ugly mugs on video, you can check it out on IRAC Veteran 8888 on YouTube every Monday at 9 o'clock. So any other thoughts before we go?
Speaker 3:No, I just want to say thanks to everybody. The show. We have a very committed group of viewers and listeners, both audio and on the channel. So you guys have been super consistent and we're going to do our best to do our jobs and be consistent and provide you guys with something to get you through your day, Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Appreciate you guys so much. Many more podcasts on the way. Y'all have a great week. We'll see you soon.
Speaker 1:Bye everybody. Thanks for listening to Life, liberty and Pursuit. If you enjoyed the show, be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, spotify and anywhere else podcasts are found. Be sure to leave us a five-star review. We'd really appreciate that you can support us over on Ballistic Inc by picking yourself up some merch and remember guys, dangerous freedom. Have a good one.