The Seven Myths of Gun Control

The Seven Myths of Gun Control: Reclaiming the Truth About Guns, Crime, and the Second Amendment (ISBN 0761525580) is a pro-RKBA book by Richard Poe published in 2001.

In it, Poe, editor of FrontPageMagazine.com, identifies common fallacies used to promote gun control and sets forth arguments to refute them in the context of American law and social structure, as well as from purely practical standpoints.

Overview

Five of the myths are of a practical nature, while two deal with the legal and social context of the Second Amendment. Poe prefaces his discussion with the declaration that the issue is primarily a moral one: that of the right to keep and bear arms. The book aims to show that a) gun ownership is in fact more beneficial than portrayed by proponents of gun control, and b) even if it were not, there would still be no justification for authorities to forbid citizens a priori from owning firearms and using them in self-defense. The myths addressed are:

1. Guns increase violent crime.
2. Pulling a gun on a criminal endangers you more than the criminal.
3. Guns pose a special threat to children.
4. The Second Amendment applies only to militiamen.
5. The Second Amendment is an obsolete relic of the frontier era.
6. We should license guns for the same reason we license cars.
7. Reasonable gun-control measures are no threat to law-abiding gun owners.

The book does not waste time on the "let’s enforce the gun laws we already have instead of creating new ones" approach, as such a position wrongheadedly accepts the premises of gun-grabbers and reduces the debate to a quibble over degree.

Methods

In each myth, Poe discusses the underlying assumptions and presents facts, arguments, and anecdotes to counter them. A recurring point is the necessity of presenting statistics that are not only valid but also meaningful. So often the myths he cites rest on statistics that either omit vital data or consolidate disparate groups into a single category. Some examples are:

• The level of gun violence among U.S. teens is not significantly different from that in other industrialized nations — when you exclude certain identifiable violence-prone subcultures.
• Gun ownership deters crime — when you consider that in 98 percent of cases in which U.S. citizens use guns to defend themselves from criminals, no shot is fired.
• Guns cause far fewer deaths to children than automobile accidents or drowning-especially when you exclude older teens engaged in violent criminal activity from the category "children."
• Crime has increased in Great Britain and Australia since those nations confiscated virtually all private firearms — when you consider burglaries, robberies, and assaults committed without a gun.

Assertions

Poe contends that not only is private gun ownership not the evil it is so often portrayed to be, but it is also beneficial — indeed, essential — for the preservation of a free and prosperous society. Throughout history the most violent criminals have been the ones in power. An unarmed populace is an invitation to dictatorship, and the disarming of populations, from sixteenth-century Japanese peasants to twentieth-century German Jews, has been a prelude to oppression. Poe warns the reader not to think America is immune from such a scenario — and indeed points out that the forcible disarmament of American Indians and southern blacks by official or semiofficial means left these groups defenseless against the depredations visited on them.

While relying on documented facts and statistics, the narrative is not devoid of passion. Indeed, some of the examples given are downright chilling. Especially ominous are the scenarios of widespread chaos and/or deprivation of civil liberties following a large-scale natural disaster or "catastrophic terrorism."

Conclusions

While The Seven Myths of Gun Control is certainly a helpful resource for pro-RKBA supporters, it may prove less effective in swaying its logical target readership: those who accept the myths but are open to opposing views. These may be somewhat put off by such elements as a snide reference to Al Gore not germane to the topic of gun control or a favorable reference to the movie Death Wish, which could be easily misconstrued as condoning vigilantism.

The most problematic argument, however, is Poe’s contention that gun-control advocacy is part of a feminist scheme to emasculate men. While such sentiments may indeed play a role, Poe relies on an analysis of the psychological motives of gun-control advocates that must be regarded as somewhat speculative. Moreover, the validity of his proposed antidote &mdsah; instilling a "warrior culture" among young males — is debatable. One could argue that the violence-prone youth in certain American subcultures already have a "warrior culture" of sorts; just not a good one. One might argue instead that a reassertion of man’s rational nature is the solution.

Still, the book remains a strong attempt to bring facts and logic to a debate that, as the author even notes, is too often clouded by purely emotional arguments.