NYT:

A gun is a tool, and we choose tools based on their function. The primary function of a gun is to kill or injure people or animals. In the case of people, the only reason I might have to shoot them — or threaten to do so — is that they are immediately threatening serious harm. So a first question about owning a gun is whether I’m likely to be in a position to need one to protect human life. A closely related question is whether, if I were in such a position, the gun would be available and I would be able to use it effectively.

Unless you live in (or frequent) dangerous neighborhoods or have family or friends likely to threaten you, it’s very unlikely that you’ll need a gun for self-defense. Further, counterbalancing any such need is the fact that guns are dangerous. If I have one loaded and readily accessible in an emergency (and what good is it if I don’t?), then there’s a non-negligible chance that it will lead to great harm. A gun at hand can easily push a family quarrel, a wave of depression or a child’s curiosity in a fatal direction.

Even when a gun makes sense in principle as a means of self-defense, it may do more harm than good if I’m not trained to use it well. I may panic and shoot a family member coming home late, fumble around and allow an unarmed burglar to take my gun, have a cleaning or loading accident. The N.R.A. rightly sets high standards for gun safety. If those unable or unwilling to meet these standards gave up their guns, there might well be a lot fewer gun owners.

Guns do have uses other than defense against attackers. There may, for example, still be a few people who actually need to hunt to feed their families. But most hunting now is recreational and does not require keeping weapons at home. Hunters and their families would be much safer if the guns and ammunition were securely stored away from their homes and available only to those with licenses during the appropriate season. Target shooting, likewise, does not require keeping guns at home.

Finally, there’s the idea that citizens need guns so they can, if need be, oppose the force of a repressive government. Those who think there are current (or likely future) government actions in this country that would require armed resistance are living a paranoid fantasy. The idea that armed American citizens could stand up to our military is beyond fantasy.

These objections are a red herring.  Guns can be owned and handled safely and the shooters can learn to shoot and observe the rules of gun safety.  It’s done every day all over the world by millions of safe gun owners.  This is written by someone who has never owned a gun – which speaks poorly of the NYT that they would approve opinion pieces on issues of which the author has no knowledge whatsoever.

But notice how quickly he turns the conversation on the notion that we need to check our firearms in to a state-approved armory, even as Mr. Gutting drives his automobile down the road and risks far greater and more frequent injury to innocent people than me with my guns.  This is called hypocrisy.

Finally, take note of his position on the idea that we need to own firearms in order to ameliorate tyranny.  Without so much as blinking, he assumes like the good collectivist that he is that the armed forces would put down citizens in armed revolt over gun confiscation orders.  Posse Comitatus being the law of the land means absolutely nothing to Mr. Gutting.

Furthermore, Mr. Gutting is apparently not the scholar he is made out to be, and knows nothing of the history of insurgencies.  Easy, it will be for the army – or so he thinks.  Oh, they may be outnumbered a thousand to one with every insurgent melting away into the woods after shooting.  But surely the army would “win,” whatever win means.

In spite of the difficulty of Iraq and impossibility of Afghanistan, Mr. Gutting is sure of the simplistic, bloodless nature of an American insurgency.  But he feels that he will never be in a position to need a weapon for self defense (perhaps he would stand around and watch if his wife was being raped by gangsters?).  It is Mr. Gutting who is firmly ensconced in fantasy land.