Is it time to get a firearm?

[Bobfripp]

i give no shits what sheep think.

 

[mynameisbond]

My parents never owned guns. They were afraid to. But I grew up in SW Virginia (lots of hunters) and served in the Army. As a Boy Scout, I took NRA Safe Hunter training and learned gun safety. I'm comfortable with guns and own several but don't shoot anymore. I have a healthy respect for them. Have never shot at a person or an animal (unless you count shooting at rodents with a BB gun) and hope I never will. But if someone breaks into my home, the dog will bark and I can protect myself and my family.

 

[SnoopRob]

I of course don't know how various scenarios would play out.

One thing I am concerned about is Trump either explicitly giving permission to people or saying things in a way that they believe he is doing so.

My goal would simply be to make myself and my family a harder target. I agree that most of these people aren't as brave as they like to pretend so showing even a bit of resistance (warning shot) would likely be enough to ward them off.

I also don't envision that such as situation is sustainable as they're not going to have state law on their side. So I don't see them coming back to target me if something were to happen.

I would only act if the situation were such that I either act or my family is dead.

Maybe I am paranoid but the talk that happened immediately after the Kirk shooting rattled me. There are plenty of people who want me dead for no other reason than I have different views they they have and because they are brainwashed into believing everyone who has different views are a threat to them. (Note that unlike them I am not stereotyping all MAGA as being in this group. I am merely saying that there are people who are in it.)

If you think that having a gun is worth the money in order to consider yourself safer in case things in our society get worse, you are free to do so. It's much like owning a weapon to protect yourself and your family against a burglar, it is possible that you will someday use your weapon to protect yourself - and, if that happens, the gun would be nearly priceless; but it is much more likely that you will never need the weapon for self-protection and probably equally likely that having a gun may lead to other bad outcomes within your family.

And I say that as a gun owner myself and someone who has brandished a gun (although I didn't actually pull it on the person) in self-defense. And as someone who has had a gun pulled on them (when I didn't have one).

I think there are other things you could do to assist you in helping to protect your family that would likely be more valuable, such as installing an alarm system (if you don't have one), for protecting your family from both burglars & roving MAGA hordes.

At the end of the day, it's your choice as to whether or not to purchase a gun for your own safety. Statistically-speaking, though, I don't know that it'll make much of a difference for you unless you are unlucky enough to be put in a very specific situation where you would need it and it would materially change outcome of the situation.