Optimism vs Pessimistic. It's a world view. Armed or Unarmed?

[JamesATyler]

I think to understand the different sides of the gun ownership issue may be understanding the difference between optimism and pessimism. People who want guns are pessimistic. They believe that you can write a thousand laws but there are simply people that do not care what the laws says. They will continue to murder, rape, and steal no matter what the law says. True that a serial killer with a knife kills fewer people in that same span of time but he does a lot of damage to a single person. That scares everyone. Hard to tell that person he didn’t need protection. Hard to tell a woman that she doesn’t need protection when there men working in groups to rape women. There is just too much crime.

People who believe there should be no guns are optimistic. They believe that if society were gun free there would be little crime. When they say they want no guns, they really want there to be no murder. If there were a rally against murder, everyone would be for it. Even the NRA would be there, guns and all. On that, everyone agrees. It is just hard to get people to make their safety a matter of chance when they feel safer with a weapon. They just are not that optimistic about society.

Optimism vs Pessimistic. It’s a world view. I think that is the basic understanding of those that are armed and those that are not. Is it that simple?

 

[HerCrazierHalf]

I think it has more to do with trust. Most anti gun people do not trust others and many times not themselves with the power to easily and summarily end another.

 

[midori]

I think it has to do with power. Even if people don’t personally make use of that power themselves, they recognize its benefit and why it exists and why it should be reserved. And they’re suspicious that it’s not about the guns-- that it’s leading up to a replay of the same scenario that you run into with so many other societies that have been disarmed.