“How Many Guns do You Need?”

Dear Fellow Survivalist;

If you’ve got anti-gun family members, you probably expended a lot of effort trying to hide from them at the family Christmas get-together. It seems we all have at least one of them in the family and they like nothing better at the holidays than to try and destroy us from their position of moral superiority.

Of course, many of these same people believe in quiet a few things that you and I would call immoral. You know what I mean; things like abortion on demand, same sex marriage and a host of other left-wing causes. They consider those things “moral” because their definition of the word is “as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else.”

They conveniently forget that abortion kills a living baby and that same sex marriage is destructive to society. But since neither of those are “immoral” like our guns are; they feel they can still ride their moral high horse and trample all over our rights.

You could try arguing their point on the lack of validity their definition of morality contains, but you won’t get very far. You’ll probably just get an angry statement about how you don’t have any right to “force your religious views on anyone.” As per usual, their hypocrisy allows them to try and force their non-religious views on others, not realizing that the lack of religion is in itself religion.

So how do you answer these people effectively? While I don’t think it’s really possible to change their minds, there are things we can say in response to their usual jabs. Here are a few such answers you might find useful:

When they ask “How many guns do you need?”

This is a clear statement that they don’t understand guns; specifically that they don’t understand the differences between different types of guns. These people probably think you can go hunting for deer with a .22LR revolver.

The clear answer is to explain that different types of guns are for different purposes. If you’re a hunter, you can explain that you can’t use a high-powered rifle for hunting birds. If that doesn’t work, you could always switch over to a bit snarkier answer and ask them “Why do you need so man pairs of shoes?” They might not get it, but the principle is actually the same.

When they say “I don’t see why anyone needs an AR-15”

This seems to be a favorite lately, perhaps because of the way that the liberal news media has been vilifying the AR-15 as an “assault rifle.” If all their claims about an AR-15 were true, it would be the most dangerous weapon ever devised by man. But it’s not, it’s just another semi-automatic rifle.

Most gun owners I know try and answer this one by talking about it being the most popular sporting rifle on the market. But that answer doesn’t seem to do much good, as they don’t really care about that. So I think a more “honest” answer would be more effective, telling them that the 10 million or so AR-15s in the country are the greatest defender of their First Amendment rights to say such things that there is.

Adding to that, you can say that the reason why their favorite left-leaning politicians want to get rid of the AR-15, is that they are afraid that the owners of those AR-15s would be the ones who had the capability of effectively fighting against the tyranny they want to impose.

When they say “I’m afraid of guns” or “I don’t like guns”

Both of these statements are really the same thing. In both cases, it is them showing forth their ignorance of guns. The easy solution is to offer to teach them about guns, so that they can get rid of their fear. I’ve personally used this answer in a number of cases, turning people who were afraid of guns into avid shooters.

When they complain that you don’t need to carry concealed.

This is my favorite complaint. It’s also actually the easiest one to answer. You can usually find it attached to some sort of statement about how the police will protect you; a false belief of many.

The place to start is pointing out that this is a false belief. Be sure to include the statistics that the average home break-in last 90 seconds, while the average time to respond to a 9-1-1 call is seven to 11 minutes. Ask them, “How are the police going to protect anyone that way?”

From there you can go on to explaining how carrying is a civic duty and how your presence there, with your gun, is protecting them from mass shooters and other criminals. They don’t have to worry about whether the police will get there in time, because you are there.

I have yet to have even the most avid anti-gunner complain about me being there to protect them, once they understood that I was doing so. Adding the part about the police not being able to do so, and according to a Supreme Court decision, not required to do so, merely enforces their desire for my protection.

So you see, it’s not really all that hard to answer these complaints, if you think it through ahead of time and have some idea of how to turn their complaint on its head. Don’t try and answer it in the context of their complaint though, as you’ll never succeed. You have to establish eh grounds for your arguments, not allow them to do so.

And don’t forget, keep your powder dry and your survival gear close at hand. This includes ear plugs, to use if those answers don’t shut them up.