We’ve just discussed this kind of appeal to emotions and why it’s ineffective. You’re effectively telling me “think of the children”, the subtext being that if I’m unwilling to relinquish the constitutional right to bear arms, I’m a bad person. Two things can be true at once - you can care about the victims and also believe that this right is fundamental in a free society and must be defended. There’s a great number of things we can do to reduce the number of mass shootings without infringing upon constitutional rights or relinquishing any of them, and none of those things are going to be discussed by Congress because they’re not marketable. What’s marketable is to create a moral panic over “black and scary” rifles and dead children even though the majority of mass shootings are committed with handguns (by an enormous margin) and take place between rival gangs. Even if we set that obvious fact aside, the reason why mass shootings in schools take place now when they didn’t use to is the increased prevalence of depression and despair, driven in part by social media turning people’s brains into mush and mainstream media consistently chasing tragedies to cover, creating a false impression of the end of days. Good news doesn’t sell ads.
I’m glad that you agree hate speech is not a legitimate reason to limit a citizen’s rights. The 2A is absolutely insurance against tyranny, not just when exercised, but just by the virtue of its existence. You don’t tread too hard on people who are armed. The first thing every tyrannical government does is disarming civilians - a population that can’t fight back can be easily broken. Americans should never relinquish the right to bear their arms, should the need to use them arise.
