#054 Is Gun Control Racist In Origin? Further. Every. Day.

It is no longer a slippery slope fallacy to claim that after guns, they will come for metal knives, and after the metal knives, they will come for the plastic ones. Great Britain has seen a string of knife bans, to the point that it is not even legal to carry a knife if the authorities do not think that your reason is good enough. (Story from the hstoday.us below) The Church of England is literally using language like “pointy knifes” must be banned, letter below. To further the point, they are literally attempting to ban plastic cutlery for purposes of carbon footprint reduction (How will we prepare food at this rate?), again new story below. This may seem silly, but it is actually happening to knives. Many conservatives have been laughed at for even suggesting that this is the logical end of the gun debate, that all guns will be banned and knives will be next. We see that occurring in Britain in real time.

When discussing the topic of Gun Control, one can easily run into the weeds of stats and lose the war for winning the battle. We need to remember from where does this type of ideology stem, and what has it produced. Note, I am a stats guy. I believe in knowing the facts, but that is only a small percentage of the conversation if you wish to win someone on the other side of the Gun Control Debate.

Last week we discussed stats and common arguments, so now let's look at the origins of gun control and what the philosophy of gun control has produced in societies that have implemented it. In America, it bears merit to look at why gun control was even considered in a society that had recognized a citizen's common law right to own a firearm since the English Bill of Rights of 1688. This Bill of Rights, by the way, reinstated the rights of all to keep and bear arms. Protestants, specifically, had been stripped of this right under persecution by James II. So why would a Protestant nation even consider gun control laws, they had just left violent persecution in Europe. Many of them fought for these very reforms. So why would some of these refugees employ similar tyrannical policies? For the same reasons those in Europe oppressed the Protestants, sin and power.

Looking at American History is like looking at the tale of two Americas. One America was fighting for Christ's Liberty for all, and the other living in the same sin nature in which the rest of the world wallows. The gun control issue is one of many debates that has serious philosophical implications. Either all have the right to defend themselves, as God has declared in His Word, or Man has the right to pick and choose if man has the right to self defense. When man usurps God's authority, tragedy inevitably strikes.

Knife Crackdown:

https://www.hstoday.us/subject-matter-areas/border-security/u-k-launches-nationwide-crackdown-on-knife-crime/

Pointy Knife Ban:

https://www.rochester.anglican.org/communications/news/government-urged-to-restrict-the-sale-of-pointed-knives.php

Plastic Cutlery Ban:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/20/single-use-plastic-plates-and-cutlery-could-be-banned-in-england

List of Gun Laws: https://www.sedgwickcounty.org/media/29093/the-racist-origins-of-us-gun-control.pdf

Bill of Rights Institute: https://billofrightsinstitute.org/essays/benjamin-franklin-and-the-first-abolitionist-petitions

NY State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen Debate:

https://firearmslaw.duke.edu/2021/08/a-historians-assessment-of-the-anti-immigrant-narrative-in-nysrpa-v-bruen/