>>766449DIfferentfag here. I'm just going to jump in and (hopefully) end this before a multi-tool thread gets relegated to /pol/.
The idea that "having more options for self defense" by carrying a gun is better than not is fundamentally like having more options for starting a fire in the woods by carrying a flamethrower is better than not. Sure, technically there's some truth, but there's a better chance of starting a forest fire with the flamethrower.
There's a similar case to be made with firearms. It's been fairly well demonstrated at this point that guns (in America):
>Are more likely to be used to escalate arguments and increase socially undesirable or illegal actshttp://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1730664/>Are more likely to be used to intimidate others than in self-defensehttp://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11200101>Are more likely to be used to intimidate intimates in the home than to prevent crimehttp://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10619696>Are not commonly used to shoot criminals in the commission of illegal actshttp://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10647578>Are not used millions of times per year in self-defensehttp://home.uchicago.edu/ludwigj/papers/JPAM_Cook_Ludwig_Hemenway_2007.pdfSo maybe it's time to come to to terms with the collective vigilante fetish in America and realize that firearms now account for as many deaths annually as motor vehicle accidents.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/12/17/guns-are-now-killing-as-many-people-as-cars-in-the-u-s/ 