As most people already know David Frum is a hack. So much so that I’ve taken to labeling people who call themselves conservatives but do their best to undermine and attack conservative beliefs at every turn “Frums”. Therefore it should come as no surprise that Frum was out on Twitter forwarding some old ABC anti-gun propaganda.
Now, there’s a lot of stupid to unpack here, so let’s start with the bizarre statement Frum makes in his tweet. Now, I’ve never been quite sure what the alternate reality David Frum inhabits is like but it’s apparently a place where concealed carry laws haven’t been in existence for decades. Back here on earth though we’ve had concealed carry laws in place in most states for a long time and, as the recent shooting in Oregon reinforces, they’re life savers.
Ok, now that we’ve cleared that up, lets move on the poorly made anti-gun propaganda from ABC that Frum finds so enlightening.
Yea, wow. There’s so many ways in which this “experiment” is stacked against concealed carry. Let’s start with the basics.
In this “experiment” completely untrained & inexperienced college students are pitted against highly trained firearms instructors in a close range shooting match in order to test the effectiveness of carrying a concealed weapon. So the only thing they’re really testing is whether these college students can win in a shootout with a fully trained firearms instructor who attack them with a gun already drawn & using the element of surprise. What a worthwhile undertaking…
But that obvious stacking of odds against concealed carry was apparently not enough for ABC News though as they continued their skewing in several other ways. First off they force the college kids to wear ridiculously long & impractical shirts with snapping holsters, a combination which nobody who carries on a regular basis would ever use. Then the highly trained firearms instructor purposely targets the college kids immediately after shooting the teacher.
Of course even all that wasn’t enough bias for ABC as they basically have to lie about the results of their own test involving the young woman in order to fit their narrative. Not only was the completely untrained woman able to draw her weapon from under her ridiculously over sized shirt but she was able to fire it at the firearms instructor, hit him in the groin, and effectively end the shooting.
ABC labels this a stunning failure because the marksman they used as the bad guy hit her giant helmet at some point, she wasn’t sure about where she had shot the gunman (because that matters for some reason), and because she stood up slightly.
It is important to note that the firearm instructor & police officer’s warnings that being trained & prepared is an essential part of being armed are, of course, sound advice. Nobody should carry a weapon unless they know how to do so responsibly.
However, what’s more important to note is exactly what ABC recommends you do instead of arming yourself since they’ve just had you sit through propaganda about how crazy & ineffective that is. Against a myriad of evidence ABC tells its viewers that it’s better to hide, play dead, try to run away, or use your cellphone. Obviously those are things that should be employed if they’re most likely to keep you alive in the situation but pretending you aren’t utterly exposed if those are your only options is insanity.
This clearly serves to remind us that when gun control advocates argue guns are too ineffective or dangerous to be used in self-defense their alternative is always that you be left defenseless. That is absurd.
But when you’re an gun control advocate absurdity is a key piece of most of your arguments so I suppose none of this bothers ABC or David Frum. It should, though, bother anybody who does cares about logic or fact. Hopefully that’s more people than not.
