Complex Issue: Not all women naive about guns

Source: Atlanta Journal
Published: May 22, 2000
Author: Suzanne Fields

Washington — The Million Mom March looked like fun. A glorious sun was shining on the Mall. Moms pushed babies in strollers, held hands with adolescent children, sang and laughed as though they were pilgrims on a religious outing, feeling good about themselves.

The message, however, was all wrong, a downer about the dark side of life. It was emotional and naive, short on facts and long on sentiment. The emphasis was on death, not life; on control, not freedom; law, not liberty.

It was enough to rankle even a dedicated feminist. Says Camille Paglia in Salon ”Webzine:” ”It doesn’t take a weatherman to figure out that the average citizen doesn’t want national policy determined by packs of weeping women led by a shrill dim-witted talk show host (Hillary sycophant Rosie O’Donnell).”

Nobody defends bad people who shoot people, whether adolescent gangsters who kill each other over drug turfs, careless adults who leave guns around for children to find, nuts who ignore their meds to look for someone to murder because they hear crazy voices in their heads or instructions broadcast by the CIA through the fillings in their teeth.

The nation’s capital, where I live, has the toughest gun control laws in the country and the rate of gun crime is among the highest. In states that allow citizens to carry concealed weapons, murder, rape, truck and carjackings are down, along with other violent assaults.

Packing heat is beginning to make sense in a world where a woman is often defenseless without a man at her side. Criminologist Gary Kleck estimates that 2.5 million men and women successfully defend themselves every year against a burglar or mugger with a gun.

Fatherless families breed criminals. Law-abiding gun users don’t. Neighborhoods devoid of adults during the day allow certain adolescents to sink to their basest instincts. The most creative political idea for mending these problems is to support faith-based organizations, enabling them to reach out to troubled youngsters. Men and women who work in these organizations have the structure and the motivation to take over when parents are gone.

The rich and privileged celebrities who led the Million Mom March are the least likely among us to have a personal knowledge of the rudderless young people growing up in cities. Celebrities get their information from songs their colleagues write, from the movies and television shows they perform in.

Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster, insists that George W. Bush will lose big on guns. After all, she and others point out, he’s the governor of a state that permits adults to carry concealed guns.

But women aren’t stupid, nor do all of us play follow the sheep. Women can recognize a complex issue when they see one. After the march, the polls showed women fairly divided on gun control. Al Gore does only slightly better with single women, George W. attracts a large majority of married women and mothers.

Carrying a gun is a good feminist issue. The Second Amendment Sisters, who counter-rallied to the Million Mom March, display a picture on their Web site depicting a tough looking blond pointing a gun at the viewer. Caption: ”As seen by would-be rapist, for about O.2 seconds.”

Talk about bang for a buck.

Suzanne Fields is distributed by the Los Angeles Times Syndicate. Her column appears Mondays and Thursdays.

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