For womb the bell tolls
Ann Coulter
May 16, 2000

http://www.jewishworldreview.com –

THE LAST TIME liberal women got the idea to use their wombs as an argument
for gun control, Representatives Carolyn McCarthy, D-N.Y., Nita M. Lowey,
D-N.Y., and Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., were uttering such prattle as “women find
they have a maternal instinct” for gun control. A reporter for The New York
Times observed at the time that the congresswomen “seem(ed) to miss the
irony that the same political party that claimed ownership of the position
that women could be more than mothers is, in this instance, casting them
primarily in that role.”

The Million Mom March (which infected the nation’s capital on Sunday) was
poised to set women’s workplace gains back about 100 years. (The Moms’ Web
page adorably notes that the time for planning this event was nine months –
and “(a)s a mother, I know what can be created in this amount of time.”)

I’m all for motherhood, but as Bill Maher, host of “Politically Incorrect,”
is forever pointing out, it’s not that hard to become a parent. (In fact, it
is because having children can be accomplished by the weak-minded and
incompetent that Maher is constantly lobbying for a licensing requirement
for parenthood.) But somehow, merely the status of being a “mom” is supposed
to trump facts and linear thinking. That was the theme of the Million Mom
March: I don’t need a brain — I’ve got a womb.

The Moms’ Web page idiotically explains: “While we acknowledge that guns may
be necessary for hunting, law enforcement and national security, the
proliferation of firearms intended for one purpose only — killing another
human being — has become untenable.”

It’s sporting of them to allow the military and cops to have guns and all,
but — how does one put this? — the reason the military and police have
guns is precisely because their guns are intended for “killing another human
being.” That’s why cops and soldiers carry guns, rather than, say, daisies.
(And just for the record, a gun that can kill a deer can surely kill a
human, too.)

The fact that guns can kill another human being is the whole point. That’s
why they’re so darn good at deterring violent criminals. By analyzing 18
years of data for more than 3,000 counties, the inestimable professor John
Lott found that violent crime drops significantly when citizens are
permitted to carry concealed guns. The greatest beneficiaries of concealed
carry laws — whether they personally choose to carry — are women and the
elderly.

Economist David Friedman explained the economic theory supporting the
statistics in his book “Hidden Order: The Economics of Everyday Life.” (Of
course, Friedman is not a “mom,” only an economist, so take his crazy linear
thinking with a grain of salt.)

Friedman begins by accepting the hysterical, counterfactual claims of the
anti-gun crowd that 90 percent of the time criminals will wrest guns from
law-abiding citizens (which, for the record, is false). “Suppose,” he says,
“one little old lady in 10 carries a gun. Suppose that one in 10 of those,
if attacked by a mugger, succeeds in killing the mugger instead of being
killed by him — or shooting herself in the foot.”

Even though the mugger will come out better on average than the little old
lady, Friedman notes that “also on average, every hundred muggings produce
one dead mugger.” Mugging becomes an unprofitable profession because “not
many little old ladies carry enough money to justify one chance in a hundred
of being killed.” Thus, even on implausible anti-gun assumptions, muggings
will decline because muggers will have “rationally sought safer
professions.”

Indeed, without a gun, crime victims may as well take the advice of Peter
Shields, former head of Handgun Control Inc., who recommends that women
faced with a rapist or robber “give them what they want.” Maybe it’s my womb
talking, but I’m tempted to say, I don’t care what the statistics are; I’m
not sitting back and taking it.

As luck would have it, the statistics do not support passivity in the face
of a criminal assault. As John Lott has pointed out, studies purporting to
show that women are more likely to be injured in a crime if they resist do
so only by lumping all forms of “resistance” together, from bare-knuckled
fighting to brandishing a gun.

The most dangerous action a woman can take when faced with a criminal is to
resist with her fists: That tends to annoy violent criminals, and the woman
will very likely be seriously injured. But a woman who takes the advice of
Handgun Control Inc. and passively submits is 2.5 times more likely to be
injured than a woman who resists with a gun. So if you don’t want to lie
back and enjoy it, get a gun. Otherwise you may never become a mom.

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