The similarity between guns and drugs is specifically as follows:

Irrational preemptive material prohibitions with a long history of failure to produce harm-reductive outcomes at expense to civil-liberties for otherwise safe and responsible citizens as it relates to fundamentally demand-side (not supply-side) issues is a commonality between both the War on Drugs and the seemingly irrational response to firearms by subsets of liberals in the United States.

Material prohibitions don’t work, they have a historically terrible track record of success. From a purely objective standpoint they’re a ridiculous policy, because their goals are almost never achieved. They’re just expensive, time-consuming, politically charged, and treat everyone like a criminal by-default. Why people would advocate strengthening one while simultaneously holding the position that another is completely absurd, for the reasons often cited above, is beyond me. It’s simply intellectually dishonest. An inability to consistently apply consistent standards across positions.

Pretty much says it all.

[1] The other bozo’s drugs won’t kill me if he trips, gets blind drunk, or thinks that somethng scarey is sneeking up in the bushes.

[2] If said bozo snorts his drugs, they might kill him. If he snorts his gun, it will kill him.

I’m not as concerned with [2], except to the extent that his bullet might kill me if I’m in the room next door. Dopers probably aren’t very good at aiming.

I don’t hate guns. I am fascinated by guns. They are pure engineering. But a gun is a tool, not a toy. I have no more use for such a tool than I do for a Terex Titan coal-mining dump truck. So I don’t own one or carry one around.

A hunter who is on land where it is legal to hunt, during hunting season, and has a license has a reason for carrying a gun that is legal for hunting purposes. But no one has a legitimate reason for carrying an AR-15 or AK-47. And no one has a legitimate reason for carrying a weapon of any kind in a National Park, where it is illegal to kill anything.

The whole trick to surviving encounters with ”large predatory” wildlife is not to go looking for it and not to look like the things it would like to eat.

Don’t walk up unannounced to a grizzly bear. Since they can run 40 miles an hour and are built like a van with teeth and attitude, your chance of having a powerful enough gun and finding the time to use it in a real confrontation are slim. That concealed .38 is just going to make it mad. If you can unsling it fast enough, the AR-15 might kill it–but only because it might bleed out after it has twisted your head off.

Mountain lions–the only other large predator in the US–are another matter. Look big, don’t let your kids run around alone, and don’t go jogging alone in the evening. You will be fine. Guns won’t help, because mountain lions grab you from behind. In the unlikely event that one wants to eat you, you’ll never see it or hear it.

I’ve lived in the mountain west for 27 years. I have climbed, back-country skiied, backpacked, hiked, and car-camped in Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Wyoming, and Montana at all hours of the day, from 1:00 AM to 11:00 at night. I have NEVER even SEEN a mountain lion or black bear, much less a grizzly. Tracks, yes. Scat yes. Scratched up trees, yes. Scavenged carcasses, once or twice. But no actual animals. Why? Predatory animals DO NOT WANT to meet us humans.

For most advocates of guns in public places, protection is just an excuse, in any case. People want guns in the parks because they want to find an opportunity to use them. Even though it is illegal to do so. These people know how hard it would be for the rangers to catch them in the act of shooting at a wapiti, big horn, snake, ”large predator”, road sign, outhouse, chipmunk, prairie dog, funny-looking rock, marmot, or lily pad (if you don’t believe that this behavior is common, drive down a rural county road some time). If rangers can’t arrest these yahoos for carrying firearms in area where it is illegal to use them for anything, then the rangers can’t stop them shooting the place up.

From whence comes the hubris that encourages such excess?

Clue: even the Bible – dammit – does not encourage killing just because you can, does it?!

Any thought of the generations to come? conservation? preservation? respect for life extending beyond merely human embryos? Is your belief system so casually set aside so as to allow one or 2 generations of humans to drive major segments of the ecosystem, much less signature species beloved in film, saga, and real life experience to be wiped out simply because it is possible to do precisely that, or simply because they are “in the way of progress.” Good luck explaining that to your grandkids.

And then what? When will folks wake up and take responsibility for tackling the hard problems of this generation and the legacy we pass on for those to come? The world does not revolve around each, or any one of us, but ALL of us have the capacity to impact its future. Please care, and take care.