legalize nuclear bombs

I recently changed my mind on gun control.

I often hesitate to share my political beliefs too thoroughly since they're not always very well thought through (this page being an example) but I was (and still am generally) a proponent of personal freedom, few laws and simple governance. Obviously, restricting access to pretty much anything would go against that.
Again, I hesitate to bring religion into this since I'm not as well-read as I wish I was, but Sikhi was a heavy influence for this as well. It plainly supports keeping weaponry, and even revering it, clearly shown by the symbol for the Sikh faith, the Khanda, being primarily composed of blades, as well as a key part of the Khalsa uniform being a Kirpan. The history and passion for self-defense in Sikhi runs deep, so a restriction on a tool for self-defense felt like a restriction on our religion (also, the previous point of letting people live how they want fits well with Sikh teachings).
I knew guns could be bad. I knew they could be used to hurt people. But at the very least, I also knew that there were many people who felt they should be generally available, and some of those people included friends, coworkers and family. Besides, advocating for guns to not be heavily restricted can have a myriad of meanings, with lots of people preferring different levels of restriction, so I felt even something as simple as making no changes to gun laws in America was a fairly central point of view, considering the fact people could push for further freedom as well. Also, I don't know a ton about guns, and it seemed most of the people who did preferred they were not so staunchly regulated.

Then the "legalize nuclear bombs" audio went viral on TikTok. I remember one of the videos instrumental in my change of heart being this one. See here for more information on the origin of the sound (basically it was just a part of some random song and went viral). I thought it was hilarious at the time, and it really stuck in my head. I started thinking about it more deeply over the next days.

Obviously, it should be illegal to own, produce, use or sell nuclear bombs as a private citizen. I'm not sure if this is debated or not, but I took that as fact. But why? I guess because they're just too dangerous. A nuclear bomb could do insane damage without much effort or knowledge of operation, and without any potential for self-defense for people nearby.
How much damage is too much? The simple answer is any damage at all, but anything can be used as a weapon. I think the real keys are "without much effort" and "without any potential for self-defense". Guns are easy to use, easily accessible, and difficult to counter with anything other than another gun (which comes with its own whole slew of issues). It really is too much power in the hands of random people.
We've gotten to a point where there really isn't much choice but to trust the government. True self sufficiency is unrealistic for most people. The argument of citizens needing guns in case they must be used against the government makes some sense to me, but realistically a civil uprising has essentially no chance of being successful in the modern developed world. If a revolution needs to happen, it would need to be more sophisticated than simple violence.
I kind of want to change my mind. People don't usually do that, and I guess its a sign of maturity. Also, I think it's fine to do something because the ideal version of yourself would do it, even if that's your primary motivation. That's how you improve, and it's a pretty good way to be a generally good person.
People often rebut calls for gun control by saying things like cars can do just as much damage as a gun under certain conditions. Aside from the fact those situations are fairly narrow, often avoidable, and rarely as likely to cause death as a gun is, vehicles have utility. The only real utility for a gun (especially a pistol, and especially in a city) is to kill.
I won't be commenting on how I reconcile the idea of restricting access to weapons with Sikhi, but I am comfortable now doing so.

And so now I'm anti-gun. I think guns should be pretty much banned. Sure, there are some uses for things like hunting or farming where owning a gun makes sense, but that balance seems to already have been fairly well struck in Canada, so any additional restrictions that don't infringe on utility would be welcome in my opinion.

I'm not sure why I wanted to write all this out, and looking back on it now it seems kind of useless. I kind of just thought it was funny I changed my mind on a serious issue because of a meme, and maybe someday it'll be interesting to look back on how I thought about things like this. lol

Posted: 2022-10-16