I read an article recently that really disturbed me. The gun control / ban elitists were predicting a clean sweep of new gun control initiatives in Maine, Washington and Nevada during this year’s general election. Much of the success they were attributing to the massive amount of money they had poured into these initiatives compared to that of the national gun rights groups. Funding here had all but dried up for fights that were not considered winnable.
I find this disturbing because without the support of larger state and national organizations, it is nearly impossible for local grassroots groups to successfully fight off the extremely well funded and well organized national gun control / ban elitists who are systematically chipping away at their rights. Propped up by billionaires who have no interest in the Bill of Rights for anyone other than themselves, they are pouring millions into these states to buy all the votes they can.
The people living in these states are fighting for their core constitutional rights, and eventually for their actual lives as they are faced with losing their ability to defend themselves and their families. Why are these fights not worth fighting?
I understand the realities of national politics and that appearance is everything. Appearing invincible can dissuade others from fighting you in the first place. However I also understand that an advantage not used is a disadvantage.
I am reminded of a story from my past; a K-9 officer with a new drug detection dog. When called to assist another department with a vehicle stop or search, he would not deploy his dog unless he first evaluated the circumstances and was completely convinced a hit by his dog would produce the desired contraband. He explained he was protecting his dog’s stats so they would be more solid for future court cases. With this approach, his dog had an impeccable search record. The unintended consequences however were that other officers would not call for K-9 search assistance when he was working. A powerful advantage that could have been used in a wide range of situations was not in order to protect a reputation.
We can’t always pick and choose the fights we fight. Sometimes they are thrust upon us and we have no choice but to fight the best we can. More than a few of us can recall a time in our lives where we walked into a situation and quickly realized – yup, I’m gonna get my ass kicked today. Bloodied and bruised, most of us survive these things and wind up a little stronger and wiser because of it.
But what about fights that involve others? Here we have more than just our own flesh or reputation to think about, we have to consider what the fight means for them. We fight to help those who cannot win alone. We combine our efforts and fight side-by-side. Tested by adversity, we forge alliances that might never have been possible and become stronger together.
Not fighting can have far more consequences beyond losing the single battle we avoid. It demoralizes those who are committed to the cause and can set up a series of future defeats when our adversary no longer sees us as a threat to their cause. This is what we are witnessing in Maine, Washington and Nevada. Small victories on prior campaigns exposed weakness that are now being exploited to take even more rights away from law abiding firearm owners.
No one goes into a fight intending to lose and let’s face it no one likes to lose. But sometimes, the fight is more important than the outcome. Sometimes fighting the good fight and losing is better in the long term than the victory would have been. Our history is full of tragic losses that inspired and invigorated populations to be better and stronger than they ever thought possible.
In 430 BC, King Leonidas lead a combined Greek city-state force of roughly 7,000 men, including his infamous 300 Spartans to stop Xerxes Persian army estimated in the hundreds of thousands. After holding the Persians for seven days, three of them in combat at Thermopylae, Leonidas learned he was being flanked and dismissed the vast majority of his troops, remaining to cover their retreat. While nearly all that remained were killed, Leonidas’s fight turned out to be critical to the eventual defeat of the Persian army the following year. His response to the Persian king’s demands for his weapons remains as inspirational for us today as it was then; Molon Labe – Come and take them.
With the lack of support from state and national organizations during the recent unsuccessful Veto Gunmageddon ballot measure signature drive in California, I’ve heard a lot of patriots denouncing these groups’ inaction and cancelling their memberships. This is a sad and not entirely unexpected result of feeling like someone you support is not supporting you in a time of urgent need. Even though we all have the same goals, the lack of cohesion and cooperation on these critical local and state issues only serves to further fracture the firearms community and set us all up for more losses at a time when we should be working together.
Wanting to win every fight is natural, but sometimes you have no choice but to fight the fight you are handed. Sometimes the fight itself is the prize and the unity it creates, the community it inspires, the passion it invokes in others is worth far more than the cost of not winning. Sometime, it really is a fight worth losing.
Bob
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