Don't expect proselytizing gun advocates and owners to protect us from the creeping falangism of state plutocracy (what we have been seeing in the USA and elsewhere for the last 40 years).
More likely, gun owners will fight on the side of falangist state plutocracy, and will resist mass movements toward restored or improved democracy, which they will construe as takings and violations of their "rights." (Gun ownership rights are not recognized internationally as human rights. Meanwhile, there are internationally recognized human rights, such as rights to decent employment, which are not recognized as human rights by the USA, and not implemented very well in many countries that have signed agreements recognizing them.)
This is not merely because gun advocates tend to be on the right or far right politically (and would therefore tend to align with other far right types, such as the Koch brothers, who might also be prepared to manipulate them further through propaganda). It is because the very notion of ultimate-protection-by-gun-ownership is a hyper-individualist fantasy which does not recognize society, how society acts in a crisis, or how it would react to an unfolding ultimate-protection-gun-fantasy. Ultimate-protection-by-guns is fundamentally opposed to democracy, and indeed desires to hold democracy prostrate to prevent such things as reasonable gun regulation.
If you run out of food and funds to buy food, the correct things to do are social in nature, not anti-social.
1) Seek employment
2) Sell unneeded possessions for cash to buy food
3) Seek help from family and friends
4) Seek help from government, church, or other organizations
If you can see a crisis coming, you can also prepare through mass organization and local planting. If you haven't prepared, people can forage and eat things like insects and trees in a true emergency and there is no food to be readily had. You are much better off being part of some social group than being alone under circumstances like these. Some people will know what's best to eat, others will know how to stay warm. Safety in numbers.
There is no likely useful option involving the use of guns to take stuff. If there is any such success, it isn't likely to last long.
Our ultimate protection is, and can only be, society itself. If society is broken, as it always is in one way or another, it needs fixing, not submerging under any form of individualism. Such submersion is in fact impossible. To be anti-social is to be part of society, even if an unwelcoming or unwelcome part. Thus, the irony of things like Randian cults, of people selflessly sacrificing their time to promote selfishness.
Now forgetting the "ultimate-protection" type fantasy arguments gun advocates make, guns may be useful for limited protection under some circumstances, that is, protection from actual criminals (and not society or the government). But even that is far more limited that advocates claim.
Gun advocates claim guns are often used in self-defense. But the truth is that guns are used far more in escalating arguments and intra-family intimidation, which are not individually or socially productive uses.
As I had previously posted, studies show higher death rates resulting from gun ownership than non-ownership. I personally feel far safer NOT owning a gun. What if someone invades my home? First, I would much rather lose possessions than my life. Rather than entering a standoff with a likely far more experienced shooter than I am, I hide as well as I possibly can. After they are gone, or as soon as I can, I call the police, and then my insurance company.
What about revolution? Successful revolution, even the now ancient US Revolutionary War involved organization on a vast scale, impressive leaders like George Washington, intelligent thinkers like Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson, a broad spectrum of wealthy elites, and massive social participation. It wasn't just a few cranks with guns. Even with all that, the USA would likely not have won without getting backing from the French (who had their own reasons to dislike the British) Army. The British were far away and were already beginning to think that the American colony wasn't profitable to them anyway, hence the escalating taxes, and were beginning to realize how much they could scrape from India instead.
More likely, gun owners will fight on the side of falangist state plutocracy, and will resist mass movements toward restored or improved democracy, which they will construe as takings and violations of their "rights." (Gun ownership rights are not recognized internationally as human rights. Meanwhile, there are internationally recognized human rights, such as rights to decent employment, which are not recognized as human rights by the USA, and not implemented very well in many countries that have signed agreements recognizing them.)
This is not merely because gun advocates tend to be on the right or far right politically (and would therefore tend to align with other far right types, such as the Koch brothers, who might also be prepared to manipulate them further through propaganda). It is because the very notion of ultimate-protection-by-gun-ownership is a hyper-individualist fantasy which does not recognize society, how society acts in a crisis, or how it would react to an unfolding ultimate-protection-gun-fantasy. Ultimate-protection-by-guns is fundamentally opposed to democracy, and indeed desires to hold democracy prostrate to prevent such things as reasonable gun regulation.
If you run out of food and funds to buy food, the correct things to do are social in nature, not anti-social.
1) Seek employment
2) Sell unneeded possessions for cash to buy food
3) Seek help from family and friends
4) Seek help from government, church, or other organizations
If you can see a crisis coming, you can also prepare through mass organization and local planting. If you haven't prepared, people can forage and eat things like insects and trees in a true emergency and there is no food to be readily had. You are much better off being part of some social group than being alone under circumstances like these. Some people will know what's best to eat, others will know how to stay warm. Safety in numbers.
There is no likely useful option involving the use of guns to take stuff. If there is any such success, it isn't likely to last long.
Our ultimate protection is, and can only be, society itself. If society is broken, as it always is in one way or another, it needs fixing, not submerging under any form of individualism. Such submersion is in fact impossible. To be anti-social is to be part of society, even if an unwelcoming or unwelcome part. Thus, the irony of things like Randian cults, of people selflessly sacrificing their time to promote selfishness.
Now forgetting the "ultimate-protection" type fantasy arguments gun advocates make, guns may be useful for limited protection under some circumstances, that is, protection from actual criminals (and not society or the government). But even that is far more limited that advocates claim.
Gun advocates claim guns are often used in self-defense. But the truth is that guns are used far more in escalating arguments and intra-family intimidation, which are not individually or socially productive uses.
As I had previously posted, studies show higher death rates resulting from gun ownership than non-ownership. I personally feel far safer NOT owning a gun. What if someone invades my home? First, I would much rather lose possessions than my life. Rather than entering a standoff with a likely far more experienced shooter than I am, I hide as well as I possibly can. After they are gone, or as soon as I can, I call the police, and then my insurance company.
What about revolution? Successful revolution, even the now ancient US Revolutionary War involved organization on a vast scale, impressive leaders like George Washington, intelligent thinkers like Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson, a broad spectrum of wealthy elites, and massive social participation. It wasn't just a few cranks with guns. Even with all that, the USA would likely not have won without getting backing from the French (who had their own reasons to dislike the British) Army. The British were far away and were already beginning to think that the American colony wasn't profitable to them anyway, hence the escalating taxes, and were beginning to realize how much they could scrape from India instead.
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