[playa_playa]

I can't believe what I'm hearing. All guns should be illegal? All guns but hunting rifles should be illegal? Civilian-aimed replicas of military-issue rifles should be illegal? What's next? People shouldn't have baseball bats in their homes because it injures far too many people?

Listen, guns are NECESSARY in some cases; especially handguns. Do you want to tell a single mom who commutes through a gang-ridden downtown street to do so without protecting herself with a firearm? Do you want to tell your sister, who has to take a subway train to that medical school because she's trying to save as much as she can, that although subway trains and the city she resides in is inundated with criminals, child molesters and rapists that she shouldn't protect herself with a handgun because "guns kill people?"

We cannot un-invent guns (and even if we could, I wouldn't want to). Criminals are going to have guns for the sake of their tasks. And since some of us aren't so proficient in the deadly art of disarming hardened criminals and kicking their asses with a flying double roundhouse, some of us are going to need guns to defend ourselves. A gun is an equalizer, of all the bad rep it receives.

As for the assault weapons issue, think of it like this: as cheap as some assault rifles and submachine guns are, many criminals are going to have them. One could make an argument that a homeowner living in a gang-infested area would need protection afforded by a gun with a superior firepower. And you know what, with all the procedures in place (background checks, necessary paperwork, the taxes), the only argument that could be made against assault weapons is that the owner of one could go berserk and go on a shooting rampage. Yes, it's possible. But it's not very plausible and does not hold water when weighed against the fact that such said protection is sorely needed in some parts of the country.