The Ultimate, Practical Reason Why You Should Never Relinquish Your Right to Self-Protection2/26/2018  In defense of your God-given right to self-protection, I feel something very important must be said. In this article, I am making a case for why you should NEVER relinquish your right to self-protection – and it is a fully practical argument without invoking any higher or deeper theology, philosophy or principles (though there are an abundant of arguments to be made from those perspectives too). I am not even going to invoke your rights being unalienable (though they are). This argument is fully practical and based solely on one, simple fact. Here we go!
In this past week or so, you have no doubt seen the utter barrage of attacks, arguments, and talking points spewed by the media and even by your long-lost college friend about gun control. “It’s time to do something!” What do they mean by something? Chip a little further away at your right to self-protection. It's been all over your social media and there has only been one way to escape it: turn off all electronic devices. That's not a bad idea, but before you do, please finish this article. Among the many “solutions” being proposed by those who do not believe you have a right to protect yourself is a common theme – let the government help you. Give the government more power to stop and prevent mass murder like we saw at Parkland, FL. “Pass laws” is essentially one of the favorite solutions. “More Federal and State Laws!” They clamor. Even if you and I assume that all of these calls for more government “help” are coming from a place of good intentions, it doesn’t matter. Because there is one, tiny problem with these proposed “solutions” – the ultimate, practical reason why you should never, ever give up your right to self-protection: THE GOVERNMENT CANNOT PROTECT YOU! The police cannot protect you. The military cannot protect you - not in your daily lives. Unless the police or military follow you everywhere you go and guard your home and business while you sleep, they cannot stop anyone from murdering you. Even if we turn our public schools into prisons with maximum security, inmates in those prisons still manage to get drugs, create shanks, and still murder other inmates in those facilities. Even if they have to use their bare hands. The only person who can ultimately stop you from being murdered is you. The cold, harsh truth of reality is that you must take responsibility for your own self protection. Period. Unless you can afford a private security detail to follow you everywhere, and protect your home 24/7, you are in charge of keeping you and your loved ones safe. The time has come to face this reality and to start doing something about it. You are the first responders. Professionals arrive on scene AFTER there is a scene to arrive upon. You must do what you can to make your circle of influence a little safer. Whether that means you carry a gun or you simply take a CPR class, it is up to you to decide how prepared and trained you want to be to combat and prevent violence. Another harsh reality is that you cannot stop or prepare for every threat. This is another practical reason why you should cede your right to self-protection to the government. There are too many potential threats. No one person or government can possibly prevent all threats from being enacted. For example: If a Navy SEAL team decided to raid my home with the sole purpose of executing me, I’m dead. I could be standing in the doorway with an automatic rifle ready for them and I’d still be dead. There are threats you cannot prevent or overcome – this is reality. The nature of life is that it is dangerous, it is fraught with risk. The best way to mitigate your risk is to take personal responsibility for your own self-protection. The government cannot save you. Think about it; what LAWS could the government pass that would stop CRIMINALS (i.e.: people who don’t follow laws) that would PREVENT said criminal from murdering you? Zero. Nada. Zilch. The laws exist so we can punish a perpetrator if we catch them. They cannot PREVENT you from being murdered by someone who is committed to murdering you. People prevent crimes. Free-will agents with the ability to fight stop violence already in progress – aka individuals. Laws do not prevent or stop anything by virtue of their existence. Especially mass murder. Someone who is bent on doing such a thing has likely already broken numerous laws leading up to the murders and murder itself is already illegal. That fact won’t save you. The government passing more laws won’t save you. This is why you should never relinquish your right to self-protection and should fight tooth and nail to preserve this right. Because the more personal responsibility you relinquish to the government, the more unsafe you become. This has nothing to do with rights, this has everything to do with what is the most practical step you can take to ensure you are safer and to minimize your risk to deadly threats. Taking personal ownership of your safety is the best way. Giving the government that ownership is not. Let me be clear, I do not like this reality anymore than you do. I wish it wasn't this way, I really do. But reality is what it is. If we deny it, we will get more people killed. Turning over personal responsibility and trusting government laws to keep you safe does not make you safer. You must take control of what you can control, yourself. And you must face the reality that you cannot defeat, prepare for, or prevent all threats. There are too many of them. You must do what you can. Don’t let what you can’t do stop you from doing what you can do. Persist and stand your ground. Do not third-party out any more of your personal responsibility to government - not in the realm of self-protection. Protect yourself, your loved ones, and your community. Do your best. No matter who you are, you have a part to play in your own self-protection and the protection of those around you. Always remember, the government cannot save you. They cannot protect you. You must do that yourself. Start taking ownership now!
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 “Don’t you care about the dead kids?!” If you have been following the recent mass murder in Florida, and are someone who publicly engages in debates or discussions in which you voice your belief that God has given all mankind the fundamental right to self-protection (which our Founding Fathers supported by writing the Second Amendment of the US Constitution), you have probably had this phrase lobbed at you like a grenade from members of the regressive left, “Don’t you care about saving children?” You calmly, and rationally explain to them, “Yes, in fact, I do care about saving children’s lives but I do not believe that passing more gun control legislation will prevent these horrific atrocities.” Odds are, at this point, some of the regressive left have gone full rage mode on you and called you names such as “Monster!” or “Murderer!” They also may stomp their feet and assert that you actually do want children to be murdered in the school (even though you just explained to them that isn’t the case). In short, they take the moral high ground. Their argument basically boils down to this:
Does this sound familiar? To illustrate this, I want to share a few screenshots I took from an online debate I was having with an acquaintance. It will illustrate quite nicely what I am referring to – NOTE: I have blurred out any identifying information because I do not want to dox this person. I am simply sharing to highlight my point that this type of rhetoric exists.  Here comes the moral high ground...  I’m sure you can spot many flaws in this person’s argumentation however, for the purpose of this article, I want to focus on just one point. This is how to never let them get away with taking the moral high ground ever again – I’m about to give you the argumentative tool to sink their ship forever – here we go! Let’s lay this all out:
This person claims they have compassion for all the dead victims of these listed massacres. In fact, they claim to have the moral high ground - i.e.: "Where is MY compassion?" Bottom line, they empathetically care, you do not. When faced with this, the solution is very simple: inform them that it is in fact their position which is morally evil. How so? Depriving someone of their ability and right to self-protection is evil. Such a position communicates that those people’s lives expendable. It is condescending and degrading to their autonomy as a free human being. The gun-control leftist has decided to make the decision that works best for someone else's ability to protect themselves. You must stop allowing a gun-control lefties to pretend that their positions are virtuous and moral. They are not. Show them the emperor has no clothes. How do you do this? When having discussions or arguments, do not allow their claims of moral superiority to go unchallenged. STOP CEDING THE MORAL HIGH GROUND TO REGRESSIVE, GUN-CONTROL LEFTISTS WHO MAKE THESE ARGUMENTS! Do not simply explain to them with facts why they are wrong, they don't care. They only care about their own feelings. I am encouraging you to tell them, straight up, in a polite, civil, but firm tone, that their position is morally evil and that if they support their position in full knowledge of the consequences it would cause, they are reprehensible human beings. As you saw in the photo, this person admits that teenage women, 18-20, who live alone, should not have the ability to own an AR-15 rifle for self-protection. That is evil and authoritarian. Do not allow these regressive leftists, liberals, post-modernists, insert-label-here-disciples to get away with making this argument. Appropriately and civilly accuse them of espousing a morally evil position. When they lob the grenade of “Don’t you care about dead kids?” at you, tell them that you love those dead children in Florida enough to put aside your own feelings, and rationally evaluate reality and how to actually make things better. Tell them you love those dead kids enough to not make silly emotional appeals that won’t help anyone. Tell them you love the dead kids enough to avoid making appeals to emotion because the issue isn't about you, it's about saving more children. Tell them you are not morally reprehensible enough to make this about your feelings because real children are dying. Here is a great way to separate true gun-control leftie ideologues from people who are genuinely just ignorant and only know what CNN has told htem. Say this to them point blank, “I believe you want to save children just like I do, because we are both caring people. In light of this, can you love those dead kids enough to put aside your emotions and feelings so we can analyze reality objectively and create some real solutions together?” If they say “No!” to this, they are not actually looking for solutions. They are a gun-control ideologue. People who say “No” to this are on a personal quest of virtue signaling and moral grandstanding and could not care less about those dead kids. If they say “No” to your question, I would tell them straight up: “Wow, I can’t believe you said ‘no’ to that. So you admit you are not actually interested in finding solutions? You admit that you do not care about those dead kids enough to put aside your own feelings? I don’t think you care about those dead kids at all, I think you just care about your own feelings and opinions and the attention you receive for them - and that is utterly detestable and wicked." Say this to them with civility but without remorse. The left and regressive post-modernists call people on the right, conservatives, and anything that doesn’t fit into their worldview, evil, all the time. They constantly take the moral high ground. No more. Take back the moral high ground because YOU HAVE THE HIGH GROUND! They do not. Your position is the one of virtue, theirs is the one of evil. They are standing in a quicksand while you stand atop a mountain, yet they are bragging about how much higher up they are than you. It isn’t evil for you to say, “Not to be mean brother, but do you know that you are sinking in quicksand?” Pointing out reality is not evil. You can point out reality in a mean way but I wish for you to avoid this as much as possible. Be civil and courteous but be ruthlessly firm and never waver from speaking the truth simply because someone said, “You don’t care about dead kids.” The real truth is, all the information to debunk these tired gun control arguments exist. They have been expounded upon ad nauseam. They are readily available online. If these regressive lefties were genuinely seeking the truth, they could easily find it. Most are not on a truth quest however, they are on a happiness quest. Consequences be damned. Make no mistake, the positions espoused in the screenshots seem to be coming from a place of love and compassion, but it is false love and compassion. As I expound upon in my book, Anatomy of a Warrior: The 7 Virtues All Warriors Must Live by to Successfully Protect and Serve, true love comes from a place of selfless care and empathy for another human being paired with rationality so that you can deal with reality. True love protects someone from evil. How can you protect someone from evil if you are not aware of reality? How can you love someone appropriately and within proper boundaries if you throw away rationality? “I love you with my feelings only” is not love; this is an immature expression of what someone thinks is love. True love requires order and structure – feelings or “empathy” alone, is not enough. You must have empathy paired with logic. You must love the other person enough to face reality, regardless of how scared, sad, terrified, or uncomfortable it makes you. Why? Because unless you are aware of reality and have the courage to face it, and love people enough to face it, how are you going to be able to help them solve their problems or combat threats? You can’t. Virtue signaling regressive leftists do not love with this love – tell them that. Many of them are not aware of this. They think they are loving and compassionate but they are not. They have been fed a false view of love and think what they are doing and espousing is loving – it isn’t. When you point out their positions are evil and they may be evil too, you are loving them enough to speak the truth. Hardly anyone else will. I am calling on you to love them enough to tell them the truth. You just might plant a seed that eventually blooms into a beautiful flower of self-awareness and reformation. If you are utterly tired of regressive leftists moral grandstanding, virtue signaling and unearned moral superiority, please share this article on your social media and send it to friends and family. Live with virtue my fellow warrior! ~Alex Lanshe Alex Lanshe is a 22 year practitioner of martial arts and sciences, has trained thousands of civilians across the country in self-defense and is the author of 3 books, including his recently released, groundbreaking book on warrior virtue - Anatomy of a Warrior: The 7 Virtues All Warriors Must Live by to Successfully Protect and Serve. The information in this book was acquired by interviewing 120 professional protectors and warriors over a 2 and ½ year period from the military, police, first responders, government agencies and the private sector. Interviewees include: Lt. Col. Dave Grossman (wrote the Foreword), Gavin de Becker (wrote the Afterword), Massad Ayoob, Carrie Lightfoot, Ron McCarthy, Chuck Taylor, Dave “Buck Savage” Smith, Patrick Van Horne, Julie Golob, Rory Miller, and more! The book can be found on Amazon by clicking here. Visit https://www.alexlanshe.com/anatomy-of-a-warrior.html if you’d like to find out how you can help Alex support injured veterans and get your name listed in the acknowledgements of his upcoming book diving deeper into the virtues and traits of a warrior! |
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