FBI raids Mar-a-Lago
(www.zerohedge.com)
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It's similar to how gun ownership deters burglary. It's not necessary that every house has a gun in it. It's that potential burglars know that any given house could, and they don't know which ones do.
This is how robust adherence to 2A serves as a preventative to tyranny. It's not that Bob who's mad at his water bill can take on the entire government and win with what he's got stashed in the garage. It's that a potentially tyrannous government doesn't know what sort of force can be brought to bear against it if it oversteps.
I think this Mar-a-lago nonsense is a clumsy attempt to gauge this. They went straight for the King, but he wasn't even there. What did they get? They got no response, which gives them no information, and they got an empty, if pretty, house. It's going to make a lot of people super mad though, myself included. I view this as some asshole tracking muddy boots on my nice carpet. It's going to get accounted for.
I understand how a well-armed populace could theoretically deter property crimes.
But it really doesn't do much to deter a tyrannical government that doesn't care about the lives of their brownshirts.
And again, what's Step 2 after the standoff for the common man?
No one ever talks about that part.
Well most of the point is that it doesn't get to the point of standoff, unless the party trespassed upon can be sufficiently "othered," like the Waco or Ruby Ridge folks, and they tried to do with the Bundy family in Oregon but didn't quite get there.
Step 2 depends, and that "common man," if he think he's a likely target for the regime, better start considering what sort of communal backing he's got. If the ATF shows up, can he call his sheriff and will that sheriff have his back? If the DoA says his runoff is unacceptable and his business is closed, does he have local authorities to challenge that decision?
That's not a new kind of fight. We've been in this fight forever. For the most part, the centralized authority has been winning. But we do appear to be hitting an inflection point which could turn the tide. I can't imagine it doesn't. I could be wrong, and we're all fucked if I am, but I think we've hit just about the amount of ridiculousness from our centralized authorities that we can bear.
The brownshirts don't want to get shot, and if they have to wonder whether they will be, they won't go as far for a tyrannical government. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn talks about this in The Gulag Archipelago, how things might have been different if the enforcers had been afraid they wouldn't come home.
And any government is going to think twice about doing something that might cause a shootout, if only for the optics.
You can't take down an army by yourself and guns can't do much against tanks etc but the point is not to make it easy for them. When it's easy for them they get a lot worse.
Deterrence is important.
I'm familiar with the Gulag quote. He was talking about axes in tight spaces though.
I respect everyone's opinions and replies, but I find all of the reasoning quite circular. Themes of deterence that are mostly speculative and untested.
I'm not arguing against gun ownership.
I just don't see how being armed prevents the State from coming after the individual common man other than making the individual cases a lot more tense and bloodier, all with the same outcome (the target being imprisoned or dead).
I'm not suggesting that I have any better ideas.
Just that I find the whole "fuck around and find out" type responses online to mostly be performative and not fleshed out.
If enough people make them resort to bloodshed instead of going quietly, oppressing the people becomes increasingly expensive and logistically difficult. Their tyranny thrives on acquiescence.
Guns (probably) aren't going to stop them if they're intent on destroying you but if they have an agenda other than bloodshed for its own sake, making the path of tyranny as costly as possible can make all the difference. Enough people banding together could deter them entirely, or at least force them to regroup.
The true effectiveness of civilian deterrence against a modern government might not be known but logistics, expenses and optics make a difference in any conflict.
I can't say how committed the "fuck around and find out" types are but I know it's always better to have guns and the will to use them than to have neither
Also ask yourself this, if guns are no threat to them why are they trying so hard to take them from you?