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Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey
- September 04, 2019
Ep 158 | Freedom & Harm
Episode Stats
Length
29 minutes
Words per Minute
189.89227
Word Count
5,611
Sentence Count
2
Summary
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Transcript
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Whisper
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).
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hey guys welcome to relatable thank you for being here i hope everyone has had a wonderful week a
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good long and restful labor day weekend unfortunately something very tragic happened
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this weekend in west texas another mass shooting today that's what we're going to talk about we're
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going to talk about mass shootings we're going to talk about gun control we will touch on red flag
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laws and the solutions that have been promote uh proposed and the differences between the right and
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the left on this particular issue this is something a lot of you have asked me to talk about we did
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many evergreen topics over the summer the second amendment is not one that we got to i'd like to
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do a more in-depth episode on really what the second amendment is the history of court cases surrounding
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the second amendment and why conservatives support it that's not what today's episode is but i do hope
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to offer a little bit of clarity to you on this particular subject first okay so like i said over
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the weekend another tragic shooting happened in midland texas this time it wasn't in a store or
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at a concert or in a building that's something that we're used to this time it was a person identified
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as a white male in his mid-30s in his car shooting at people in other cars he was pulled over on saturday
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afternoon for not using his turn signals this was a totally routine traffic stop but he then started
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shooting at the officers and then he drove off and started shooting at other drivers and passengers
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he hijacked a postal truck and drove to odessa about 20 miles away shooting and killing people
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on route he killed seven people and injured over 20 people among the seriously injured was a 17 month
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old baby girl her mother apparently was not injured there was a story of someone coming out of a
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restaurant and seeing the mother and her child covered in blood in the back seat in a car seat
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and her mother was just hysterical of course exactly how i would be as well i can't imagine the terror
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and the helplessness that she felt in that moment and the heartache and the fear and the anxiety that
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she's probably experiencing now reportedly this young girl is in stable condition which is great
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but i'm sure this mom and her dad are probably dealing with a lot right now and so while i'm praying
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for all of the victims and their families uh this particular story since i am a new mom of a baby
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girl just really gets me in my core into my heart just because i can feel and empathize how scary that
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must be and i'm i'm just thinking about them a lot and have been over the past few days uh so law
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enforcement cornered this guy in the parking lot of the movie theater they shot and killed him thankfully i am
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so thankful so thankful for our police officers proving yet again that the only way to stop a bad
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guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun bad guys are always going to find a way to harm and to kill
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and even to illegally buy guns so the need for well-armed good responsible citizens will always be
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necessary for our safety and we'll get into more of that in just a little bit so a little bit more on
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this guy i'm not going to name him because one of the motivations they have found and researchers
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have found in these mass shootings is publicity is fame is notoriety i'm not going to give him that
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satisfaction i'm also not going to be a part of any kind of complicit encouragement or indirect
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encouragement of people who are maybe considering doing something like this because they want some
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kind of recognition i'm not going to give them that thing that they crave the question always is
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were there any signs leading up to this should we have known that this guy was a threat did he have
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a criminal record what was the context of the shooting what's his online history and of course
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the big question that law enforcement is looking at and that we wonder too what is the motive what we
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know is that he was fired from his trucking job just hours before this so that could explain a little
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bit of it maybe he was angry but of course a lot of people get fired from their jobs and they don't
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go on some kind of killing rampage so clearly there's something else going on here he actually called the
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fbi tip line just before this happened after he was fired apparently he got into a verbal altercation
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with his boss they both uh called 911 this guy called the fbi tip line but apparently according to the
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fbi he was just rambling he wasn't actually threatening to do anything and so no action by them was taken
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public records show that he was arrested way back in 2001 for two misdemeanors one was trespassing
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the other was evading arrest that was 18 years ago the guy was 36 and so he was 18 when he was arrested
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for those misdemeanors most people wouldn't say that a misdemeanor alone when you're a teenager
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necessarily means that you pose a risk to society he doesn't have much of an online footprint from what
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we know that's a little bit rare a lot of times when we see these mass shootings there was some
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kind of sign online but his neighbor did tell officers that he threatened her with a gun for
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leaving her trash in a dumpster close by she also reportedly said that he would shoot at animals in
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his yard from a structure on top of his house every night which is extremely disturbing especially
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to people who love animals i mean i guess it's disturbing to everyone we don't know maybe they could
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have been rats or raccoons or something like that but they also could have been cats and dogs
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we do know that animal abuse especially in a grown man and especially of domesticated animals is
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typically some kind of indication of other kinds of violent behavior not every time but many times
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the fbi also believed that there had been a lot leading up to this as there almost always is these
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things just don't happen in a vacuum there is always something that precipitated it or something that
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had been going on along behind the scenes for a long time this is according to usa today
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fbi special agent christopher combe said the shooter's home was a very strange residence that
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reflected his mental state he was on a long spiral of going down combe said after a search of the
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property west of odessa he didn't wake up saturday morning and go into his company and then it happened
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he went to that company in trouble and had probably been in trouble for a while but that's really all we
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know at this point we know that he used a rifle texas governor greg abbott tweeted that the shooter had
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failed his background check to get a gun but he didn't say how or why it's probably not because
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of the misdemeanors because in texas only felonies or domestic violence misdemeanors stop you from
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being able to purchase a gun the texas tribute says this in texas licensed licensed dealers must conduct
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background checks through the national instant criminal background check system or in ics however
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there are exceptions to this rule such as if the buyer already has a texas license to carry a handgun
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private sales between individuals also do not require a criminal background check which includes
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some gun sales at gun shows this is exactly why advocates for gun control believe that there needs
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to be a universal background check which supporters say would close the so-called gun show loophole and
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make private transfers pretty much impossible every firearm purchase would have to be registered
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with the nics some have also suggested red flag laws you've probably heard a lot about this in the
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news recently which allows family members or police to ask a state court to temporarily remove guns from
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someone they believe is a violent threat based on something they've said or done better work and other
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democratic candidates for press for the presidency propose gun buyback programs where the government
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would literally confiscate certain kinds of guns what they consider assault style guns or military style guns
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the pushback on all of this from gun rights advocates is that each of these suggestions limits the freedoms of
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responsible citizens that's the big argument that that we've been having universal background checks would
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essentially require a registry of all guns which many believe is an invasion of privacy privacy and an over
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encroachment of the government the check also adds a cost to the purchase of buying a gun which could make it more
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difficult for poor people to purchase a gun legally that's a problem the red flag laws they sound really good in
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theory i think that they sound good on the surface but there is a risk of manipulating them there's a risk of
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politicization for example someone disagrees with you politically or maybe it's theologically or whatever and they
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petitioned the court to remove your weapons the court may share this person's political inclinations
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and agree to take your weapons away for that reason there's just no way of guaranteeing that there would
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be a fair objective standard for these laws and president trump actually interestingly demonstrated this
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problem when he tweeted about chris cuomo getting angry at someone in public for calling him freedom
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he said that maybe cuomo poses a threat under red flag laws and should have his guns taken away because he's an
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angry guy well obviously president trump was being sarcastic he was being facetious uh but that is
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exactly what we should be afraid of with these kinds of laws using red flag laws as either a personal
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or political or professional whatever it is weapon against someone uh red flag laws would just be very
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difficult to enforce there was actually a story last week out of portland about a marine who said online
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that he would quote slaughter antifa you know antifa the violent thugs uh if he were attacked so he's
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talking about acting in self-defense and all of his guns under these red flag laws in uh in oregon were
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removed from him that is crazy i don't see how that's not unconstitutional and while i do think that we need
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to do a better job of that a better job of tracking people who potentially pose a threat that's just very
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difficult i mean think about it there are a lot of just weird erratic people in the world who are
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into some really freaky stuff who don't necessarily though pose a threat of violence and they have a
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right to be weird they have a right to be into freaky stuff we don't have to agree with it but that
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doesn't necessarily mean that they don't have a right to own a gun people have suggested gun buyback
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programs where the police buy your guns it is mandatory of course we know that bad guys won't turn in
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their guns and this costs money it's a terrible idea here is better work talking about that we're
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going to speak as defiantly and as strongly as we can but we're also going to take action universal
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background checks red flag laws and into the sales of weapons of war and buying those ak-47s and ar-15s
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back so there have been supposed solutions put forth but really the conversation after something like
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this happens is predictable before the bodies are even cold liberals are saying that it is a gun
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problem that it's even a white male problems conservatives are arguing that it's not a gun
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problem guns don't shoot people and let me just give credence to both arguments on the one hand
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conservatives are right guns don't shoot people a gun has never committed a crime a gun is neither good
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nor bad it is an inanimate object that can be used in self-defense it can be used for sport for hunting
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or for evil it depends on who is behind the gun a bad person behind a gun means that bad things are
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probably going to happen and if a responsible gun owner is behind the gun they probably won't bad
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people will find a way to do what they want no matter what the gun laws are no matter what their
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weapon of choice is so there's no use in passing laws conservatives say that would violate the rights of
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responsible gun owners who do make up the majority of gun ownership to which however the left says
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sure a gun doesn't fire on its own but we already have laws that make assault and murder illegal and
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these people are still assaulting and murdering people there has to be a law or a series of laws
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regulating the weapon of choice for these mass shooters they would say yes a bad person may use a
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knife or a truck or a shovel but in this country they typically don't and these kinds of
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weapons are apparently capable of killing a lot more people a lot faster than other kinds of
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weapons so why don't we try to limit the casualties as much as possible as much as we can by getting
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rid of these guns that's what people on the left would say or gun control advocates would say and i
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get that i understand how that makes sense i really do and these what i just did is a really good faith
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rendering of both arguments both sides really have a lot of dishonesty uh but taking the most honest of
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both sides the best of both sides what we're talking about essentially is how to balance our
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personal liberty our constitutional right to bear arms with public safety the nature of personal
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liberty is that there will always be risk same thing with free speech for example free speech means
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there is a risk of you being offended there is a risk of hearing me say something that you don't like
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the question is how much risk are we willing to bear and is it possible to mitigate the risk of harm
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without severely hampering individual liberty that's the real question that we're asking that's the
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real debate that we're having if we can get past all of the punditry punditry and all of the
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politicization of this that is the question that we are trying to answer so the problem is and here's
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where i reveal my issue with the leftist position on this in particular is that the left especially today
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just has a very low value on individual liberty whereas the right cares about both harm and liberty
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the left really only cares about harm especially in this case and they believe that taking guns away
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and making it harder to get guns is the answer to preventing harm while the question is is this true
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because i think all of us would like to prevent mass shootings all of us would like fewer casualties
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but does taking guns away really prevent shootings there is a meme that you've probably seen that goes
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around every time a mass shooting happens with a list of flags it's you know the flag emojis and a
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number next to it and all next to all of the flags is the number zero and then there's the american
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flag at the very bottom and the number next to it i think is like 250 accounting for how many mass
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shootings have occurred this year celebrities share it everyone shares it it's been shared millions of
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times and people share it without giving any kind of source without citing hey this is where i got these
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numbers from uh they just say nope this is a fax because someone tweeted it out but we should
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probably ask some questions before we just take this at face value like this person who created this
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meme what is the definition of mass technically it is four or more people shot at the same time
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but we don't we don't know if that's this person's definition of mass shooting say that it is we don't have a
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citation for it so we don't know if it's really true that four or more people haven't been shot at the same
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time in any of these other countries that are listed especially considering that the homicide
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rates for some of the countries on this list are much higher than the united states in brazil for
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example they have extremely strict gun laws and yet their murder rate is one of the highest murder
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rates in the world that goes for most of central and south america and mexico by the way there is a
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non-partisan study that i've cited before by lot and moody i have it in the highlights on my instagram
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uh that you can you can go look at it there you can just swipe up and see the whole study for
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yourself so you know that i'm not making this up they found that there is no correlation no
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correlation at all between the number of guns in a country and the number of homicides a lot of people
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say that if you look at other countries shootings go down after strict gun laws go into place but if you
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look at the charts that these people are citing uh before and after those gun laws are actually put
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into place what you'll see is that the number of shootings was already on the decline before the
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laws were even passed getting rid of guns is only going to make people like you and me unsafe we are
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not safer as a society if i for example don't have a gun by taking away my guns from me and my family
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are making it harder for me to get a gun you do absolutely nothing to contribute to the safety of
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this country you've done nothing all you've done is violate my freedoms and make me more vulnerable
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because guess what if a 200 pound guy or less than that about even if a 150 pound guy approaches me and
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my child on the street and tries to assault me i'm powerless it doesn't matter how quick i am with my
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mace it doesn't matter how good i am with my knife um not that i carry a knife but if i did it doesn't
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matter how many self-defense classes i've taken i probably won't be able to fight him off maybe if
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i'm lucky maybe if i'm really lucky and he happens to be really slow but my trump card is going to be
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my gun if i and if you gun owner know how to handle it well and this is the same for almost every woman
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and a lot of men and of course it's not just criminals uh the second amendment protects us
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against it's the government it's tyranny the taking away of our freedoms you've probably heard the second
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amendment protects the first amendment and that's true this is precisely why the second amendment
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exists the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed for some for some reason for some reason
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some people like to pretend like that part doesn't exist that it's just a well-regulated militia
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no the founders did not want a nation in which only the government and law enforcement are armed
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that makes you powerless to the whims of a tyrant and that is exactly what they sought to avoid
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you don't have to like guns or own a gun to respect the rights of people to defend themselves how they
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see fit i don't judge you if you don't own a gun or if guns scare you that's totally fine i want you to
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be able to protect yourself with pepper spray if you want to i want you to be able to protect your
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family uh by i don't know taekwondo if you want i also want you to be able to own a gun if you want to
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i want you to be able to take your protection into your own hands i want you to have the ability
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to defend yourself and to help those around you should the opportunity arise there is this utter
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misconception among a lot of people on the left especially the coastal elites especially those who
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live in big cities who just don't seem to understand this that people who own guns or people who believe
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and the right to bear arms aren't gun nuts maybe you are and that's totally fine if you love guns and
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you love going out and shooting guns and you're obsessed with going to gun shows that's totally
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fine but the vast majority i would say of gun owners aren't like that like i really don't care
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about guns i'm not obsessed with guns i'm not in gun culture again that's cool if you are but i'm not
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like that all i care about is protecting myself all i care about is the right to protect my family
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that's that's all i care about and i want you to have the right to do that as well you don't have
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to but i want you to have that right what we care about way more than guns it's freedom uh they think
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that we are i don't know excited about the opportunity to use our gun on someone and what
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they must not realize is that all responsible gun owners pray pray that we will never have to use our
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gun on a person no one wants to be in that situation i think they think that we are like
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warped in our minds and that we love violence no not at all we hope that violence is completely
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eradicated of course those of us who are christians know that that's not going to happen until jesus
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comes back but that's not our desire at all we're not more violent people we just want to be able to
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protect ourselves and protect our families but the question is the question is misconceptions aside
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is what do we do about this because both the right and the left again if we take the best of both
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sides want to do something about this we don't want casualties we don't want this to happen again
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we don't want ourselves we don't we don't want to be put in this situation we don't want those that we
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know to be put in this situation we don't want to see another one of these stories and we don't want
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to have this twitter dialogue where it's so exhausting where both sides are so dishonest and
00:20:01.420
it's it's it's it's the worst it's the worst of the american soul the conversations that we have
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after these tragic shootings it is the worst part of us that seems to come to the forefront
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and i would say that most of us don't want that anymore most of us would love to never have this
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conversation again and so what do we do again we are trying to find the balance between liberty
00:20:29.680
and preventing harm last year congress passed the fix ncis bill and since then over six million
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records have actually been added to the federal databases this is from conservative review.com
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the fix nics act was passed in march 2018 and aimed to increase compliance with federal background
00:20:48.500
check laws by providing additional reporting resources imposing penalties on federal agencies that
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fail to comply and promoting state level compliance through incentives and public reporting of
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those who don't comply the doj numbers also indicate that the department has now received
00:21:04.040
implementation plans from all 50 states the district of columbia and 71 federal agencies the plans are
00:21:10.120
meant to evaluate and approve current nics reporting practices so as far as i'm concerned that's a good
00:21:15.720
thing we don't want people falling through the cracks that's a big problem that we have is not that we
00:21:20.000
don't have that ground checks because we do but people fall through the cracks that is a problem and i hope
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this uh that this act continues to be implemented and work well is there more that we could do maybe
00:21:32.780
and i know this might be unsatisfying to you but i don't have the perfect answer for this i want one
00:21:37.760
i want congress to work on this i want the left and the right to come together i want democrats and
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republicans to come together and have a conversation about this but i also want to get rid of the talking
00:21:47.860
points that say neither side really cares because i believe that both sides do and i also think it's a myth
00:21:53.240
perpetuated by some people on the left to say that uh the politicians that support the second
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amendment are just beholden to the nra they just want nra money no the nra supports them because they
00:22:05.400
ideologically support the second amendment because they've probably always supported the second amendment
00:22:10.240
maybe not every single politician that they support but um politicians conservative politicians
00:22:16.160
are ideologically inclined to support the second amendment so that's not why we're not having
00:22:21.540
a serious conversation about this at least that's not the main reason why we're not having a
00:22:26.820
conversation about this it's just a back and forth of scoring political points when really i would
00:22:32.400
really like to see these things come to an end i simply don't believe that any of the so-called
00:22:38.460
solutions that democrats have put forth will do anything i mean they put forth these solutions in a very
00:22:46.100
emotional state and they don't correspond the legislation that they put forth doesn't actually
00:22:51.800
correspond with the crime committed so often the legislation that they put forward wouldn't have
00:22:57.240
stopped the particular shooter that they are reacting to which just goes to show again it's about
00:23:02.420
political points it's not actually about fixing the problem and so i'm ready to hear more solutions from
00:23:10.140
our congress people i am ready to hear how we can make these tragedies stop or at least stop them from
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happening as often without limiting the freedom of people like you and me responsible gun owners who hope to
00:23:24.640
never ever have to use our guns uh on a person in self-defense i i hope that that never happens but
00:23:32.140
nevertheless who want to protect our families um what we know also as christians what we know as
00:23:40.940
christians is that no legislation will fix this no bill will fix this no pundit will fix this no
00:23:47.640
politician will fix this that sin is the problem and sin is going to persist and yes i i will say that
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mass shootings look different in america than they look in other countries homicide rates are higher in
00:24:01.160
other countries but this kind of crime is unique to us it's not completely exclusive to us but it is
00:24:08.320
unique to us but what we know as christians is that no matter what kind of crime is prevalent in our
00:24:13.320
country no matter what the problem is the solution remains the same like if our essential and ultimate
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problem is that we are dead in our trespasses if our essential problem is that we are broken in the
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core of our being that we are totally depraved then the ultimate solution can only be the only one who
00:24:36.120
can save us from those things the only one who can make us alive who can make us a new creation
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whose kindness can lead us to repentance who can make us love god's law and walk in his ways and that is
00:24:45.880
jesus which means a few things that means that our sole responsibility our ultimate responsibility
00:24:52.900
responsibility as christians is to share the gospel if that's what changes hearts and minds and we
00:24:58.680
believe that this is a heart problem then that's our sole responsibility we can't say you know this is
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a heart problem this is a problem in people's souls and not give people the solution we can't just be
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people who talk about problems we also have to share the solution which is jesus it's really easy to score
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political points on twitter and say this isn't a gun problem this is a heart problem okay well who fixes the
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heart who changes the heart who makes the heart of stone a heart of flesh who makes us a new creation
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who saves us who reconciles us a wicked people to a holy god changing us completely and eternally
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it's jesus so we can't just be people that state the problem we also have to know the solution and
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because we know the solution that means something else that we don't live in fear so much easier said
00:25:43.540
than done anyone who is in my family knows what an anxious person i am how paranoid i can be how i'm
00:25:49.400
always thinking about the worst case scenario and how worried and fearful i can be and yet jesus tells
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us over and over again in his word do not fear do not let your heart be troubled do not be anxious do
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not worry your heavenly father knows what you need that is much easier said than done but i have to
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believe that the god of the universe who existed before time began who is suspended in the eternal
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now who was ever on his throne who is the same yesterday today and forever knew exactly what
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we would be up against in 2019 and i don't believe that it was arbitrary that you and i were placed
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on the time in history on the specific point in eternity that we were placed not that god needs us
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but that he chooses to use us when and how he does and i believe that he equips every generation you are
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not here by accident god doesn't do anything flippantly he doesn't do anything arbitrarily he
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doesn't do anything accidentally he's not surprised by anything he's not thrown off by anything he's not
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looking down and saying oh my gosh i made a huge mistake no because he is gracious because he doesn't
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um he doesn't experience time the same way that we do uh he is patiently bringing people to himself
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even as we are experiencing these scary circumstances and the way that he has chosen
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to bring people to himself is through the power of the holy spirit through christians so that's still
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our responsibility we can stay steadfast we can stay assured knowing that our obligation
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does not change uh that god is the same that we serve a god who is the same and that he has equipped
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us and he has called us to the same thing that he has called christians to for thousands of years so
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the thing that we should pray for is to be obedient and is to be bold and not to shrink back just because
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things are unsure i know that's the temptation that's certainly my temptation but to go forward
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in truth speaking the truth in love and sharing the gospel that is just as good of news today as it has
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always been that is our role it is not to be paralyzed it is not to be ridden with anxiety
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even as we look to our children and say what kind of world is this how could i bring kids into this
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world some people are are asking themselves right now god has called us to the same responsibility
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that he always has and he's not going to leave us behind he's not freaking out even though we are
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and he's on our side if our god is for us who can be against us we know that they're going to be
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trials and tribulations we know that there are going to be difficulties we know there are going
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to be surprises for us and yet uh we know that god is sovereign that he is in control and that he knows
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everything and that he is all powerful and we also know there's a day when jesus is coming back when
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we won't worry about mass shootings that'll be in the distant past what what is that what is strife
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what is division what is politics will ask what is it disagreement what is uh what is sadness
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what is sorrow what what are what are tears uh we will only know joy we'll only know perfect peace
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and we all look forward to that day until then we've got a job to do this is spiritual warfare
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and god has shown us in his word how we can stand up uh for what is true uh that's all we have today
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i will see you back here on friday
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you
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