October is National Domestic Violence Awareness Month and gun control advocates can't settle on a narrative: They argue that women are independent and empowered while simultaneously arguing that we women are too stupid and weak to own or carry firearms. Women are independent enough to obtain an abortion but not empowered enough to exercise their Second Amendment rights. It's an inherently sexist, anti-woman, progressively patriarchal belief that encourages the disproportionate rate of female to male victims. The advocates of this oppressive belief push discredited studies (see Arthur Kellerman's work) to undermine women's rights.
The war on women is real: It's called gun control.
I wrote in my first book, Hands Off My Gun, how a domestic violence incident in my family taught me the importance of a woman's right to bear arms. I realized that I never want to be a victim, I never want to be at the mercy of an attacker, I never want to live in fear. I'm at the range as often as my schedule allows to practice my marksmanship; I train with different scenarios so that if, God forbid, the worst ever occurs, my reflexes, my muscle memory, my skill set serves me to protect myself, my loved ones, innocents. Gun control advocates who argue that we women are too stupid to carry guns also actively discourage women from improving their firearm skills at the range. They shame us on social media if we visit the range. They attack us if we teach our children about gun safety and how to properly handle firearms, when they aren't pretending that we're nonexistent. They lie. They have repeatedly refused all offers to partner with safe storage groups like Project Child Safe. Led by a very rich man named Michael Bloomberg, they wage war against women who seek to legally own firearms. When a woman buys a gun she's smeared as being part of the “gun lobby.” They brutalize women gun owners on social media and create boycotts to silence their voices. They peddle fear, threaten us, and when fear fails, try to emotionally black mail us as bad mothers unless we surrender our guns. They tell us and have told us that women are too weak to own a gun and that women don't need a gun if we only “feel like we're gonna be raped.” To them, suffering is a virtue and our lives aren't worth protecting. I've written:
Some statistics, My emphasis:
In the vast majority of those self-defense cases, the citizen will only brandish the gun or fire a warning shot. In less than 8% of those self-defense cases will the citizen will even wound his attacker. Over 1.9 million of those self-defense cases involve handguns. As many as 500,000 of those self-defense cases occur away from home. Almost 10% of those self-defense cases are women defending themselves against sexual assault or abuse.
Not anymore. That's why I filmed this ad:
I don't want another woman becoming an unnecessary statistic. I don't want another woman shamed into thinking that she can't responsibly own a firearm because Michael Bloomberg and his well-funded, professional lobbyist group convinced her that she's too weak and irresponsible to access her rights. It's amazing how gun control advocates are also those who lecture on equality—equality on everything except the right to bear arms. Women have every right to protect themselves and their families; I wrote several years ago that firearms are the “ultimate equalizer.” If we're to discuss female empowerment, let us not exclude a woman's right to bear arms. If you want to prevent more victims, encourage more women to get get their concealed carry license and train to develop and improve their skills. Stop shaming them for seeking education and empowerment.
