A sincere wish for our DU gun owners: visit Norway!

I just received a brochure in the mail about a trip to Norway, primarily for its scenic value. I thought it would be a good thing if more of our pro-gun Americans, including those here at DU, could visit a country with a gun-loving population who own guns, hunt with them and target shoot. I have mentioned Norway in past Gungeon posts but I thought I would recap here.

Norwegians love guns, own them and keep them in their homes, use them for hunting in their rugged mountainous areas and are avid sportsmen. Norway is a modern day representational democracy with a market economy, altho with a strong social safety net for its citizens. Norwegians are free to join shooting clubs.

Norway has had one "lone wolf" mass shooting/bombing in 2011, by a disturbed fanatic who had to spend 9 years getting the financing for his attacks. Compare that with the number of mass shootings in the U.S. in just one month or one year!

The Norwegians love guns but also strictly regulate them with gun safety laws that our U.S. gun owners claim would restrict our liberty and freedom. Yet here's the thing: Norwegians have, in the history just 70 years ago, actually fought, suffered and died for their liberty and freedom. Their heroism and tough resistance in the face of overwhelming power is unquestioned.

So why did those very Norwegians, who fought the Nazis (sometimes on skis in rugged terrains), pass strict gun control laws after World War II? They had real experience fighting tyranny. We have people strapping guns to themselves in public blithely claiming it protects freedom without one shred of evidence to the contrary, and certainly without any experience of true suffering and death in the face of real threats to freedom.

It is too bad that so many Americans, particularly now, cannot afford to travel to foreign lands to broaden their perspectives on what they are talking about when they cite "freedom" to oppose even the mildest of gun safety legislation. And I find it interesting that when I hear them "we aren't China" or some other repressive regime, that they don't cite Norway. Because they can't. Funny, that...