Axe Fight

Imagine at the time the Constitution was written, instead of guns being mentioned in the 2nd Amendment, it was axes.  Say, for some reason, New York and Vermont boys were terrified of losing their axes, so to ensure their right to axes was preserved, they actually had the Founding Fathers preserve the right to bear axes in the 2nd Amendment instead.

For 184 years, no one paid too much fuss about axes.  For the most part, people respected others personal space when it came to axes.  They didn't hatchet random strangers in the streets, or wave their axes in grocery shopper's faces.  All the sudden, in the 1960's, racist white Americas who had always had their axes noticed African Americans had access to axes as well, and this scared white America.  They started to pass anti-axe laws, many of them introduced by Republicans who understood people were concerned about too many axes on the streets.

The axe industry didn't like this, but they also understood they had a role to play in axe safety.  Axes are dangerous, and so they quietly went along with the legislation.  At the same time, they started developing newer axes, more powerful axes, axes with bigger heads, and multiple blades.  They even created an automatic axe which had six circling heads and could cut through anything pretty quickly with its razor sharp blades.

In the 1980's, a crazed man attacked the President with an axe, and did some serious damage to not only the president, but to others who were surrounding him.  People noticed in the last decade more axe violence seemed to be prevalent, matching the timeline the axe manufacturers started successfully marketing their modern axes to people who felt the axe would get them the respect they felt they deserved.  Laws were passed restricting axes, as common sense ruled the land.  People were realizing axes everywhere was a bad idea.

The axe industry stewed.  They had started making real money off of the non-lumberjack market and wanted more.  They converted their axe safety organization, the NAA, to an advocacy group, promoting axes and axe owner rights.  They started to spread money around to the politicians, especially the Republicans who always like to 'make believe,' wanting to look like tough guys to the dim witted.  The NAA started to challenge anti-axe laws which were put into place with popular votes, laws which made a tremendous amount of common sense.  With their bankrolled politicians, the NAA started having success.  They put out a list of which politicians were friendly to the axe industry and which politicians were the enemies of the NAA.  They related axe ownership with rural values.  "Didn't your ma and pa have an axe?  We're just carrying on the great American axe tradition!"

Then in the 90's, as the axe industry developed more and more powerful axes, politicians who had NAA endorsement started giving the axe industry back their money, ten fold.  They removed axe laws.  Anyone could carry an axe, anywhere, no background checks for axe purchases, EVER, no government research on the dangers of axes, no inspections of axe dealers records.  The goal of the axe industry was no longer advocacy, but forced axe ownership.  No one should be allowed to be axe-less, and if you dared speak out about the dangers of axes, you were anti American.  They rescinded the common sense restrictions, with the promise, "with many axes on the streets, everyone will be safe, crime will cease, and the world would be a better place."

Far from it.  Late in the first decade of the 2000's, we started to see the rise of axe slaughters.  Schools, offices, movie theaters, concerts, airports, churches; all of them were being targeted.  The common theme was the murderers had been able to get access to axes, even when they CLEARLY shouldn't have had any axes at all.  The NAA, terrified of their narrative being shouted down, got their mouthpieces and politicians to start talking about anything else but what the problem really was. Video games! Gangs! Mental illness! Terrorism! Anything to take the focus off the real problem, axes.  They then would scream how "it's too soon to talk about axe violence,' knowing they were only trying to silence the negative coverage, never intending on revisiting the mess they had created.

And the cycle of axe violence continues over and over and over and over and over and...

In early America, at the time the Constitution was written, the axe was a much more useful than the gun.  A muzzle loading weapon was somewhat useless if confronted by multiple enemies at once.  Many of the early settlers used guns for hunting only.  The idea of preserving them in the 2nd Amendment was far more about trying to make white plantation slave owners in the south happy.  Disgusting.

The axe was a more lethal weapon back then.  If you did get attacked, you could use it to defend yourself against one or more people, you could use it hand to hand combat or throw it, and it was a mandatory tool in regions where settlers depended on wood for heat.

When the founding fathers wrote guns into the Constitution, they had no idea what the future would bring, and if they could see what the 2nd Amendment has become, they'd rip it out of the final draft in a heartbeat.

Stop trying to make AR-15's into some sort of manifest destiny laid down by the founding fathers.  They weren't.  To imply that is to suggest they knew a ten headed motorized axe would come to life one day, and that's insane.

If axes today were one tenth as deadly as guns are, we'd regulate them tighter than a whales butt.  We already do regulate them more than guns.  Once my son took an axe to a hardware store cash register as I continued to shop for other things, and I was approached by a store manager who asked if it was okay.  He said the store had a policy;  no axes being sold to certain people, as they'd deemed axes "too dangerous too be sold to just anyone." His words, not mine.