The anti-gunner lobby detests good guys with guns. No, seriously, they seem to hate it when a story surfaces in which a law-abiding citizen with a gun stops a mass shooting. Whenever this type of news story is reported – which is rare – they go out of their way to spin the incident and distract from the fact that someone saved lives using a firearm.

This odd tendency on the part of the progressive left surfaced once again in response to the story about a mass shooting in an Indiana mall that was cut short by a hero who pulled out his gun and shot the assailant. Instead of celebrating the lives that were saved, they attempted to distract from the heroic deed.

RedState’s Bonchie wrote a piece on Shannon Watts, an anti-gun activist, who took to Twitter to express her ridiculous opinion on the incident. “Imagine thinking that arming a civilian with weapons of war and enabling them to go into a mall to kill three people and wound three others before another armed civilian is forced to open fire on the gunman inside a crowded foodcourt is a good out outcome,” she wrote in a now-deleted tweet.

But why are they so disturbed by the idea of a good person saving lives? Surely, if a guy punched out a rapist trying to assault a woman, they wouldn’t react this way, right? It appears they are only disturbed when saving a life involves a firearm – which happens a lot more frequently than they would like to admit. There are several reasons why progressives are bothered by the notion that a person with a gun can save lives – and why they try to convince the public that these scenarios don’t exist.

For starters, civilians defending life with firearms hampers their ability to push for more restrictions on law-abiding gun owners. Over the past few months, we have seen that anti-gunners do not want average citizens to own most types of guns. They contend that regular folks should not own “weapons of war,” which is a term that has absolutely no meaning.

These folks contend that only authorized police officers should be allowed to possess guns. Yes, there is a fringe that says even police should not be armed. But nobody pays attention to them. The fact of the matter is that they believe that if average citizens were not allowed to bear arms, gun violence would magically disappear. The reality that the vast majority of gun crime is committed by people obtaining firearms illegally does not faze them. It’s like they think violent criminals will somehow stop using guns to victimize people if Democrats pass laws restricting law-abiding people.

When a civilian uses a firearm to defend themselves or other people, it calls into question the wisdom of preventing them from bearing arms. In fact, if more people knew how often defensive gun uses occur each year, I’d wager most would oppose efforts to restrict firearms. The fact of the matter is that responsible gun owners save more lives than are taken by criminals using firearms. It’s an inconvenient fact that the anti-gunners would rather keep under wraps.

Another reason why progressives don’t like the idea of people owning guns is that it shows that they do not depend on the government to save them if they find themselves in a dangerous situation. More gun ownership could lead to more people realizing that their safety is their responsibility. Police are typically not going to arrive on the scene in time to protect civilians from violent criminals. As they say, “when seconds count, the police are just minutes away.”

If the increase in gun ownership is an indication that people have lost trust in the government’s ability – or willingness – to defend them, in what other areas will people stop trusting the state? It could go far beyond the issue of self-defense. If people can’t rely on the state for their safety, why should we trust them with our financial welfare or education, for example?

Indeed, when it comes to schooling, Americans are waking up to the reality that public schools are failing their children and are seeking other alternatives. There is a reason why the Biden administration is attacking charter schools, after all. Progressive ideology is based on the idea that the state should be the entity upon which everyday people should depend. The notion that people would stop viewing government as the answer to their problems is a serious issue for the far left.

Lastly, the third reason why so many progressives have a problem with the idea of a “good guy with a gun” is due to ignorance. In my experience, the vast majority of those who think civilians cannot – or should not – be responsible for their own self-defense know little about guns or the overall gun debate. As mentioned earlier, most of them don’t even know that studies have shown that tens of thousands of self-defense situations – at the lowest – happen each year. They believe situations in which people defend themselves using firearms are nearly nonexistent.

Even further, these people tend to believe that more legal gun ownership leads to more gun crime. They don’t know that a very small percentage of gun violence involves legal gun owners and that the overwhelming majority involve criminals who illegally obtain their weapons. This is why more education is needed. The more we inform people about the realities surrounding the gun issue, the more they will see that legal gun ownership is not as dangerous as the anti-gunners would have them believe. If those who favor gun rights are going to win this debate, they will need to do it through education more than argumentation.