There are more guns than humans in the U.S., about 120 per 100 people. The next highest percentage in any country, the Falkland Islands, is about half of ours. You probably already know this.

But did you know that 3% of American gun owners possess about 50% of those 300-plus million guns? Yes, the average gun owner has eight or more of them in their personal arsenal. Some have lots more. This is a fetish. Three-quarters of Americans don’t own a gun, thank goodness.

Guns are implements of division, of antagonism, of hate, of death. They are lethal weapons designed to make killing on impulse as easy as wiggling a finger. This is why they exist. If you recoil at this objective description of guns you are living in blind denial of their purpose, even if you like them.

This is true even if you use a gun to shoot someone who would kill you if you didn’t shoot first. A gun is a tool of actualization of hostile relations between enemies, or those perceived to be enemies, or those we feel comfortable relating to as if they are enemies, because we are unsocialized paranoiacs and our capacity to relate to others as equal beings with so much more in common with ourselves than differences between us is pathologically disabled.

Here’s my personal list-in-progress of required prerequisites for buying a gun that demonstrate understanding and minimal competence in approaches to de-escalation of conflict and recognition of the meaning and nature of beloved community. A prospective purchaser, in addition to completing a course in gun safety must:

1. Plant a tree in a public park, school, or cemetery.

2. Submit a book report on “Caste” by Isabel Wilkerson

3. Hold a baby kitten in their arms until it falls asleep.

4. Participate in a certified program of nonviolent conflict resolution.

5. Watch 10 minutes of any Tucker Carlson rerun and explain why he is an elitist, fear-mongering white supremacist who should never again be allowed anywhere near a microphone, and look at Steven Bannon’s face for five seconds without thoughts of violence crossing your mind.

There is a lot of talk, mostly by those who oppose any restrictions on access to weapons of mass annihilation, about broader access to mental health care to weed out bad guys. How would this work, exactly? If someone has an arsenal bigger than some small countries and feels there are enemies all around, he gets to talk to a mental health counselor when he strolls into a clinic?

This is in order to make sure that the three-quarters of Americans who don’t own guns are as “sane” as the quarter who do before they, too, can acquire them … or something like that?

Whom do you suppose participates in more psychotherapy already, people who own guns or those who don’t? Just musing.

Well, I agree with mental health testing for gun purchases. Anyone who still thinks that Donald Trump is a good human being ought to be required to participate in serious mental health counseling for as long as it takes to be able to make rudimentary perceptions of who is a friend and who is a malevolent, soulless, sociopathic flim-flam man.

This is not political. It is about perception of reality and the capacity to identify potential enemies before being a finger wiggle away from massacring them.

Why is it not a requirement of gun purchasers to disclose what well-regulated militia they belong to? Wouldn’t the Supreme Court have to rule in affirmation of this if a law mandating it came to that bench?

No, actually, because the patron of a majority of the justices, the NRA, defines a “well-regulated militia” as … “the American people.” That’s right, you and me and the psychopath next door — all of us — are the “militia” the Second Amendment refers to, according to the gun lobby. Don’t remember being conscripted? Too bad. You’re in, pal.

And that “well regulated’ clause? Silly, the Founders might have been referring to bowel function. Who really knows?

The prefrontal cortex typically does not fully develop until we reach the age of around 25. Guns are now the Np. 1 cause of death of teenagers in America, surpassing car crashes — the previous top cause — and all diseases combined. Guns don’t kill people. Young men with guns kill people.

Lots of gun rights advocates say they want more kids to have guns. Supply your own punchline. It’s beyond even the distraught and cynically sarcastic mood I’m writing this screed in.

Every 14 hours a woman is killed by a domestic partner. And statistically, by far, the most dangerous call for law enforcement is to a home where there is a domestic dispute, accounting for around 40% of all murders of police officers.

So, what is the solution to this scourge promoted by NRA CEO Wayne Lapierre? Disarm those with a history of domestic violence? Nah. After all, violent serial abusers are citizens, too, members of the universal militia known as America, and are entitled to their Second Amendment rights, ya know. Surely you can see this coming: “Arm America’s women!” thunders Lapierre.

Am I ranting? You bet! Where is sedate discourse getting us? OK, I gotta find my meditation cushion. Bring it, beloved trolls. Peacefully, please.

Jonathan Klate lives in Amherst.]]>