This was originally written about seven years ago as a Facebook post. Stumbled across it recently and gave it a polish and decided it would be useful here.

America’s most popular assault rifle is still the AR-15 and its variants, which are many. I have some experience with one. Not just plinking or shooting at cans, but at a professional range. I was supervised by a pro and the weapon I was firing was capable of full-auto operation—a fact I was able to take advantage of.

Honestly, it was a tremendous amount of fun ripping tiny holes in paper targets with multiple rounds at each twitch of the trigger. It was literally a blast. I went through a 30-round magazine very quickly, even though I was shooting short bursts.

And it gives me tremendous satisfaction to know that I have not the slightest interest or feeling of need to possess such a weapon (or even the usual semi-automatic version) in any way, shape or form.

I can tell you that in the use for which this weapon was designed, it is truly devastating. Rounds come out of the muzzle of the AR-15 at a speed approaching over half a mile per second. But because the weapon is so easy to shoot—more like a very loud toy—it is easy to divorce oneself from the damaging power it posesses.

A surgeon treating survivors of the Parkland shooting spoke of the frightening and devastating amount of damage done to the bodies of the children he was trying to save. I will not go into the graphic details. Suffice to say, when people describe this as a weapon of war, it is a brutally accurate description.

And war is insanity. Pure and simple. The people who want war are insane. At their core they seek to profit from the deaths of others. There is nothing noble or redeeming or glorious or righteous or any other of the flowery bullshit used to describe war. It is insanity.

So why would anyone want to insist that these weapons remain available to the general public? The first answer is of course profit. But to create a market to sell these fearsome weapons into, one must create a climate of fear, anger, difference and division—one where “the other guy” must be inherently dangerous. Where one has to have “protection” from those “others.”

Here’s a different idea. If you really feel unsafe in your environment, go out and talk to the other people in it. You are going to find—I guarantee it—that the vast majority of people in your area are really friendly and amazingly safe. Even the ones that might not be so good are actually trying to be. Then ask yourself, “Are these people I might want to make war against?” I doubt it.

So when you hear the howling words of gun lobbyists and their pet politicians professing the intent to “protect the rights” of everyone to own weapons they don’t need and would never want to use against a fellow citizen, know that you’re hearing the voice of insanity. Turn the channel. The silence will be much nicer, just like your neighbors.