"But the only thing guns do is kill!"

How many times has someone resorted to this argument? This statement usually comes from the "cars kill more than guns" argument, and it's just silly and simple-minded.

The argument goes that cars kill FAR more people than guns do (and they do), so by the same reasoning, we should ban cars. The misguided person you are arguing with usually comes back with, "Well, cars are for transportation too! Guns are only for killing people!" (Kill? I bought mine for hammering nails into my wall...)

Of course guns kill people. If they didn't, they wouldn't be very useful. But they must realize that guns don't just kill people; they defend people, and they provide recreation for sport shooters.

To those who refuse to recognize the recreational or sporting aspect of shooting, I like to remind them of pools. Small children drown in pools all the time, and not only in their parents' pool, the pools of neighbors or friends who do not have gates around their pools, or fail to properly secure their gates. We should ban pools! Obviously people only use them for recreation, and our children are dying. WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!

People who argue that guns just kill people, should be reminded that the police use guns to kill people. "Well, they just kill bad people" they argue, "then why shouldn't I?" you counter. Now you're back to a "only the police can use guns" argument, which is much easier to defend against than a "guns can only kill things" argument.