Recently I have noticed an interesting new trend taking shape on my phone. More and more, my liberal friends are texting me with concern for their safety, wondering how to buy a gun. A friend in NYC was recently threatened with violence—he’s gone from being passionately anti-gun to being dead-set on buying a firearm. But regulations in NYC make it practically impossible to do so.

In today’s world you can burn down a church, tear down an abolitionist statue, or pour fake blood on the portrait of a founding father, and you’ll be praised. But don’t dare defend your family from a violent mob threatening to kill you, your wife, and your children—that would be wrong.

Recently, in St. Louis, Missouri, a married couple successfully defended their home with a rifle and a pistol against a BLM mob allegedly endangering their lives. For this, the city’s lead prosecutor is attempting to press charges against them. The whole episode is perfectly symbolic of the chaos in America.

After the murder of George Floyd, America’s cities burned. Since then, disorder and destruction have worn on, enabled by police inaction. When the safeguards against chaos are removed, a tyrannical kind of anarchy fills that void: mobs and rioters are running rampant, at times attacking not only property but innocent civilians.

Every modern society regardless of culture or history has police. That’s not an accident or a coincidence. Ordinary citizens have begun to realize this—and, simultaneously, that police are, well…no longer policing.  Surprise!  When law enforcement stops enforcing the law, crime skyrockets.

Waking Up

For decades, Americans had been living in a period of increasing general safety. “Gun culture” grew somewhat foreign to us and especially to urbanites: “Why would you need a gun if there’s a police officer on every street corner?” That’s an understandable perspective, albeit a short-sighted one. When your greatest physical threat is a bad hot dog or taco from the local food truck, concerns naturally lie elsewhere. But rural Americans, for whom the nearest police station is often 30 minutes away, have always had to rely on themselves to keep malevolence at bay.

And as 911 response times crawl upward in cities, urban Americans face a change in perspective.

Even notable fashion icon Dave Rubin of the Rubin Report just purchased a pistol. To which I say: welcome! The public at large is at last coming to remember the old truths that we so-called “gun nuts” never forgot. And the Second Amendment is having a moment.

As reported in the New York Daily News, firearms sales have risen all year. A Small Arms Analytics & Forecasting analysis showed that, after upticks of 19% and 17% in January and February, March sales leaped by an estimated 2.5 million guns, an 85% increase over last year. A 71% jump in April was followed by an 80% increase in May.

In the last three months, Americans have bought 5.5 million guns. An astonishing number? Yes, in one sense. But when you’re fearful for your family’s safety, when you witness unabashed violence permeating throughout streets, and when police are nowhere to be found, it makes sense: the quickest, most effective action you can take is to buy a gun.

Just called the police because there was just a dangerous standoff between my neighbor and some protestors and got the response: “Sir, the city is under attack. Do what you have to do.” And they hung up. Did that really just happen?

— Scott Barry Kaufman (@sbkaufman) June 1, 2020

This viral tweet is a representation of the reality inside America’s major cities—which, it’s important to add, are all run by Democrats. The fault of such disorder resides with Democrat cowardice and abetment.

But with a mob, just one individual who stands firm is often enough to stop a tantrum from escalating into a terror. You don’t placate a disobedient child’s outburst. You don’t give in. You discipline. You firmly say “no” and that’s that. Staring down a mob isn’t as simple as stopping a scene, but in both cases, the decisive factor is a demonstration of firm resolve.

Necessary but Insufficient

So get armed. Defend yourself. Defend your family. But although owning a gun is the best way to guarantee physical safety from the woke mob, it won’t be enough to defend people long-term from a full-fledged leftist state—especially with the growing calls for harsher gun control.

If you are observing the world and see the purgatory to come, realize you do have the power to halt the descent. Continue voting and community building. But the bigger solutions to stopping the woke mob do require financial investment. We need our own media giants—unafraid and unapologetic to wield the same pressure to counteract the mob’s attempts at cancellation—and these can only be built with financial support.

If you believe in the message of a creator or organization, one who dares confront the radicalism of the Left and defend America, support them. Because if good Americans shy away and cower, silently voting and nothing else…well then, your cancellation will be televised.