Because we care about individual liberty here, we think you should be able to engage in self-defense to protect that liberty (and your life, if it comes to that).  That includes the right to armed self-defense, of course, a right that becomes all the more important when encountering potential assailants who are stronger and/or more numerous than you.

Indeed you might recall from the legal fight to guarantee an individual right to keep and bear arms, that my colleague Tom Palmer once fended off some anti-gay marauders by just showing them that he had a gun.

And now we see that same story play itself out, except the would-be victim scared off a homophobic gang by merely maintaining the impression that he had a gun:

The situation could have gone either way: I could end up beaten or dead, or we could all go our separate ways.

All I could think to do was to get to my backpack and find my phone. As I fumbled for the phone, I heard one of them say, “Does he have a gun?”

So I kept my hand in my backpack, allowing them to wonder whether I was reaching for a gun. Then a couple of them started to run away, and the others soon followed. I got back on my bike and pedaled as fast as I could out of there.

When I got home, I began to reflect on what had happened, and more disturbingly what could have happened. I am in contact with the LGBT unit of the police department to file a report. But I’ve thought a lot about the turning point of the situation — the fact that one of them thought that I might have a gun. None of them said, “There’s a law against antigay hate crimes!” That wasn’t the deterrent. It was the possibility that I might have had a gun that saved my life Friday night.

It’s unfortunate that the people Mr. LaSalvia encountered are around – whatever their motivations – but would we be in a better world if people like him couldn’t imply the potential for armed self-defense?

Of course, in DC, Chicago, and many other places – which, after the recent Supreme Court rulings, must allow guns to be kept at home – it’s still illegal to carry a gun (open or concealed).  If the thugs Mr. LaSalvia ran into knew the local gun regulations (as many professional criminals do) and accurately gauged their target as a law-abiding citizen, they would have known that he was bluffing. 

Is that what gun-control proponents – many of whom I surmise strongly support gay and women’s rights – want?

(H/t: Lindsay Charles)