The nationwide scientific survey showed the public’s approval of hunting rose five points in the past year, up from 74 percent in 2011. The survey, conducted in February 2013 using random digit dialing and supplemental cellular telephone sampling, was the fifth in a series of similar surveys by Responsive Management to track trends in public approval of hunting since 1995.

Support for hunting has remained generally consistent during this time–73 percent in 1995; 75 percent in 2003; 78 percent in 2006; 74 percent in 2011; and a peak of 79 percent in 2013.

Mark Damian Duda, executive director of Responsive Management, is still looking at survey results to better understand why approval has increased. Said Duda, “Approval of hunting among Americans is fairly stable and bounces between 73 and 79 percent. The reasons for this increase are still unclear, but it is probably related to the increase in hunting and shooting participation.

Added Duda, “Since 2006, hunting participation has increased by 9 percent while shooting participation has increased 18 percent since 2009. Other studies we have conducted on public opinion on hunting show that the strongest correlation for approval of hunting is knowing a hunter–over and above demographic variables or anything else. With the increased number of hunters in the field and sport shooters at the range, it is possible that this is being reflected in this uptick in support for hunting.”

One thousand Americans 18 years old and older were surveyed to achieve a sampling error of plus or minus 3.00 percentage points. More than half (52%) of those surveyed strongly approved of hunting. At the other end of the spectrum, 12 percent of Americans disapprove of hunting. Another 8 percent neither approve nor disapprove (total does not equal 100% due to rounding).

Sure, for now, they are going after those evil “assault weapons” which are nothing of the sort. But even if they confiscate every one of those firearms, some crazed lunatic will use a bolt action gun or non-”assault weapon” and kill just as many and that will be the call to go after even those more commonly used to hunt game. If the line is not drawn here, there may never be a line from which we can defend our rights.

Many politicos have uttered the now overused line that “I hunt and I never need more than 3 bullets in my gun to shoot a deer”. That’s all fine and good, if the second amendment had anything to do with hunting. But let’s tackle that crap-tastic line just for the sake of argument.

Firearms like the AR-15 are now very commonly used to hunt. Many use the “evil” AR-15 and Mini-14/30 to hunt feral hogs that are tearing up much-needed farmland and to put down coyotes that endanger game and livestock. The truth is that in the hunting world, those guns do far more good than evil and the truth must be used to create reason in the debate.

Our second amendment rights were written down and agreed to, not because our founders had some naive idea of how firearms would evolve or that they wanted to protect our right to hunt mule deer, but because they knew that power-hungry ideologues would some day seek to slowly enslave the people.  It has happened before in so many countries, the same way, little by little until the people had no way to defend themselves.

Evil people will do horrendous things – we cannot stop them. Laws cannot stop them. Only a narcissistic populace can be led to believe that they or their government have the power to stop evil. A thinking people realize that evil exists and will use any means necessary to carry out terrible deeds. Only citizens with the means to defend themselves and others can belay such things.

The tragedy in Newton is a prime example. While an evil man happened to use a firearm to cause such pain, remember that he could as easily have killed his mother with a bat and used the car he stole to plow through the bus line at the school to have the same effect. Would we then outlaw cars? Of course not. We would look to the source of the problem, not the weapon used in the crime.

For the political elite, the answer is laws. Make this illegal or that illegal, as if the evil-doer gives any care to what is or is not legal. Adam Lanza didn’t care that he illegally murdered his mother, that stealing the guns was illegal, that possessing them was illegal, that stealing her car was illegal, that bringing the guns to a school was illegal, that murdering children and teachers was illegal or that suicide was illegal. Everything that happened was already supposedly prevented by laws on the books – but they failed as they always will.

Consider the legislation that Feinstein, Biden, Obama et al are planning to push. Make a certain firearm illegal, stronger laws against firearms on school grounds, laws against magazines – none would have stopped Adam Lanza. He broke a slew of laws to commit his horrific crime. How would one or two more matter?

The guns did not cause Adam Lanza to kill anyone. There were warning signs, actions not taken and mis-steps made along the way by everyone that knew him. The wake-up call should be that we, as a society, don’t know how to deal with people like him before they commit these atrocities. Why not?

The news is focused on his tactics and tools, not his motivation and the failures by so many to prevent his spiral into darkness. America can do better.

The easy thing is to blame the inanimate object – the weapon. Explosives, firearms, knives, clubs and vehicles would already be considered illegal if used in a crime, but they still are used to kill. Should we outlaw all those things or just begin to understand the cause and admit that sometimes evil happens.

If every gun owner does not decide that all guns are rightful and only humans are evil, then all guns will some day be labelled evil. At that point, even your field over-and-under shotgun will be considered a dark and unnecessary thing.