A woman of valor who can find? For her worth is far above rubies.
– Proverbs 31:10

I knew that I was going to have to choose him or my son, and it wasn’t going to be my son, so I did what I had to do. There’s nothing more dangerous than a mother with a child.
− Sarah McKinley

When seconds count, the cops are just minutes away.
− Clint Smith

Eighteen-year-old Sarah McKinley was home with her three-month-old son on New Year’s Eve. She lived in the rural community of Blanchard, Oklahoma, and police response times tended to be long. Her husband was not with her; he had died of cancer on Christmas Day.
She saw two men attempting to break in. She recognized one as a man who had been stalking her since her husband’s funeral. Reportedly he was looking for drugs in the cancer victim’s home. She gave the baby his bottle, then retrieved a shotgun and a handgun and barricaded the door. She phoned 9-1-1 and asked what to do. She was told she could not shoot unless they came through the door. But the 9-1-1 dispatcher, who was a woman, added, “You do what you have to do to protect your baby.”
Reportedly Sarah was on the phone with 9-1-1 for 21 minutes, and the police still had not arrived when the men broke down the door. The first man, the stalker, came at her with a 12-inch hunting knife. She fired the 12-gauge shotgun, killing the man. His companion fled, quite possibly breaking the Olympic 100-meter record. He later turned himself in to police.
Predictably, most comments were favorable to the young woman. But they noted with sadness that in some states and most European nations, she would be jailed for murder, and her infant son would be taken from her. But equally predictably, other comments were opposed. One commenter referred to “loving our enemies.” How this was relevant to Sarah’s life-and-death problem was unclear.
Another commenter related that as a soldier in Sweden, he had been taught that when on guard duty, he should (1) yell stop, (2) fire a warning shot, (3) shoot the intruder in the leg, and (4) only then shoot to kill. It was less clear how this was relevant to stopping an attacker with a large knife rushing across a small room. It was still less clear why Sweden should serve as a role model of moral behavior in the face of evil, after its pro-Nazi “neutrality” in World War II.
And it was entirely unclear how someone who never faced a life-threatening attack somehow became an expert on handling such a situation. What this man and other critics of Sarah McKinley were really saying is, “My beliefs on gun control and self-defense trump your right to remain alive. You should be dead, and your baby should be an orphan − if he’s lucky.”
It is utterly inexplicable that people with such beliefs consider themselves “liberal,” “tolerant,” “pro-woman,” and “for the little guy.” Isn’t Sarah a woman? Isn’t a three-month-old a little guy?
Only after conservative media and websites carried this story did the mainstream media pick it up. There are literally thousands of instances in which an armed citizen prevents a criminal attack, but they rarely appear in the liberal media. On the contrary, the much rarer cases of accidental shootings are reported prominently. Selective reporting of the news is the worst form of bias, because it dupes others into sharing that bias.
When liberals in America and other Western nations inhibit self-defense against criminal attack, they reveal much about their thought processes. When they arrest a father for wounding a career criminal who is entering his small child’s bedroom in the middle of the night, they tell us much about themselves. When they criminalize the use of pen knives, knitting needles, walking sticks, and even toy guns in defense against criminal assault, they tell us much about their belief system. They are excusing and protecting criminals − but criminalizing self-defense.
Such people may have gray hair and sit in legislatures, or on judges’ benches, or occupy professorial chairs, but intellectually and emotionally they are children. They believe that if they close their eyes, the boogey man can’t see them. They believe that if they pull the blanket over their heads, the monsters won’t attack them. They believe that if they don’t fight back, eventually the schoolyard bully will tire of them and go on to bully someone else − not a very humanitarian attitude.
They believe that if they disarm themselves, eventually fewer weapons will be available to criminals and terrorists. But this belief is only superficial. If they truly believed that weapons make them less safe, they would post signs in front of their houses declaring, “There are no guns in this home.” But no one, not even the staunchest advocate of gun confiscation, ever posts such a sign. How revealing.
At some subconscious level, liberals recognize that if even a minority of homeowners are armed, criminals will be deterred from entering any homes while people are there. And figures bear this out. In America, only about 13 percent of burglaries are “hot” − that is, home invasions. But in Britain, where homeowners are disarmed, 59 percent of burglaries occur when people are at home. About 30 percent of victims of these “hot” burglaries are assaulted, or worse. Of course, if a burglary occurs when no one is home, no one is injured. This is not complex. Disarming homeowners endangers them.
I believe that the reason many liberals detest the idea of self-defense is their stubborn refusal to see the world as it is, but instead to act as though their childish fantasies were real. They never worked in an emergency room and saw the results of man’s inhumanity. They never took ROTC in high school or college. They never were instructed by a master sergeant with combat decorations. They never smelled the pleasant odor of gun oil. They never took responsibility for defense of their loved ones and themselves. They prefer the false safety of their illusions. They consider themselves civilized, but in fact they are merely infantilized.
Many liberals remain intellectual and emotional children, despite their receding hairlines and increasing waistlines. Advancing years detracted from their appearance, but added nothing to their wisdom. In their own minds, they remain helpless children. But real children depend on adults to protect them. Who will protect childish adults?
If these people detest guns, let them refrain from owning one − but not stop me from owning one. If they don’t approve of missile defenses, let them move to a nation that lacks them − but not stop me from protecting my loved ones and myself from apocalyptic, paranoid fanatics who are armed with missiles and nuclear weapons. Their right to hold infantile, unrealistic, pacifistic beliefs stops where my safety begins.
Instead of the learned fools who attended elite universities and graduate schools, let us emulate 18-year-old Sarah McKinley. She has more wisdom and guts than all of them put together. She has more understanding of the responsibilities of citizenship than do many liberal politicians. And she has more understanding of the responsibilities of a human being than do many liberal clergy.
She is the prototypical American: self-reliant, responsible, independent, willing to listen to advice and ask for help − but ready if necessary to act on her own and defend those dependent on her. She is indeed a woman of valor.
To contribute to the Sarah McKinley Donation Account and help this 18-year-old widow with a young child, mail your contribution in her name to the Chickashaw Bank, P.O. Box 548, Blanchard OK 73010.
Dr. Stolinsky writes on political and social issues. Contact: dstol@prodigy.net. You are welcome to publish or post these articles, provided that you cite the author and website.
www.stolinsky.com