I went though a period of stupidity wherein I converted from an anarchist to a minarchist.

I've since rehabilitated myself. Still, during that phase, even I had a passing fancy that Red Flag Laws were a sensible idea.

For those of you who don't know, those laws would allow people of close relation and psychiatrists to report people who have guns to the authorities if they exhibit "red flags" in regard to being a threat to their lives or others, and have their guns temporarily confiscated. That's my generous wording.

The thing is, I managed to pull my head out of my ass for two seconds.

I lived in Virgina for four years, and that's a state with Red Flag on the books. That's also where my girlfriend, who I was going to propose to, cheated on me and left me for another guy. If she were more of a vindictive bitch than she actually was, she easily could have called the cops and had my guns taken away simply because I made a few comments about self-harm being a thing that was on my mind. I would then have to hire a lawyer and sue the government to get my guns back.

"Well, maybe she would have just been trying to save your life. " you say. "Isn't it sensible to get the guns out of the hands of potentially suicidal people?" you say.

Well, no. The fundamental problem with Red Flag Laws from a philosophical place is that it turns due process upside-down. By its nature, it's a law that authorizes the government to take your property without any evidence that you've done anything wrong. On top of that, in order to get your property back, you have to prove your own innocence rather than holding the state accountable to prove your guilt.

What's more, of all the dozens of debates that I've had on this issue, the best "success story" that anybody could point to in support of these laws was horrifying.

This "success story" happened in Maryland, where a family member red flagged a man who she feared might commit suicide. The police banged on his door in the middle of the night. The man answered the door holding a gun, and the police shot and killed him. So, that's the success story -- the guy that people were worried would kill himself got killed by the cops instead.

If that's success, what does failure look like?

All this does is increase interactions with police and citizens with the increased awareness and tension that comes with the knowledge that the citizen is armed. Your gun control law is enforced by bringing extra guns to confiscated guns from a gun owner who hasn't committed a crime under the assumption that the gun owner is mentally unstable with no evidence aside from an accusation.

You don't see that this is a recipe for disaster?

This is basically legalized SWATing for any vindictive ex boyfriend or girlfriend, or ex husband or wife. "Hey, my boyfriend that I just cheated on said something about jumping off our balcony. He has guns. He's mentally unstable.

Send men with guns to take his guns." They'll come and take the guns without any real evidence or due process.
How does this make sense to anybody who has really looked at the reality of the problem?

It got me for a short time when I became an idiot and thought that the murder, theft, and rape machines that we call "government" had a valid place in this world.

Any person of any level of valued intelligence should see the problems here.