The outcome of the Zimmerman case has shown, once again, that if you have a legal gun, you have more rights than someone without a gun.

Zimmerman had the right to stalk, harass, and kill – because his gun was legal. Had he been doing what he did without a legal gun, the police would have arrested him for the gun’s status alone. That much can be certain. And my guess is that things would have escalated and Zimmerman would have been charged for murder because he would have been considered a criminal every step of the way.

He would have been labeled a criminal for owning and leaving the house with an illegal gun. He would have been considered a criminal for stalking a child in the night. He would have been considered a criminal for fighting a child. And he would have been considered a murderer for killing that child.

But because his gun was legal, a good chunk of America believes in the story that was created by right wing talk radio and Zimmerman’s defense attorneys: he was a good man protecting his community while practicing his Second Amendment right who became the victim of a violent black man.

In the past few weeks, this same scenario – a legal gun changing the entire perspective ad outcome of a what should have been considered a crime – has happened at least two times.

In June, a man in Texas had the right to kill a prostitute who refused him sex because his gun was legal. The woman, Lenora Ivie Frago, had agreed to give Ezekial Gilbert 30 minutes “of her time” for $150, but said that didn’t include sex. After an argument ensued, she left. On her way to the pimp’s car. Gilbert shot her. She went into a coma and died months later.

Gilbert’s attorney argued that his client was only retrieving stolen property. The moronic Texas jury bought that, and let go a man who killed a woman because she refused to have sex with him.

I say he “had the right” to kill Frago because imagine that Gilbert’s gun was illegal. In the same event-changing manner as in my above example of how Zimmerman’s case would have turned out, Gilbert would have been labeled a criminal form the start, a murderer once the police arrived, and a jury would have put him away – likely to death row, considering that this was Texas and the woman who died not only suffered, but left behind a baby daughter.

Now, imagine again that when Frago tried to leave with Gilbert’s $150, that he grabbed her and beat her. Let’s imagine he punched her in the face a few times, knocked her out, and called the police to report a robbery. Would he have been patted on the back and told, “Good work, son. You did what you had to do to protect your property.”?

I seriously doubt that. But when it comes to a legally-owned gun, violence is not only acceptable – it’s seen as a right.

In May, there was a case in Alabama in which a woman shot her boyfriend’s stepson while he was in her driveway because she “feared for her life”…a quick Q&A investigation found she did nothing wrong – her gun was legal and she was scared.

Extremely little is known about this case because the police deemed it a justifiable homicide and didn’t release anything they found. According to the very weak media reports, the police bought the woman’s story that she didn’t know who the 19-year-old was her boyfriend’s stepson and she had every right to shoot a man who was at the edge of her driveway.  (why this case did not create more media pressure is beyond me, considering the possibility for it to be a juicy story, especially amidst the Zimmerman controversy)

Again, to hammer home my point, imagine if her gun was illegal; there would be a different outcome. Imagine if she had thrown a knife at chest or a rock at his head or just beat him. There would be more questioning, more suspicion, more investigation.

But the gun was legal. What else is there to know? If you’re scared, you can kill – as long as it’s with a legal gun.

My legal gun = more rights theory is not just a theory. It’s happened, like in the case of the black man who killed the white teen who came to his house with a posse and threatened his son. He had an illegal gun, and not only did he get imprisoned for manslaughter, but they threw an illegal firearm charge at him, too.

And a Miami police chief also agrees. In a 2010 Tampa Bay Times article examining the repercussions of Stand Your Ground laws, which found that “justifiable homicides” have tripled since the laws were enacted in 2005,  Chief John Timoney said:

“Whether it’s trick-or-treaters or kids playing in the yard of someone who doesn’t want them there or some drunk guy stumbling into the wrong house, you’re encouraging people to possibly use deadly physical force where it shouldn’t be used.”

I don’t know why this is the case. I suspect it has to do with the gun lobby creating an obsession over the Second Amendment that has caused gullible Americans who have seen too many movies to push lawmakers to pass gun-worshipping laws…but I have no proof, only conjecture. But whatever the explanation is, this is certainly the outcome: a society that loves guns so much, killing with them is seen in a different context than killing by other means. It’s seen as protecting one’s self and practicing the right our Founding Fathers wanted us to – even if your idea of protection and practicing is aggressive to the point of murder.

And as long as your gun is legal, you have the right to kill people coming up your driveway, kill prostitutes who refuse to have sex with you, and kill unarmed black teens.

In America, you don’t need money to be part of the privileged class – you just need a gun permit. Oh, and of course, it helps a lot if you’re white, since they’re 354% more likely to be cleared of murder in states that give gun owners extra rights.