We the People... and guns

This writeup is actually a draft to a reply comment in a thread in an IMDb message board of a film about guns and people titled "Dear Wendy".

The conspiratorial part of me thinks that the Dandies were all set-up by the sheriff, who's half-confession to Dick (the main protagonist) later in the film indicates his desire for a gun monopoly. Those who want a power monopoly on guns are just fine with getting the Second Amendment scrapped.

Sebastian was brought to the town to infiltrate (to try to seek some more information about the group, confirm its intentions and stuff) and and report on it. He had to do it, since he was the one who had the most to lose in the first place. Sebastian might not even have been a relative of Clarabelle, who couldn't remember anything anyway.

The first warning sign was Sebastian using another person's gun. In a way he might have wanted to indicate that he was more trouble than it seemed, but I don't know if it was intentional on Sebastian's part or not.

The Dandies could as well have gotten off the hook, with the quite possible exception of Sebastian himself, since it was Clarabelle who had the shotgun hidden deep in her purse anyway.

The typical reaction the gang had post Clarabelle's shooting an officer was fear, so they reacted accordingly. The correct reaction would (IMHO) have been to take the gun away from Clarabelle or to distance oneself from her, but not leave the scene and appear deeply red-handed. Another way to clear up the situation would have been to make clear who shot the shot. No-one knew that Clarabelle had the gun with her. Well, I was wathing with just half-an eye (figuratively).

The beginning of the movie has the main protagonist (Dick) gaining a newly-found confidence in himself, such that he had not felt before in his life. The end of the movie ends with people wielding guns with more confidence than they have ever deserved in their own petty lives.

Sebastian is finally shown slowly making a turnaround for the Dandies and their core principles, as along the film's progression he realises, that the Dandies are just kids with a rather strong ethical focus towards guns.

The short end of the morale: The cops got killed, the kids got killed. Lack of trust and mutually assured destruction. The lack of other items besides guns that could instill such confidence in disaffected people -- Little else other than a gun instills people with as much confidence.

The longer end:
The film draws a harsh comparison of two gun-owning societies by showing which one of them is sufficiently mature to actually bear arms.