Cody Wilson is a 25-year-old University of Texas law student, self-proclaimed market anarchist and co-founder of the arms manufacturing company Defense Distributed. The company has managed to set itself apart from other arms manufacturers because its fully functional handguns and semi-automatic rifle components are available for free to anyone with an Internet connection and access to a 3-D printer. With the advent of 3-D printable firearms and the mass distribution of them via Internet downloads, Wilson has been dubbed one of the “15 Most Dangerous People in the World” by www.wired.com and National Security blog, Danger Room. The only people who should really consider Wilson and company dangerous are law makers and anti-gun enthusiast on Capitol Hill.
In wake of the 16 mass shootings that took place in 2012, President Barack Obama initiated 23 executive actions aimed at curbing gun violence, including universal background checks, increased regulation of large capacity magazines and a resurrection of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban. Despite mounting evidence that gun laws do not curb gun violence, such as the Center for Disease Control’s dubbing of 51 control initiates as “insufficient,” politicians still vehemently strive to violate the Second Amendment and destroy private property rights.
The way Wilson’s firearms are manufactured is the source of all the controversy surrounding them. Wilson and company have utilized 3-D printers and thermoplastics to make fully functional, nonmetallic firearms available to anyone and are completely untraceable by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives since they can be manufactured at home without a serial number.
Politicians such as U.S. Rep. Steve Israel proclaim that mass production of these nonmetallic firearms increase the likelihood of terrorists bringing these firearms onto planes and calls for an extension of the Undetectable Firearms Act that bans all firearms not detectable by metal detectors. Yet the Transportation Security Administration currently employs Advanced Imaging Technology that can “safely screen passengers for metallic and nonmetallic threats” and is used in more than 160 airports nationwide, according to its website. Israel’s blatant ignorance and campaign against Wilson and Defense Distributed is a testament to the states’ desire to legislatively thwart technological, societal and political progress.
While Republicans and Democrats spew age-old gun control rhetoric at one another, Wilson has managed to transcend the left versus right political paradigm and add a new dimension to the gun control debate. The idea that any new firearm legislation is initially void due to Wilson’s accomplishments and the issue of intellectual property rights regarding the free distribution of firearms has opened a political Pandora’s box.
Wilson has put the spotlight on the striking authoritarian similarities between the left and right and feels that American politics have grown stagnant. In an interview with Glenn Beck, Wilson stated, “I don’t believe in Romney vs. Obama. I believe in real politics. That is a real political act, giving you a magazine and telling you that no one can take that away. That wasn’t true maybe two weeks ago.”
Wilson has become the poster boy for the idea that we have not come to the final political paradigm and that the state cannot halt human progress. Technological advancement will always circumvent state-imposed prohibition and Defense Distributed in the personification of that idea.
Defense Distributed has produced a multitude of firearm components and a fully functional handgun dubbed “The Liberator.” They have also produced 3-D printable 30 round AK-47 and AR-15 magazines nicknamed “The Feinstein” and “The Cuomo” respectively in ode to the two anti-liberty politicians.
Cody Wilson has successfully spearheaded the pro-liberty movement, transcended worn out left wing versus right wing rhetoric and has brought about an international political shift. Wilson is the greatest example of a modern political revolutionary and has done more for political and technological progress than any suit and tie in Washington.
T. Emmett Ryan is a Santa Fe political science sophomore. His columns appear Tuesdays.
