Of course. Protection and survival go hand-in-hand. [ diplomatic to the end. padmé draws her patience around her like the heavy robes that once marked her station. ] I am not attempting to establish one over the other. My point is one you yourself brought up: fear.

[ as she speaks, her fingers skip over the parts of the gun she pulled apart. she cleans them as best she is able. blasters had saved her life on more than one occasion, but to padmé they are a last line of defense. a resource one should only count on when all others had been exhausted. ideally, they would be used little. experience had forced her to take them up too often to count, but her belief remain unchanged.

blasters are dangerous. in the hands of someone already frightened, frightened further by the promise of a "them" courtesy of the weapon they're given… it's a tragedy waiting to happen. ]

Unlike, say, a knife, a blaster cannot be reduced to simply a tool. A blaster has only one purpose. Put it in someone's hand, it is with the implicit promise that it will need to be fired. Inexperience paired with fear is a lethal combination. [ for reasons that she truly hopes are obvious. ] And the fact remains that we don't have the means to train everyone, nor should we if we did.

Knowledge remains the better instrument to counter fear. Organization to prevent panic. Fostering diversity of thought, different means of approaching a problem. There is peace of mind found in being heard.