I know it will happen. Just give it 8 hours.

Hah

I believe that we need anti gun laws to protect against stupid parents because we can't stop them from having children. Sure dumb parenting is to blame AS WELL but America does not need all these guns.

Re: Hah

Why not though? If kept in the hands of adults, who keep them safely and use them responsibly, they pose no threat to anyone except people whom they fully intend on shooting, such as armed criminals breaking into their homes.

You should not pre-emptively punish the many for the sake of the few who are too stupid to handle it. Simply punish them, and leave those with the brain capacity to handle it free to act as they wish.

Whoever is stupid enough to leave a loaded weapon in a place that a 4-year old could reach it should be charged with de-facto murder, on top of negligence.

Well...not really. But still. I do rather like Erik's comparison of pre-emptive war to pre-emptive safety regulations.

The other question being, where does one draw the line for need? The rich don't need all their money. Why don't we just take it from them and give it to the poor? I don't need the ability to buy 5 different bread flavors at my local store. Why not just enrich one kind with all the nutrients I need?

Where does "need" stop being an actual necessity and begin to become a crutch and a farce?

Re: Hah

Everything is dangerous in excess. The fact still remains however that you are more likely to be shot by your own gun then you are likely to shoot someone breaking into your home.

Look at all the other countries with gun banning laws. How many deaths do they have a year from guns alone? Not as many as us... What about the people who go buy a gun and shoot up their work place? What if they had to do a *lot* of work to go get that gun?

Maybe it would give them time to think twice. I know that fully banning guns will never happen in the states because of things like the NRA and other such groups. Lets support the second amendment okay? You should only be able to own guns made during the civil war. One round and it takes you 2 minutes to load it! If you are going to shoot someone you must reeeeally want to do it.

Or perhaps we should give guns to everyone so we can all defend ourselves from each other? I mean what if someone breaks into my house and I need to fire back?

Christ I would rather see NO ONE with guns rather then "responsible" owners. Because someday these responsible owners might either snap or loose their gun to someone not as nice.

Re: Hah

And look at England, where criminals now have virutal free reign to break into someone's home and is quickly becoming one of the major crime centers of the world. A direct result of the outright banning of handguns.

Those countries with gun banning laws also have smaller populations. i would wager $10 that several of them still have a higher ratio of violent crime when you consider the population.

If no one had guns, then only the military and police would. Then what stops them? I only trust people who have the capacity to control me only as long as I have some way of controlling them.

I would rather see everyone given a gun then have nobody allowed the freedom to defend themselves and their property from others. I would rather see 1000 children die from accidental shootings than see a military coup in this country simply because the citizens could not stop it.

As an aside, how many reports do you ever hear of children whose parents are in militias dying of accidental shootings? I bet if you looked up that number, it would be significantly lower than the number of those who died whose parents were casual gun owners.

Casual gun owners generally do not teach children how to respect weapons, and the power they hold, nor do they teach them how to properly operate them.

Re: Hah you really suck. - This one is Ben talking

Your point on England is poor, hell its poor statistic manipulation. Sure crime in England is on the increase, but linking it to firearms, thats just stupid. England is in the middle of a massive recession, unemployment is high and welfare has been getting more restricted since Thatcherism came into vogue. These are far more likely catalysts than the fear of getting shot by the person you are robbing. Hell the thieves can't get decent firearms without a degree of difficulty anyhow and you are talking about home invasion, not armed robbery, so firearms are a moot point.


Your point on higher murder rates doesn't work either. The US Gun related murder rate was taken at over 11,000, approximate the population at close to 300,000,000. Most other countries have a hard time getting into the several hundred a year. For example, Canada, 30,000,000 people - 165 Gun murders, 1 per 181,818 people, Australia with a population of 20,000,000 had 65 gun related murders. Lets take those percentages, the murder-rate per capita in the states therefore is approximately 1/26,968. Australia has a rate of 1 in 307,692 people. That is around 11.4 times the rate of the US. So it is most definitely NOT relative

How many Western nations where we don't possess guns do you hear dealing with military coups, in fact when you look at where coups are taking place its in regions that are RUN by Militaristic Regimes, Africa and South America are the primary theatres of coups today.

This is part of the problem, you people think you have a right to defend yourself. From who exactly? How many times has your house been broken into? How many times have you been beaten up walking down the street? No this is all in case the evil criminal man comes to get me, or as the 2nd amendment was written the Brittish. Its been 200 years I think you are pretty safe right now that they aren't interested.

No Gun ownership isn't a damn right. It is a privelege that has been perverted and totally taken out of frigging context. You have a right to life, all these evil criminals you're going to shoot with teh guns you all (Gun zealots)hoarde up have a right to life. You have no right to kill them. So therefore you have the privelege to own guns to protect you from the Brittish military. Hell its a 200 year old ammendment I think it should be taken literally, That meaning you have the right to 'bear firearms' designed right up until it was written. You have no right to own guns designed solely for killing people, automatic rifles nobody should be allowed to own privately.

All in all your defence that the world will fall apart without all of you totting your little guns and protecting your unique brand of "Democracy", I don't know how anyone can be truly free with all the fear floating around Gun defending arguments. Hell, here I can't own a handgun or an automatic, or even a semi-automatic and you know what I am still alive and haven't been robbed once and on a relative scale as you so stress I think you'll find that across the board all of our crime rates are lower.

Re: Hah you really suck. - This one is Ben talking

amen, ben. hope things are going well with you guys!

thanks for posting the gun related murder rates - ever since i saw "bowling for columbine" finally a couple weeks ago i've been wondering what those are.

my take on this whole situation is that the u.s. has had guns too long and gotten to used to this idea that they should have them.

i will venture to say that the majority of gun related deaths in this country are made with illegally sold, unregistered guns. with that said would it really make sense to ban guns completely? the majority of the killers would still be able to get their guns, it might just be a little harder to get them but get them they would.

and with that said i'll say that i agree quite a bit with michael moore that we need to change the influences that cause people in this country to believe that guns are a good answer - main influence being the media. and no, i don't mean rock music and pop culture but the media coverage of what is going on in this country - the real live news coverage on t.v. and in magazines and newspapers across the country.

how many times have you heard people in the u.s. say: "i don't watch the news, it's too depressing". that should be changed - it should focus on the positive and not the negative. the fact that people find the negative so exciting is why it keeps on the way it is. the point made about the cycle of fear and consumption in this country was dead on and i think if that could be changed it would change so many other problems we here in the u.s. deal with every day.

then again, i'm an idealist. how can we change a cycle that's been revving up and fine-tuned for hundreds of years?

-katie

Re: Hah you really suck. - This one is Ben talking

"This is part of the problem, you people think you have a right to defend yourself. From who exactly? How many times has your house been broken into? How many times have you been beaten up walking down the street? No this is all in case the evil criminal man comes to get me, or as the 2nd amendment was written the Brittish. Its been 200 years I think you are pretty safe right now that they aren't interested.

No Gun ownership isn't a damn right. It is a privelege that has been perverted and totally taken out of frigging context. You have a right to life, all these evil criminals you're going to shoot with teh guns you all (Gun zealots)hoarde up have a right to life. You have no right to kill them. So therefore you have the privelege to own guns to protect you from the Brittish military. Hell its a 200 year old ammendment I think it should be taken literally, That meaning you have the right to 'bear firearms' designed right up until it was written. You have no right to own guns designed solely for killing people, automatic rifles nobody should be allowed to own privately.

All in all your defence that the world will fall apart without all of you totting your little guns and protecting your unique brand of "Democracy", I don't know how anyone can be truly free with all the fear floating around Gun defending arguments. Hell, here I can't own a handgun or an automatic, or even a semi-automatic and you know what I am still alive and haven't been robbed once and on a relative scale as you so stress I think you'll find that across the board all of our crime rates are lower. "

And yet every single post has failed to make the point as to why it is inherently wrong to own a gun. If it is not wrong, then why should it not be a right? The government should not have the capacity to tell us what we can and cannot own. Ownership is one of the three primary rights argued by Locke, and it is one of the fundamental rights every person has.

If we do not use a gun in a way that harms another human being, how is it wrong to own one? Simply because it can be used for an evil purpose does not mean it will. Pre-empting evil by limiting freedom is just as evil.

The government exists to protect it's citizens from those who seek to do them harm. That is the ONLY purpose I see in government. it should not act as a nanny and hold our hand through life, as that negates the point of living to begin with.

Preventing people from owning weapons is not a protection. The people who are going to harm people are going to harm them all the same. The means to do it will change but the evil will not go away.

Yet again, I ask. Why is it wrong to own a gun? Why and how is it more right to prevent me from owning one?

[b]Gun laws to prevent murders:[/b] This is one of the most flawed ideas ever. If guns were banned to prevent people from intentionally killing each other, why would criminals refrain from buying them? "Oh, I'd better go register my gun legally so I don't break TWO laws when I murder."

I didn't even touch on the fact that plenty of objects can be used as weapons. People were able to kill people a long time before guns were invented. Banning them won't stop those that think it's ass-haulin' time.

[b]Gun laws to prevent accidents:[/b] This position first of all implies that no one is competent enough to make a decision on his own, and second of all. Secondly, and very contradictorily, that government officials are competent to decide for everyone else what they should/may do. Oddly enough, most people don't seem to consider the fact that this just adds a middleman to the decision-making process. If I want a gun, I'm voting for someone that opposes gun control. Unfortunately, if two people don't want me to have a gun, I'm outnumbered, and as a result, am not allowed to do what I want with my life and property, but instead have to conform to someone's fears, however irrational or unjustified.

Yes, yes, I'm sure you have a lot of statistics. Statistics can be used to "prove" lots of things. Guns result in thousands of accidental deaths a year? So we should ban them to save lives? I'll accept your position as long as you're willing to ban the following entirely: cars, cigarettes, drugs, sex, physical contact with sick people, raw meat, stairs, knives, wild animals, anything flammable, household cleaners, and natural disasters. I can think of more if you'd like.

The problem is that plenty of things result in death. In fact, living itself results in death. We'd go a long way in preventing death by killing everyone so they don't have to worry about dying. If you advocate gun control because too many people die from the existence of guns through accidents, then you have to be willing to ban everything that produces similar results.


Since statistics seem to go so far with you guys, perhaps you should look at this: http://www.saps.gov.za/profile/popul.htm

For every 450 American citizens, there's ONE police officer to protect them all. The police can't be everywhere, and can't prevent everything. Yet you see problems with people carrying weapons for purposes of self-defense, so they're left without much of a solution should there be no police officers present.


In the end, all of your arguments suffer from the same basic fallacy; that a man has no right to his own life, no right to his own property, and no right to make his own decisions, whether they result in success or accidents.

-Erik

Nice of you guys to totally miss the point,

Alright as an aside Erik, America has one of the highest Police to Citizen ratios in the world. The ratio here in my state of Victoria is about 1 to every 1000 citizens.

Look I am saying that your arguments for gun ownership are shoddy at best. You attack mine and yet you can't really get past the whole "Its a right Consarnit!" point of view. I mean all I see coming back is that and a whole heap of paranoid scenarios. Self Defence from burglars that have never hurt you in the past, from a military coup that as other democratic countries with strict gun laws have shown just doesn't happen.

Hell, you want to stick so hard to your right to own guns at least conceed that the weapons available on the market have gotten out of hand. There is simply no need for automatic, semi-automatic rifles, hollow point bullets and especially handguns among the public. The second Ammendment was written over 200 years ago. It was not written with these technologies in mind. All of these weapons soul purpose is killing people. Can't you see how insane this argument is?

The arguments on your side are shoddy too. You attack ours yet you can't really get past the whole "It isn't needed Consarnit!" Paranoid scenarios, while unlikely, should never be discounted. Need anyone recall the french revolution, which gave us the lovely little invention known as the guillotine?

How does a burglar not harm me? he takes thing that I worked for, that I paid for, that are mine. He has no right to something I own, and I will defend those things against his use of force to remove them from my control.

Weapons on the market are out of hand? Only if they are used out of hand. Fighting a man weilding an assault rifle with a handgun? Madness. Police use assault rifles too. Isn't that a bit extreme? And simply because we have the highest Police to Citizen ratios in the world doesn't mean much when there is one police officer for every however many citizens. That one police officer can't be at 5 different houses on a night when there is one murder, a rape and two burglaries.

Guns should not be taken away simply because a small minority use them in a negative way. As Erik pointed out, and has been mentioned to the point at which it has become inane, you would be obligated to use the same justification for a myriad of other objects, to the point at which it would go on ad absurdium, to the point of rediculousness.

*sigh*

Hello folks, it's Drizzten. Any statistical arguements I would make I have already made in Members Only a long time ago. However, they are unimportant to the point.

Any arguement based on someone's "need" is bunk and not valid. You do not determine what I need to live my life and I do not determine what you need to live your life. Do I *need* 300 CDs? Do I *need* a nice car? Do I *need* a firearm loaded and next to my bed? Absolutely, because I have long decided that those are some of the things that I value enough to obtain. I have a concealed weapon license as well and I've carried a small .38 special around town running errands. Why? Because I refuse to let myself become a statistic. My life and the things I value are too important to say, "Nah, never happen to me. I'll just call the cops and wait a few minutes" or "I'll just give this jerk what he wants and let him vicimize me" or "Perhaps if I run away, I can escape harm."

It doesn't matter if I will never use my 9mm in self-defense. What matters is I have an extremely effective means to protect myself, those I love, and my valuables in case of emergency. NO ONE has the right to deny me my right of self-defense. To argue otherwise is to say a collective of humans is more important than an individual...a fallacy that rests upon the implicit acknowledgement that you sacrifice an individual in order to save a group of individuals. Of course, those who argue that are rarely in the position of that sacrificial person, so they can argue on about how silly it sounds to want to defend yourself from boogeymen and overbearing governments.

Gunfire is merely one way of committing murder. You want to ban items that can easily murder? You better have a lot of paper ready. Crimes of passion (the ones often decried when guns are involved) are by their nature irrational. Remove the gun from a hypothetical scene and the future criminal will use something else.

"If it only saves one life" is possibly the worst EVER excuse for violating individual rights. This kind of justification can be used against any concievable dangerous object and activity. You want to neuter the world and make it progressively safer? You'll have to run roughshod over freedom and personal responsibility to do it.

Have a nice day. :)

I would like to state, as a simple matter of fact, that the sole purpose of a gun is not to kill, but to harm.

It can be used to kill, but that is not it's inate purpose. Someone can just as easily shoot someone else in the leg as the head.

Well...

A firearm has no will of it's own, so it's actions are dictated by it's user. But all uses of a firearm (except for display or ceremony) involve destruction of some sort, with death as a possible side product.

On the other hand, I'm inclined to disagree somewhat, partially due to my upbringing. If I aim a loaded firearm at someone, there is only one thing I'm aiming at: the center ring. In the unpredictable situations that can arise from a criminal encounter, I'm not taking any chances. If I aim in anger, my first shots go towards the chest.

Tricky shit like shooting legs and arms can come later, if necessary. Hopefully, you've loaded sam's hated hollow-points to make the quickest possible stop without needing to follow-up.

-Drizzten (http://www.drizzten.com/blog/)

Throwing the towel in.

They managed to bring in someone whos opinions I usually respect. I don't like arguing...I mean "debating" for the sake of it so I will just give it up. You have about as much chance of convincing me as I have of swaying you.

I like America its got a lot of blood on its hands but its my country and I can bash it all I want but it is nicer then some places I could be. But to make one point I have been in Australia for a little while now and it isn't an internment camp. It is not the third reich where people's freedoms have been taken away. They have extreamly harsh gun policies here however and not a one person I have talked to has complained about it. They haven't had their freedom taken away it would appear.

America has gotten the reputation of a country full of paranoid, ignorant, rifle weilding jerks, with one hand on the button and the other stroking their own proverbial dicks. I hate to say I can see where this opinion is coming from.

I won't agrue anymore though because Drizz in his last comment proved my point more then I could have possibly hoped to.

On a side note the last comment made from this lj name was Ben and not me.

Re: Throwing the towel in.

Sam, I don't consider it relevant if another country's population as a whole doesn't complain about lost freedoms or bears any serious resemblance to a 21st century Axis power. I think it's sad they choose to vote their freedom away, but that's their choice. Of course, your statement isn't a valid arguement at all. Would you say the same thing (summed up as, "the people don't mind") if a nation voted to require everyone to engage in some activity or disengage in some activity you find respectively horrifying or important?

The fact that the majority of people living in societies with stricter gun controls don't complain about those controls doesn't change the nature of the problem (as Matt, Erik, and I have mentioned several times, it's our right to our property and lives that gives us the ancilliary right to own firearms) in any way. Neither does the fact that the bureaucracy required to enforce such laws most likely won't resemble militant facism. The appearance or popular approval of an idea or action does not change it's nature or it's morality.

If my last remarks prove to you that I am a "paranoid, ignorant, rifle weilding jerk," then that's your opinion to make. On the other hand, I see my comments as being entirely serious (except for that shooting arms and legs part), fully anchored in reality, and simple to understand. Someone breaks into your house, and you've got mere seconds to make critical choices. Better to escalate the threat of bodily damage to it's very highest level and scare the bastard out of your home than position yourself in a manner to allow the person to attack you. In short, you aim to kill. To shortchange yourself to fullfill some desire to appear open to compromise, hesitant to repell, or otherwise come across as "nicer" is seriously endangering your own life and property.

That isn't paranoia or ignorance. It's reality. Hopefully none of us will have to encounter such a situation. But if I do, I know I at least have a tool to fight back. You, on the other hand, might not.

-Drizzten