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Although this thread does not function under the same strict guidelines as the USPMT, it is still a general practice on TL to provide a source with an explanation on why it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion. Failure to do so will result in a mod action. |
On March 01 2012 04:47 brain_ wrote:
ITT people who have never owned, fired, or seen guns tell demonize innocent people and tell them what they can and cannot do.
All that matters to me is this: people own themselves and should be free to do whatever they want so long as they do not (unconsentingly) harm other people or the property of others. Buying/owning a gun does not hurt anyone, nor does it violate anybody's rights. You can't argue that it displays an intention to do so, because the vast majority of gun owners are peaceful people who never end up hurting anyone... And besides, if you buy that kind of logic, then you're fine with preemptive wars and whole lot of other bad things. Regardless, the act of owning a gun doesn't harm anyone, so you don't have the right to use the force of law to coerce compliance out of somebody who is doing nothing wrong other than making you uncomfortable.
I think guns are pretty miraculous. What else can put an octogenarian on an equal footing with a heavyweight boxer? Personally, I own two rifles and I'll buy a handgun for my birthday this year. I'm going to the range this weekend to try out a few different models with friends. Then again, Americans are predisposed to see guns for the tools that they are because of the history of our frontier. Our ancestors shot their way to dinner, to Independence, and sadly through a hell of a lot of Indians. Europe, on the other hand, has been sewn up by one totalitarian state or another for the last 800 years... And none of those states wanted the common people to be armed.
In the end, it doesn't matter - just follow the golden rule.... If nobody is violating your rights, you don't have a right to fuck with them. And if they fuck with you... well, have a gun!
You are correct I do not have the right to coerce anyone. Society on the other hand has. There is no right to own a gun, it is privilege granted by society.
Europe has kind of aversion to gun ownership partially because people with guns in our history were those who raped, pillaged and murdered (as they did in US). But also because we killed tens of millions of ourselves in wars spanning centuries with them and that stands as rather glaring warning to people of what guns are built for.
And yes your ancestors killed a lot of Indians, but they did not shoot themselves to independence with privately owned weapons. They shot themselves to independence by "government" borrowing money and creating (semi)professional military with those funds.
What you wrote is not a golden rule. It is just a credo of a tough-guy street thug.
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On March 01 2012 05:05 dogabutila wrote:
All statistics, semantics, what ifs, and where-do-you-draw-the-lines aside it all comes down to this:
What gives you the right to take my firearm away from me?
Me, nothing. Society on the other hand can give you the privilege of owning a gun, but can also take it away if considered necessary.
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On March 01 2012 06:13 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 02:47 mcc wrote:Yes safety is broader term than just homicide rates, but likelihood of being killed is a big part of it. Typically, if you're trying to kill an average citizen in a civilized society, you will succeed regardless of what weapon you have available. Humans are remarkably fragile, and if you are out to kill someone there are literally almost unlimited means to do so. What firearms actually affect are unintentional homicides, as it is far more likely that an untrained individual can accidentally kill someone with a firearm than with, say, a knife, baseball bat, or their bare hands. However, all this suggests is that regulating firearm safety is of the utmost importance, just as it is critical to strongly regulate the use of vehicles (which are similarly very capable of causing unintentional homicide when used improperly).
I noted that in my second post in this thread that the reason for bans on guns should be prevention of accidental deaths and crime of passion death toll minimization. And easiest way to do it is to ban guns as unlike cars they are not in any way essential for functioning modern society. This is where analogy with cars breaks down.
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On March 01 2012 07:19 mcc wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 04:47 brain_ wrote:
ITT people who have never owned, fired, or seen guns tell demonize innocent people and tell them what they can and cannot do.
All that matters to me is this: people own themselves and should be free to do whatever they want so long as they do not (unconsentingly) harm other people or the property of others. Buying/owning a gun does not hurt anyone, nor does it violate anybody's rights. You can't argue that it displays an intention to do so, because the vast majority of gun owners are peaceful people who never end up hurting anyone... And besides, if you buy that kind of logic, then you're fine with preemptive wars and whole lot of other bad things. Regardless, the act of owning a gun doesn't harm anyone, so you don't have the right to use the force of law to coerce compliance out of somebody who is doing nothing wrong other than making you uncomfortable.
I think guns are pretty miraculous. What else can put an octogenarian on an equal footing with a heavyweight boxer? Personally, I own two rifles and I'll buy a handgun for my birthday this year. I'm going to the range this weekend to try out a few different models with friends. Then again, Americans are predisposed to see guns for the tools that they are because of the history of our frontier. Our ancestors shot their way to dinner, to Independence, and sadly through a hell of a lot of Indians. Europe, on the other hand, has been sewn up by one totalitarian state or another for the last 800 years... And none of those states wanted the common people to be armed.
In the end, it doesn't matter - just follow the golden rule.... If nobody is violating your rights, you don't have a right to fuck with them. And if they fuck with you... well, have a gun! (1) You are correct I do not have the right to coerce anyone. Society on the other hand has. There is no right to own a gun, it is privilege granted by society. (2) Europe has kind of aversion to gun ownership partially because people with guns in our history were those who raped, pillaged and murdered (as they did in US). But also because we killed tens of millions of ourselves in wars spanning centuries with them and that stands as rather glaring warning to people of what guns are built for.
1: How can society have a right, such as the "right" to initiate violence, that individuals do not have themselves? Society is a figment of our imagination. It is just a collection of individuals that you arbitrarily associate in your head. All rights stem from individual rights. Any "rights" that imaginary collectives have must be derived from individual rights. So how could collective rights trump the individual rights from which they derive their existence? If collective rights trump individual rights, then those individual rights don't exist, and therefore the collective rights don't exist either. Conclusion: if you believe in individual rights, there can be no such thing as collective rights.
To phrase it from another angle: society is just a lot of individuals. You admit that you don't have the right to coerce me, yet think that "society" does. If society is just individuals, which individual has the right to initiate force against me? How can you give somebody else the right to use violence against me when you yourself do not have that right? How can you give someone something that you don't own? It doesn't make sense.
2: The people who murdered millions with guns (and gas chambers) were not private gun owners. They were totalitarian governments whose rise to power was made easier by the fact that the populace was lightly armed. More specifically, it was government thugs and legions of brainwashed, sometimes-voluntary slaves (called "soldiers") who murdered millions. And keep in mind that Auschwitz was completely legal according to German law at the time... That is the kind of "morality" you get when you allow governments to dictate right and wrong because they act on behalf of an imaginary "society". Stick to basic human rights and you can't go wrong.
Europe should have an aversion to governments, not to guns.
On March 01 2012 04:54 TanTzoR wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 04:47 brain_ wrote:
Europe, on the other hand, has been sewn up by one totalitarian state or another for the last 800 years... And none of those states wanted the common people to be armed.
Ok. Your post may be the most sensible thing ever, you lose all credibility when you say that.
Excepting western Europe for the last 70 years, Eastern Europe for the last 20, and England for a bit longer than either, how is my statement inaccurate?
70 years ago Nazis were rounding up Jews. 30 years ago East Germans who dissented were forcibly imprisoned in mental hospitals where they were sedated and denied visits. People trying to cross into West Germany were shot.
80 years ago the British Empire was beating peaceful Indians to death because they marched with Ghandi. In WWI millions of young British men marched to their deaths for the sake of vague nationalism and "alliances".
Go back much further and it was all monarchy.
Never forget how close to home this stuff is. The vast majority of Europeans are only two to four generations away from being peasants, pawns for the ruling class to kill or send to their deaths at a whim. Historically, a lot of this is true for America as well, but it is balanced by the nature of our frontier and the philosophy of our founders. Keep in mind I'm not saying America is the greatest place ever, yada yada, just pointing out an aspect of our culture that is relevant to this issue.
On March 01 2012 06:23 Focuspants wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 04:47 brain_ wrote:
ITT people who have never owned, fired, or seen guns tell demonize innocent people and tell them what they can and cannot do.
All that matters to me is this: people own themselves and should be free to do whatever they want so long as they do not (unconsentingly) harm other people or the property of others. Buying/owning a gun does not hurt anyone, nor does it violate anybody's rights. That logic is flawed because it can be applied to anything so long as you dont actually use it. With this logic, you can own ANYTHING, regardless of how harmful it COULD be, just for the sake of having it. The sheer fact that it is there, makes it more likely to be used, and furthermore, like everything else dangerous humans get their hands on, it increases its chances of being MISUSED greatly.
And by your logic, people can't be allowed to own ANYTHING. How do I know you aren't going to go on a killing spree with that car of yours? How do I know you aren't planning to stab your wife with your kitchen knife?
Basically you are saying that fear trumps individual rights. Because you are uneasy, you have the "right" to have uniformed thugs force people to act the way you want.
All this because people COULD do something. Doesn't that seem a little odd to you?
On March 01 2012 06:58 hzflank wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 05:05 dogabutila wrote:
All statistics, semantics, what ifs, and where-do-you-draw-the-lines aside it all comes down to this:
What gives you the right to take my firearm away from me? The same thing that gives the taxman the right to take your money away from you. No one is truly free. There has to be a line drawn somewhere. The question is what side of the line should firearms fall on? I don't know the answer but I do no that using 'freedom' as an argument is ridiculous.
This is what statists actually believe. That society couldn't possibly function if people were free - instead we need some all-powerful body to force us to behave. Reward the "good ones" according to your definition and punish the "bad ones". Like God, just in the form of lots of people with uniforms and guns. Funny how people who rail against religion all day long will turn around and place the same faith in government, a self-interested and violent organization.
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On March 01 2012 07:24 mcc wrote:I noted that in my second post in this thread that the reason for bans on guns should be prevention of accidental deaths and crime of passion death toll minimization. And easiest way to do it is to ban guns as unlike cars they are not in any way essential for functioning modern society. This is where analogy with cars breaks down.
The easiest way to minimize harm with anything is banning. That doens't mean it's the best way to minimize harm. Prevention of accidental deaths is not best addressed by complete banning. Would you argue that alcohol should be banned completely, or regulated? It's not about whether something is "essential" (aside from the fact that this is bullshit anyway since we could get along without just about anything, including cars). It's about costs vs. benefits.
What you don't seem to understand is that freedom is considered an intrinsic good, and you have also failed to considered the academic research that shows that legal firearms reduce crime. The burden is on you to show that (a) the costs of legalized firearms ownership outweigh the benefits (to freedom and crime reduction), and that (b) the best way to deal with that is outright banning.
While you have shown that (a) is debatable, you certainly haven't supported (b) in the slightest. Most proponents of firearms ownership do acknowledge that firearms are dangerous tools, but address this with the need of stringent safety regulation rather than outright banning. If you think that firearm ownership should be banned, you had better present evidence that this option and the associated outcomes are superior to properly regulated ownership.
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This is a silly thread. There are no statistics being presented. Just two sides claiming that the other side is wrong.
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Being allowed to own guns and being allowed to carry guns are two totally different things, I think owning guns is ok, but carrying them in public seems a bit too much. It also depends on the type of firearm too, most friends i know here in canada own a hunting rifle (though im from the middle of nowhere), and im perfectly fine with that.
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On March 01 2012 08:09 brain_ wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 07:19 mcc wrote:On March 01 2012 04:47 brain_ wrote:
ITT people who have never owned, fired, or seen guns tell demonize innocent people and tell them what they can and cannot do.
All that matters to me is this: people own themselves and should be free to do whatever they want so long as they do not (unconsentingly) harm other people or the property of others. Buying/owning a gun does not hurt anyone, nor does it violate anybody's rights. You can't argue that it displays an intention to do so, because the vast majority of gun owners are peaceful people who never end up hurting anyone... And besides, if you buy that kind of logic, then you're fine with preemptive wars and whole lot of other bad things. Regardless, the act of owning a gun doesn't harm anyone, so you don't have the right to use the force of law to coerce compliance out of somebody who is doing nothing wrong other than making you uncomfortable.
I think guns are pretty miraculous. What else can put an octogenarian on an equal footing with a heavyweight boxer? Personally, I own two rifles and I'll buy a handgun for my birthday this year. I'm going to the range this weekend to try out a few different models with friends. Then again, Americans are predisposed to see guns for the tools that they are because of the history of our frontier. Our ancestors shot their way to dinner, to Independence, and sadly through a hell of a lot of Indians. Europe, on the other hand, has been sewn up by one totalitarian state or another for the last 800 years... And none of those states wanted the common people to be armed.
In the end, it doesn't matter - just follow the golden rule.... If nobody is violating your rights, you don't have a right to fuck with them. And if they fuck with you... well, have a gun! (1) You are correct I do not have the right to coerce anyone. Society on the other hand has. There is no right to own a gun, it is privilege granted by society. (2) Europe has kind of aversion to gun ownership partially because people with guns in our history were those who raped, pillaged and murdered (as they did in US). But also because we killed tens of millions of ourselves in wars spanning centuries with them and that stands as rather glaring warning to people of what guns are built for. 1: How can society have a right, such as the "right" to initiate violence, that individuals do not have themselves? Society is a figment of our imagination. It is just a collection of individuals that you arbitrarily associate in your head. All rights stem from individual rights. Any "rights" that imaginary collectives have must be derived from individual rights. So how could collective rights trump the individual rights from which they derive their existence? If collective rights trump individual rights, then those individual rights don't exist, and therefore the collective rights don't exist either. Conclusion: if you believe in individual rights, there can be no such thing as collective rights. To phrase it from another angle: society is just a lot of individuals. You admit that you don't have the right to coerce me, yet think that "society" does. If society is just individuals, which individual has the right to initiate force against me? How can you give somebody else the right to use violence against me when you yourself do not have that right? How can you give someone something that you don't own? It doesn't make sense.
Society is not figment of anyones imagination unless you call your body figment of imagination just because it is composed of individual cells. Anyway when I say right of society I mean two aspects, one is ability to enforce and second is morality of the act.
Concept of individual right is just something that when enforced will mostly produce positive , in a moral sense, results. There are no rights without society as they are social constructs. Societal "rights" are different beast altogether. Societal rights are purely rights for society to enforce something, whereas individual rights are protection from acts of others. There is no link, so your attempts to logically link them and disprove existence of societal rights is lacking.
Individual rights are societal constructs. Nothing stems from them. They stem from ethics as shortcut, good-enough for practical use, everyday approximations of actual ethical principles. Societal right(s) are emergent phenomena, similar how one neuron is not capable of generating consciousness, yet whole brain is. It is somewhat imprecise analogy as the nature of such emergence is different in both cases, but enough to illustrate.
So I am not giving society any rights. They emerge from human interactions and social organization. The only common thing they have with individual rights is that in the end they both stem from biology, but in different ways.
To summarize. Acts are either moral or immoral and that can be determined without appealing to rights. Individual rights are just guiding principles that in most cases lead to ethically good outcomes. But they are not the basis of morality/ethics. They are application of actual moral principles in the messy real world. Societal rights on the other hand is first recognition that society can collectively enforce things and second the thing being enforced has to be moral/ethical. So society has the "right" to ban guns if it is able to enforce it and second if banning guns will lead to moral/ethical outcome.
On March 01 2012 08:09 brain_ wrote:
2: The people who murdered millions with guns (and gas chambers) were not private gun owners. They were totalitarian governments whose rise to power was made easier by the fact that the populace was lightly armed. More specifically, it was government thugs and legions of brainwashed, sometimes-voluntary slaves (called "soldiers") who murdered millions. And keep in mind that Auschwitz was completely legal according to German law at the time... That is the kind of "morality" you get when you allow governments to dictate right and wrong because they act on behalf of an imaginary "society". Stick to basic human rights and you can't go wrong.
Europe should have an aversion to governments, not to guns.
My point in that statement was to explain European aversion to guns, not to argue whether this is or is not a reason to ban guns. Aversion are by definition emotional, thus not necessarily product of rational analysis. Also why did you limit my statement to 20th century. People in Europe killed themselves en masse even before that and often with privately owned guns. I never said that governments have any capability to dictate right or wrong. That would be hardly possible when morality is objective enough, so cannot be dictated on the whim.
On March 01 2012 08:09 brain_ wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 04:54 TanTzoR wrote:On March 01 2012 04:47 brain_ wrote:
Europe, on the other hand, has been sewn up by one totalitarian state or another for the last 800 years... And none of those states wanted the common people to be armed.
Ok. Your post may be the most sensible thing ever, you lose all credibility when you say that. Excepting western Europe for the last 70 years, Eastern Europe for the last 20, and England for a bit longer than either, how is my statement inaccurate? 70 years ago Nazis were rounding up Jews. 30 years ago East Germans who dissented were forcibly imprisoned in mental hospitals where they were sedated and denied visits. People trying to cross into West Germany were shot. 80 years ago the British Empire was beating peaceful Indians to death because they marched with Ghandi. In WWI millions of young British men marched to their deaths for the sake of vague nationalism and "alliances". Never forget how close to home this stuff is. The vast majority of Europeans are only two to four generations away from being peasants, pawns for the ruling class to kill or send to their deaths at a whim. Historically, a lot of this is true for America as well, but it is balanced by the nature of our frontier and the philosophy of our founders.
You have no idea about history, yours and definitely not European. Philosophy of your founders is nothing that revolutionary and does not change the reality. Which was genocide on the same level as done by European Imperial powers. Long after slavery was banned in Europe it was legal in US. Anyway dick waving about who was worse makes no difference for this discussion.
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On March 01 2012 08:09 brain_ wrote:[ Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 06:58 hzflank wrote:On March 01 2012 05:05 dogabutila wrote:
All statistics, semantics, what ifs, and where-do-you-draw-the-lines aside it all comes down to this:
What gives you the right to take my firearm away from me? The same thing that gives the taxman the right to take your money away from you. No one is truly free. There has to be a line drawn somewhere. The question is what side of the line should firearms fall on? I don't know the answer but I do no that using 'freedom' as an argument is ridiculous. This is what statists actually believe. That society couldn't possibly function if people were free - instead we need some all-powerful body to force us to behave. Reward the "good ones" according to your definition and punish the "bad ones". Like God, just in the form of lots of people with uniforms and guns. Funny how people who rail against religion all day long will turn around and place the same faith in government, a self-interested and violent organization.
How nice of you to misrepresent people who you call "statists", who believe in no such thing. How come no hardcore libertarian is able to avoid crazy black-white fallacies. Noone believes in all-powerful governments, or that government is necessary for all societies to function somewhat well. Unlike the faith in religion, the faith in government that people have has to be earned in real world. People do not have faith in bad governments, why do you think they are changed so frequently throughout the history. Also lumping all governments into one bag and assigning them properties only some of them have is another rhetorical tactic widely employed. Your whole post is strawmen and black-and-white fallacy.
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Brain, by definition society cant succeed if everyone is totally free. You cant make any decisions about anything, because many people will have different responses. Society also consists of people, not a person. To coexist with others you need to give some things you may want up. This is seen at so many levels of human interaction, be it between 2 friends, between a family, a neighbourhood, a state/province, a country, etc... Society has rules, expectations and punishments which are dictated by the majority (often the vast majority). You have to be out of your mind if you believe society can operate with individual freedoms taking precedence over everything.
Your comparisons of government to religion and god show just how out to lunch you really are. Me putting "faith" (I think you mean trust) in a public representative of my area, through the process of an election, based on their record, is in no way comparable with the belief in a sky wizard that created and governs the universe. You seem to be so aloof, its entertaining.
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On March 01 2012 08:47 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 07:24 mcc wrote:I noted that in my second post in this thread that the reason for bans on guns should be prevention of accidental deaths and crime of passion death toll minimization. And easiest way to do it is to ban guns as unlike cars they are not in any way essential for functioning modern society. This is where analogy with cars breaks down. The easiest way to minimize harm with anything is banning. That doens't mean it's the best way to minimize harm. Prevention of accidental deaths is not best addressed by complete banning. Would you argue that alcohol should be banned completely, or regulated? It's not about whether something is "essential" (aside from the fact that this is bullshit anyway since we could get along without just about anything, including cars). It's about costs vs. benefits. What you don't seem to understand is that freedom is considered an intrinsic good, and you have also failed to considered the academic research that shows that legal firearms reduce crime. The burden is on you to show that (a) the costs of legalized firearms ownership outweigh the benefits (to freedom and crime reduction), and that (b) the best way to deal with that is outright banning. While you have shown that (a) is debatable, you certainly haven't supported (b) in the slightest. Most proponents of firearms ownership do acknowledge that firearms are dangerous tools, but address this with the need of stringent safety regulation rather than outright banning. If you think that firearm ownership should be banned, you had better present evidence that this option and the associated outcomes are superior to properly regulated ownership.
I provided the reasons why it is not only easiest, but also very good way of doing it in other posts and even in the one you responded to.
Your alcohol analogy is again not the best. Alcohol would be best banned if such a ban could be enforced. But since the production of alcohol is easily hidden from the government and demand for it stays high even with severe penalties banning it is not practical. Guns are not as easily produced and their ban much more easily enforced. What you seem not to understand is that I am not some ideological opponent, I have no problem not banning things when the enforcement of such ban outweigh the benefits. Banning guns in Europe does not really face any significant enforcement problems. Also to add as you seem unaware of what I wrote in some other posts. I have no problem considering heavy regulation of guns, for example banning just handguns. And I even wrote that banning guns in US is probably not a good idea. That should address your (b) point.
Notice that I added qualifiers to my statement, so no we cannot get along without cars in FUNCTIONING MODERN society. So yes it is exactly about costs vs benefits as I said repeatedly in this thread, so I have no idea how is it counterargument to my statement.
Freedom is no intrinsic good. It is just a natural state of thins that should be changed only if such change leads to better outcomes. Thus yes, proponent of introducing new rule limiting freedom has to justify it. You did not provide any academic research links so I see no reason to (and hardly can) dispute them.
I already provided arguments why banning private ownership of guns in non-US first wolrd countries is such a solution.
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Really interesting thread, I learnt why Americans think they can have guns. Seriously, I jsut believe the less people have guns the better overall. Humans are stupid, I include myself. Don't give them too much power. Here is all the problem, you need a strong government so people don't have too much power but you also need educated people so democracy is not just shit and government's holders don't have too much power. In France most of medias belong to politics close friends. It's not that different from Berlusconi in Italy.
It may seem offtopic, but I really think it's the way things happen for guns, power to government or power to citizens? You need a good balance.
Concerning USA murder rate which is higher than in any other modern country, I really don't know why. I don't think it's really related to guns because others countries also allow them.
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Read through about 6 pages from my last post and couldn't take it anymore, I had to get to the end so I skipped about the last 4 pages.
The people that seem to be offended the most buy guns are ya'll non-americans. There's a few liberal americans here and there but for the most part it's europeans, canadians, and austrialians.
Sorry but ya'll just won't understand america. Ever.
This post is very well put and explains why americans are pro-guns. Our country was founded on the RIGHTS of the people to OVERTHROW the government. I don't know about the foundings of all the european countries or austrailia besides the stuff I learned in school, but I seriously doubt most of ya'll have that in your laws.
That being said, the AMERICAN military officers all take an oath when they get commissioned. They swear allegiance in this oath to the AMERICAN CONSTITUTION, which is not represented by any one man. They do not swear to obey orders of the president of the united states or any other man. They don't even say in their oath that they will follow the order of senior ranking officers. Our own military is built to overthrow the government if it gets out of hand.
I think with some better understanding of the foundings of our country and principles behind it the foreigners (to me anyway) will start to get it. If not then I'll just chalk it up to you living in a liberal country, and that's ok because it doesn't affect me.
Let's actually address some things though since I feel like writing a book today:
Suicide:
+ Show Spoiler +On February 29 2012 11:30 Focuspants wrote:As for suicides being higher in gun owning households, thats a fact. Not speculation. So clearly there is some correlation. Furthermore, over 90% of firearm suicide attempts are successful, while less than 3% of drug related ones are successful. http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/press-releases/2007-releases/press04102007.html"In 2005, the most recent year for which mortality data are available, suicide was the second-leading cause of death among Americans 40 years of age or younger. Among Americans of all ages, more than half of all suicides are gun suicides. In 2005, an average of 46 Americans per day committed suicide with a firearm, accounting for 53% of all completed suicides. Gun suicide during this period accounted for 40% more deaths than gun homicide." http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp0805923"Ready availability of firearms is associated with an increased risk of suicide in the home. Owners of firearms should weigh their reasons for keeping a gun in the home against the possibility that it might someday be used in a suicide." http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199208133270705The list goes on... This is absolutely true. More guns = more suicides. Guns make it really really easy to kill yourself. Great. I'm not sympathetic though, and when I decide to kill myself I'm going to use my gun to make sure I don't screw it up and live by accident. On February 29 2012 12:15 Focuspants wrote:
When it is statistically more likely that someone will kill themself with your gun, than you will need to defend a home invader with deadly force and succeed, statistically speaking, isnt it a better bet to not allow guns in a home? Logically, it makes sense that if youre on average causing more harm then doing good with one of your actions, you should change that action, no? Unless you know how many people commit suicide with someone else's gun besides their own, then you have no point here. I seriously doubt that survey has been done. Likewise about the 'more harm than good'. Like the post I linked above said, you prove that it's doing more harm than good and I'll agree with a gun ban in America. Until then, you're just someone else that is uneducated about guns which is why you are afraid of them. If you have knives you may choose to slit your wrist and that has a (put number here)% success rate, unlike pills! Ban knives! No, you just don't let unstable people and children get them. A quick google search is actually showing me that canada suicide rates are actually HIGHER than the united states. Weird? Please point me to some other studies because these have to be wrong. I won't bother linking them I just don't believe it. If you do please PM me with a link to your post because I may not see it, this thread is growing faster than I can read it.
Homicide:
+ Show Spoiler +On February 29 2012 09:59 Focuspants wrote:
Ya VA Tech would have gone so much better if everyone had a gun on them and started firing at the gunman through a crowd of scrambling students. I could see that going really smoothly.
To say that a minor stealing a gun from his uncle and using it to shoot up a school has nothing to do with gun control is being extremely ignorant. If the gun wasnt there and easily accessible, he likely would not have done it. Its the same reason suicide rates are higher in homes that have guns than those without. The ease of accessibility saves that all important (often dangerous) step of having to get one yourself. Yea, it just might have gone a little differently, but that's just speculation. Every reason that gun banners come up with is just speculation. It's how you imagine something playing out in your head. It would have taken only one trained rambo to stop it from happening completely. Yes a lot of states here make you get trained before you can carry. Personally I'm an infantryman and shoot guns and blow shit up all of the time. I'm confident that if a Ft. Hood, TX type shooting occured anywhere near me I'd be able to stop it straight away. Oh geesh imagine how the Ft. Hood shooting would have gone if the soldiers there would have been packing? I think it was 13 dead? It's a shame the government doesn't let us concealed carry on post. On February 29 2012 15:20 Focuspants wrote:
Um actually, noise will scare off most burglars. 99.99% of burglars want things to sell or money, not to kill and rape your family. Posing a legitimate threat to their safety will likely make the situation escalate way beyond what it would be if you made some noise and called the cops.
Are Americans really that scared of random untargeted home invasions with the intention of murdering your family and raping your wife? Like, the rate at which this happens is so incredibly low, its mind boggling to me that this is a legitimate worry to this many people. Escalating a situation will net more injuries or deaths than just making noise, letting them run off with your tv and getting a new one from your insurance company. Why would you even go to confront them?
The level of misguided pride that is displayed by a lot of these posts is nauseating. "YOU AINT TAKIN MAH PROPERTEHHHH". Its clear that your whole culture and system is so flawed its likely beyond repair over any short period of time. Your citizens walk around scared, you arm yourselves, kids get ahold of these weapons and kill themselves or people in their schools, your firearm related rates for everything bad are extremely high, yet people fervently cling to this idea that guns make people safe.
The gun culture being allowed to proliferate to the point its at, the terrible distribution of wealth leaving so many poor, and the fear that is implanted in your hearts is a dangerous combo, and there truly is no way to solve your problems without you thinking that the government is trying to disarm you so they can take over your lives. So confusing. We are running around scared? Quite the opposite. I feel very safe. And no, you ain't takin mah proertehhhh. The first thing I do when I move into a new neighborhood and start talking to the neighbors is ask them if they like guns and tell them about mine. Wonder why nobody steals my shit? Weird. I found some interesting numbers thanks to the best website out there, wikipedia. Check this out: "Furthermore, in recent years, the gap in violent crime rates between the United States and Canada has narrowed due to a precipitous drop in the violent crime rate in the U.S. For example, while the aggravated assault rate declined for most of 1990s in the U.S. and was 324 per 100,000 in 2000, the aggravated assault rate in Canada remained relatively steady throughout and was 143 per 100,000 in 2000. In other areas, the U.S. had a faster decline. For instance, whereas the murder rate in Canada declined by 36% between 1991 and 2004, the U.S. murder rate declined by 44%." Hey we aren't the best, but it's getting better! I'm sure there's a lot of contributing factors but in the last couple of decades having a gun around has been the "cool" thing for citizens to do. You do it your way and we'll do it ours.
While there are many posts deserving of a response in this thread I'm afraid I don't have time to keep up with it anymore. For all questions regarding americans and their guns please read this american gun guide prior to posting about america, especially if you are american.
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NoSlack, your idealistic nationalism is touching  But you overestimate the USA and underestimate other developed countries. Educated people do know the principles on which the US was founded, but that was a long time ago. In 1900 I would think that your post would make a lot of sense, but since then the US has become very similar to European countries: party politics trumps antiquated principles.
Next time that airport security stick his finger up your ass: just bend over and think of the constitution.
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On March 01 2012 15:42 hzflank wrote:NoSlack, your idealistic nationalism is touching But you overestimate the USA and underestimate other developed countries. Educated people do know the principles on which the US was founded, but that was a long time ago. In 1900 I would think that your post would make a lot of sense, but since then the US has become very similar to European countries: party politics trumps antiquated principles. Next time that airport security stick his finger up your ass: just bend over and think of the constitution.
I've never known anyone to get strip searched at an airport, thanks for the one liner though! Maybe you should start a thread and we can throw one liner jokes at each other and LOL all day long! I have to warn you, though. I work with 3 brits (2 english and 1 irish, contractors here in afghanistan) and I can probably get some pretty awesome jokes off of them.
You got any substance or are you just america bashing? The majority of americans don't WANT to be like european nations.
Now if you don't mind keeping this thread on topic. Got any content about gun control laws?
Don't forget to PM me with a link to your post because this thread will be 10 pages longer when I log back in 24 hours from now.
Edit: Oh and I have no need to estimate or overestimate or underestimate any other countries. As I said in my post, you don't affect me.
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I wasn't bashing America at all, I was bashing you. You were bashing every country but America though. I am surprised that I should have to lecture you on what americans want but you should realise that america has a very large and diverse population and you should not assume that the majority of americans share your views.
There is no good content on gun laws. Different countries have different laws that are based on their history. These laws wont be changed anytime soon and there is no conclusive evidence that they need changing.
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On March 01 2012 15:42 hzflank wrote:NoSlack, your idealistic nationalism is touching But you overestimate the USA and underestimate other developed countries. Educated people do know the principles on which the US was founded, but that was a long time ago. In 1900 I would think that your post would make a lot of sense, but since then the US has become very similar to European countries: party politics trumps antiquated principles. Next time that airport security stick his finger up your ass: just bend over and think of the constitution.
Anyone who thinks strict airport security is overly impeding on freedoms has no room to judge what freedoms a nation deserve. Also saying other people in your country have a different opinion is a weak argument.
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On March 01 2012 06:52 Gustis wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 05:05 dogabutila wrote:
All statistics, semantics, what ifs, and where-do-you-draw-the-lines aside it all comes down to this:
What gives you the right to take my firearm away from me? What gives you the right to forbid me to piss on your face? Well, ignorant one (may the possibly existing diety give blessing to your country), social convention does. Peace!
On March 01 2012 07:21 mcc wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 05:05 dogabutila wrote:
All statistics, semantics, what ifs, and where-do-you-draw-the-lines aside it all comes down to this:
What gives you the right to take my firearm away from me? Me, nothing. Society on the other hand can give you the privilege of owning a gun, but can also take it away if considered necessary.
On March 01 2012 06:58 hzflank wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 05:05 dogabutila wrote:
All statistics, semantics, what ifs, and where-do-you-draw-the-lines aside it all comes down to this:
What gives you the right to take my firearm away from me? The same thing that gives the taxman the right to take your money away from you. No one is truly free. There has to be a line drawn somewhere. The question is what side of the line should firearms fall on? I don't know the answer but I do no that using 'freedom' as an argument is ridiculous.
"People can because we can" is not an answer. Neither is "Cause the government feels like it."
Governments exist because people consent to be ruled by them. Period. Otherwise revolution happens. When people start a country, they often put limits on what the government can do. Plainly speaking, the authority granted to the government is not unlimited and they cannot do something just because they want to. They are only authorized to perform certain functions. This is true of ALL non-authoritarian governments.
In America, we cede our rights to the government so they can perform actions and duties outlined in the constitution. However, the founders also recognized that the government wants to enlarge itself and grow it's own power. Politicians want to be more powerful right? So in order to have the citizens adopt the constitution, they also explicitly recognized some of the rights that the people have. So the government has an outlined job, and powers. They also have things they cannot infringe upon, (although, current slow infringement and exceptions and such can be a whole other topic) without a significant governmental interest. So, people have basically decided that the government can in specific instances restrict said recognized rights of the people when there is a "compelling government interest" (pursuant to something that they are charged with doing....) and these instances must be tailored to be as in-obtrusive as possible.
"social convention" is just another way of saying, well, just because people decided to they can. - This isn't true. PEOPLE cannot take anything away from me. The government can. However, they can only do this if it is pursuant to one of their charged objectives, and only if it is directly necessary for that. And they minimize harms on recognized rights. Of which owning guns is one.
So, really, no. People thinking I can't own a gun isn't a good enough reason. The government cannot take away my 'privilege'
of gun ownership, because it is not a privilege granted by the government. It is an extension of a natural right that the people have not ceded authority to the government to regulate.
The taxman takes my money, because as much as I gripe about it there is a necessity for the government and the government does need money to operate. They don't take my money because they say they can. They take my money because I allow it.
Somebody else posted earlier that individual rights are just social constructs and basically are derived from whatever society grants you the ability to do. That's completely backwards. Natural rights are what people are born with. Again, life, liberty, property. These are real natural rights and not privileges because they do not require anybody to do anything for you to have them. They exist. Other rights, like a supposed right to healthcare or some such requires an obligation on the part of somebody else to provide you with things. These aren't strictly rights per-se, but privileges. Thats actually what the definition of a privilege is. In short, gun ownership is not a privilege because it was not given to you by somebody else. It's a right, and to restrict that, a person needs to give up or cede the right to the government to do so. Without a specific, compelling interest directly related to the function of government they cannot do this. Then in the instances where they can, it must be tailored as specifically as possible to achieve the goals without eradicating the right.
Did you guys ever learn about locke, hobbs, kant etc in government?
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EPT
