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Quantum
Why doesn't the USA pass tougher gun control laws? I know there's Charlton Heston and the NRA opposing it but after Columbine and all the other shootings you'd think they'd have the popular support to do something.
Elijah
The problem with tougher gun control laws is that there are too many guns in 'the wild' to get them all. An all out ban on firearms would only remove the guns from the hands of law abiding citizens. Both sides have just about equal numbers, so it makes lobbying enough support to ban or enough support to remove all gun control difficult. It is a very complicated issue. Fully automatic firearms have been heavily controlled for decades, yet they are still used in crimes.
(Some discussion from XK, Quantum and Jack Fear which was largely relevant to the Virginia Tech shootings)
Kirk Ultra
The USA doesn't have tougher gun control laws because of the second amendment, which was put in place to ensure that, should the US government become too corrupt or oppressive, the people would have a chance to fight against them to free themselves. That's the number one reason - fighting our own government. As the United States government is currently building internment camps all over the country (not too mention all the other things they're doing that are too obvious to bring up) I really don't plan on doing anything to take away that right anytime soon.
Hurricane Katrina is another example of why I don't think guns should be banned. A lot of people there needed them to live.
Now, I do have to say that I find most gun culture (fun Hunter Thompson hijinks aside) to be pretty annoying, and I think the NRA are a bunch of assholes, but I am still against gun control. I don't want to make a big thing about it one way or the other, but you know how it is on Barbelith with the gun control debate. As soon as it's mentioned everybody has to throw in.
What I will say though is this. Virginia is right next to Washington DC, and in DC you can get guns. Illegal guns, and lots of them. Guns have been outlawed there, but not surprisingly there are still gun crimes committed. Drugs don't go away when drugs are made illegal, prostitution doesn't go away when prostitution is made illegal, and guns don't go away when you make guns illegal. If anything, making them illegal ensures that they become more popular, more dangerous, and limits their control and distribution to organized crime. (bit of a tangent, sorry) Anyways, if the Virginia Tech Shooter had it in him to walk around for two hours shooting and killing all those people, then he probably would have had it in him to make the hour drive to DC to pick up a gun if there didn't happen to be one at his local Wal Mart.
Absolutely anybody could buy a gun on the streets of DC. He probably could have even gotten them on the streets Richmond (Richmond is a city in Virginia). In San Francisco, if you want to buy some guns, go to Market street and just wait for the dealers to stroll by. Most of the dealers are selling weed and other drugs, but about one out of every ten of them will have a gun for you. San Francisco recently outlawed guns, but somehow the dealers are still out there.
I have to echo what XK said above, "why are people electing to commit mass murder?" What is it about our society or the world that is making people snap like this. Is this guy walking into a school and shooting 30 people different from people sitting on their couches and cheering (or even not reacting) to the news of what high-tech bombs we've dropped on a bunch Middle Eastern people that day? Is this another example of people going crazy and embracing violence just because they can't find any other meaning in the world? Did the guy just have a chemical imbalance? What kind of medication was he on?
Even if I was in favor of gun control, I'd still be a bit hesitant to apply it to people and situations like this is that it just seems like there's so much more to it. Like somebody mentioned Columbine above? There is much, much more to the Columbine than is commonly broadcast on the news. There's a newspaper in Denver that has been constantly fighting with the police for the release of more information ever since the shooting happened. 11,000 pages of witness testimony was released, as well as other documents pertaining to the shooters, which eventually lead to the discovery of sexual abuse at the hands of police officers in their past.* They were also on prozac (or something like prozac, I forget). These are complex problems that were not addressed by politics or the media after the shooting, and they certainly weren't addressed by anybody before all those lives were ended. The only problems discussed were guns and Marilyn Manson.
As far as I know, nobody knows why this guy did what he did yet. And I don't want to say that guns are an absolute good, or any of the other silly points pro-gun people usually take, but I do hope the investigation of this does go further than assuming his pistol made him crazy.
*The 11,000 pages also revealed corroborating testimony that at least two other shooters were involved in the Columbine attacks, but that's a discussion for another thread.
[moderator note: not this one, an it please God]
Mister Disco
I don't like to rain on anyone's parade, but from the outside, it doesn't look like the possession of guns is really working to stop the US government from doing anything. It's great that the US constitution has a 'safety valve' built in, but the government will always have more guns. They have the (moral/political) monopoly on violence, too. And as Hurricane Katrina illustrates, in a stunning example, the government is quite keen to engage its own 'citizens' in a shooting war.
And about Hurricane Katrina, please tell me how people needed guns in order to live? Do guns have some awesome flood-stopping ability I was never told about? Apart from defending themselves from the insanity of the military, what on earth were guns useful for that working levees, a decent evacuation plan and a few thousand buses wouldn't have solved more efficiently?
This is all part of the same problem. One of the main issues around gun culture is the assumption that a deadly weapon will solve problems, full stop. If you think you're living in an action movie, of course you're going to think that the only solution to the problems of the world is guns. But the world is not an action movie.
Sorry, this has nothing to do with Virginia Tech. But it seems incredible for people to claim that guns are necessary for survival or the continuation of life when it's so clear that statistically, states which sanction the legal/unregulated possession of firearms have more gun deaths than states which don't.
grant
Within the past six months, I watched Bowling for Columbine for the first time. It was based around the idea that America's culture of violence and fear (based in part on our legacy of slavery) is what creates these incidents. To illustrate his argument, Moore goes across the border from crime-city Detroit to its Canadian twin, Windsor, where people leave their door unlocked even after they've been broken into and, surprisingly, all seemed to own guns without trying to use them on each other.
This was before the recent college shooting at Dawson College, so maybe real life has weakened that observation a little. And, well, Moore's been known to stretch his footage to make a point.
Still, it's an observation worth making.
Jack Fear
Agreed with Disco in strongest possible terms.
Also: Kirk, that's a pretty fast-and-loose interpretation of the Second Amendment, which reads:
A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.
...which would seem to imply that "the people" are allowed to keep arms so that they may use them to serve the State, by defending it from outside enemies—not to combat it.
In this light, it's possible to argue that since we already have a well-regulated militia under the control of individual states—i.e., the National Guard—in addition to a standing federal army, that there is no need whatsoever for private ownership of firearms.
Quantum
should the US government become too corrupt or oppressive, the people would have a chance to fight against them to free themselves.
So, how's that working out for you guys? Bushgov already seems pretty corrupt and oppressive and yet people haven't taken to the streets with their guns and overthrown him. In any case, are you seriously suggesting that having an armed populace fight the army (and probably national guard) to overthrow the government is a) a realistic scenario or b) a good idea?
Do you really believe it's the people vs. the government, so you have to have guns? Even if the cost of those guns is lots of people getting shot to death?
I can see that gun legislation wouldn't stop gun crime because it's too late, your country is flooded with guns. But I can't understand how anyone can think it's a good idea to give almost everyone the right to own a device specifically made for killing people. I'm thinking of people I know, and how many of them I would trust with a gun, and while I love them dearly I can't think of many.
Slim
I don't like to rain on anyone's parade, but from the outside, it doesn't look like the possession of guns is really working to stop the US government from doing anything. It's great that the US constitution has a 'safety valve' built in, but the government will always have more guns. They have the (moral/political) monopoly on violence, too. And as Hurricane Katrina illustrates, in a stunning example, the government is quite keen to engage its own 'citizens' in a shooting war.
I think he was referring to protecting oneself from looters and other people up to no good, not the government. In a lawless situation, a gun may be quite handy.
Kirk Ultra
Disco - No, guns do not have flood stopping power. Thank you for the hilarious joke though.
People turned violent after Hurricane Katrina. A lot of the violence reported in the media turned out to be untrue, but a significantly huge amount of it was. My girlfriend was down there with the Red Cross after it happened. People she knew had to steal guns from a gun shop in order to keep other people from raping them or killing them. Real violence happened down there. It was very bad.
You're quite right when you say that the right to own guns has not kept the government from becoming corrupt. They haven't. But we're not in the type of situation where people should be using guns to solve the problems of government. I didn't say guns should be used to solve those types of problems. I didn't say they should be used to solve any type of problem. People just need to educate themselves and stop using voting machines. I am absolutely against the use of guns against any other living thing in all but the most extreme situations. Like there's an actual war happening where you are, or somebody's physically trying to murder you. I do not own a gun. I do not plan on getting one. I do not believe in violence against the government. I don't have any shootout fantasies i want to live out. I was just responding to what somebody else above asked about gun laws before the argument got too one-sided.
This is all part of the same problem. One of the main issues around gun culture is the assumption that a deadly weapon will solve problems, full stop. If you think you're living in an action movie, of course you're going to think that the only solution to the problems of the world is guns. But the world is not an action movie.
This is why I said in my post that gun culture was annoying. At no time did I suggest that I thought of the world as an action movie. A lot of people do believe we live in an action movie though, and that is a big part of the reason why there is so much violence in this country. Children are raised in this country that their entire purpose in life, as Americans, is to do the right thing no matter what. As adults though, we learn that doing the right thing is the last thing anybody you believed in wants to do, they just want to pretend to do the right thing, and never ever admit that they aren't. Cowboys kill Indians. GI Joe uses napalm. This is hard to reconcile for a lot of people, so instead of admitting that things aren't the way their parents and teachers told them they were, they cling to stupid ideals and flip out over minor things and violence is the only thing they can figure out. That's why I hate gun culture so much. They're just most assholes who wish they had something dramatic to stand for, so they make gun ownership a religion.
Western psychology is completely fucked up, and crimes like these are screaming of deep deep problems in our society's collective soul.
Quantum - So, how's that working out for you guys? Bushgov already seems pretty corrupt and oppressive and yet people haven't taken to the streets with their guns and overthrown him. In any case, are you seriously suggesting that having an armed populace fight the army (and probably national guard) to overthrow the government is a) a realistic scenario
Well that depends on what you mean by realistic doesn't it? Do you mean is it capable of happening in real life? I'm pretty sure physics does allow for it, as does stupidity. Is it likely to happen? Of course not. The US government primarily oppresses people outside of it's borders (unless you're Mexican, from the Middle East, or you've ever used drugs), so that people within its borders can feel elite and superior. Americans are much too fat and full of denial to rebel even in a political sense, let alone the action movie sense the gun nuts dream of.
or b) a good idea?
Obviously not. As I said above, people need to educate themselves, stop fighting over petty wedge-issues, and fix the corrupt election system so that we can get people who aren't mobsters into office. People also need to legalize drugs, because the war on drugs is what perpetuates gang violence, which is the source of almost all gun violence in the country.
Hell, the war on drugs is is responsible for most of the gun violence in the Western hemisphere. And a good amount of it in the Eastern hemisphere too.
Do you really believe it's the people vs. the government, so you have to have guns?
Well, in broad philosophical sense, yes. Though "vs" is a pretty loaded term. I just think of it as a political line in the sand.
Even if the cost of those guns is lots of people getting shot to death?
Making guns illegal doesn't make them go away, it just makes sure only criminals have them.
I can see that gun legislation wouldn't stop gun crime because it's too late, your country is flooded with guns.
See, you just said so yourself. The guns are all out there already. There's a huge black market for it.
But I can't understand how anyone can think it's a good idea to give almost everyone the right to own a device specifically made for killing people.
If they're already everywhere, then why should we stop the people who want to get them legally?
Jack Fear - I can see what you mean by that interpretation of the second amendment, but mine is different. I won't say mine is right, because it's a pretty vague phrasing, and the founding fathers disagreed on a lot of things. (Plus they were all slave owning bastards so who cars what they have to say anyways.) I think it depends on what is meant by "free State," "State," and "the people." Does "State" mean government, because the government leads/rules the people? Or does it meant the entire country, of which the government is really just a organization point? And what about "the people"? Does that literally mean the people of the united states? Or does it mean the government in that "we represent the people" sort of way?
I interpret the second amendment as meaning that the citizens have the right to bear arms to protect against invasion, and to protect against government corruption, as both of these would make the state less secure. I base this interpretation on the writings of Thomas Jefferson, who was always going on about not trusting the government (I'm paraphrasing there) and people needing to have revolutions every twenty years. But I won't say that this is the only interpretation, because he wasn't the only one worked on the Bill of Rights.
I understand all the arguments against gun control, and I have a lot of respect for them, but as long as we live on a planet where so many people are insane and so many governments (especially my own) are corrupt, I can't bring myself to support most gun control legislation.
And as Hurricane Katrina illustrates, in a stunning example, the government is quite keen to engage its own 'citizens' in a shooting war.
Exactly.
(Moore, as a note, has gone on the record saying Americans should have their guns taken away until they get rid of the fear.)
%That Michael Moore sounds like a real right wing nut-case to me.%
Dizfactor
Disco
I don't like to rain on anyone's parade, but from the outside, it doesn't look like the possession of guns is really working to stop the US government from doing anything. It's great that the US constitution has a 'safety valve' built in, but the government will always have more guns.
US forces in Iraq have more, bigger, and better guns (and tanks, and air support, etc) than the insurgents. How's that working out for them?
The real problem with this argument is not that's its unfeasible to imagine armed revolution against the US government, it's that 1) armed revolution against the US government is a really bad idea anyway and 2) the most enthusiastic gun owners in the US are also the most enthusiastic supporters of the elements of the US government most in need of overthrowing.
Disco
One of the main issues around gun culture is the assumption that a deadly weapon will solve problems, full stop. If you think you're living in an action movie, of course you're going to think that the only solution to the problems of the world is guns. But the world is not an action movie.
Agreed.
Kirk Ultra
Drugs don't go away when drugs are made illegal, prostitution doesn't go away when prostitution is made illegal, and guns don't go away when you make guns illegal.
Also agreed.
Disco
But it seems incredible for people to claim that guns are necessary for survival or the continuation of life when it's so clear that statistically, states which sanction the legal/unregulated possession of firearms have more gun deaths than states which don't.
That's not, strictly speaking, true. See Canada for at least one counterexample.
Gun control is one of those issues where both sides piss me off intensely, because they're both prone to being completely full of shit. Guns will not, on average, improve your life. Private ownership of them is not protected under the 2nd Amendment. Most importantly, we do not live in a lawless land populated by subhuman criminal scum who beset the good citizenry on all sides with threats of violence, and so people do not "need" guns as a matter of course for self-defense. However, at the same time, rates of gun crime are really overblown, accidental shootings are really, really rare, and it's kind of heinous to try to capitalize on events like this as if they were in any way representative of a statistically significant phenomenon. Bringing up isolated sensationalistic incidents like this as an excuse to ban guns is just as dishonest and manipulative as bringing up the spectre of poor/urban/black street crime victimizing affluent/suburban/white people who "need" guns to defend themselves.
The majority of gun owners are responsible people, who may be under weird delusions about living in some pemutation of Escape from New York or Die Hard, but who ultimately are essentially harmless. I feel it's a bit hypocritical of me to advocate legalizing drugs, prostitution, and gambling while also advocating gun control. All of those three do hurt people from time to time, including people who don't consent to taking the risks inherent with them, and I think it's not only unfair to penalize the responsible people, but bad policy to drive these things underground where they're harder to regulate and observe.
I suppose my position could be summed up as: Guns are stupid, unnecessary, and sometimes dangerous, but they should be legal.
Boboss
I do wish you'd stop going on about how making guns illegal only makes sure that criminals have guns, Kirk. That may be true as a matter of definition, but the broader point which I suspect is embedded in your argument - that making guns illegal won't really do anything to prevent and lessen gun crime - is at worst complete bollocks and at best highly debatable.
Fraser C
I take Kirks points about gun control and as a Scot rather than an American, I obviously bow to those who live in a country where this is the norm.
But this tragedy is a matter of simple mathematics. As a vastly populous country, the US is bound to have a large proportion of mentally unbalanced people out there. Combine that with the availability of guns and you get what happened yesterday, something like twice a year now.
Removing as many guns as possible from private hands will limit the risks. Not eliminate it of course, but limit it. The virtually free availability of guns in the US is the key factor here (although obviously there is also a mental health issue as well).
What I find most distressing about this horrible news is the reaction of most Americans I've heard talking about it. "Lets not overreact" "guns are our right" etc. Jesus folks, get your heads out of the sand.
And Kurt, when you say that guns are OK as it offers the people a means to mount an armed insurrection against the Government is they get out of control it doesn't inspire much confidence in your reasoning.
It's about the daftest excuse for having a lethal weapon in your house as I've ever heard. This "Guns of Brixton" philosophy is based on a paranoid delusion. This isn't the 1870s and you aren't frontiersmen anymore. The redcoats ain't about to hove over the hill and burn your crops.
You said yourself that a lot of gun owners are paranoid and live in fear of some kind of "Escape from New York" day of reckoning. But they are mainly harmless? I would suggest not if they live in a fantasy world.
Obviously, you'll never get rid of all the guns, but have a go.
We had a terrible tragedy here in Scotland a few years ago when several children and teachers were shot dead by a maniac who rampaged through a school. The nations reaction to it was to demand the banning of all guns not required for ones profession. It may not have cleared guns from the streets entirely but it was right and proper to put the law in place, to speak with one voice and demand that an effort be made. Guns have no place in the hands of private citizens.
Protection of the public should be entirely in the hands of publicly funded Police with responsibility to the public. Government should be based on the principles of democracy, not the threat of armed insurrection.
I'm yet to hear a valid, cohesive argument for guns. Everything I've heard is either entirely specious or based on a lack of will to change, to turn away from utter insanity.
You can have no real Law and Order is everyone has the means to enforce their own version of the rules.
Evil Scientist
I have to say the argument that private ownership of firearms in order to defend your country from possible invasion really doesn't hold any water when it's you're living in the world's only hyperpower. I can see that argument holding some validity if you lived in, for instance, Israel where the threat of invasion is somewhere in the realms of possibility. Or, for that matter, Palestine where you'd be defending your house from invading forces on a regular basis.
But the United States hasn't been even slightly in danger of invasion in the past four decades.
Making guns illegal doesn't make them go away, it just makes sure only criminals have them.
True, and it doesn't make guncrime vanish. Look at here in the UK where the public cannot legally own firearms, we still have a lot of guncrime.
However, legal possession of firearms by the public does not appear to be halting, or even slowing, the crime rate in the US. One argument would be that every petty criminal has to carry a firearm and be prepared to use it simply because every citizen has a firearm and is prepared to use it. So even a burglar who breaks into empty houses has to pack a gun and be ready to use it because he might come round the corner and find the homeowner going for his gunsafe.
Guns quite obviously don't provide protection within a normal setting, all they do is force both sides into a lethal confrontation. Criminals still commit crimes regardless of whether their victims may be armed or not.
What are the statistics for crimes foiled by gun-toting citizens (genuine question)?
Moi-mème
Look at here in the UK where the public cannot legally own firearms, we still have a lot of guncrime.
Hmmm. I'd question "a lot" - what are your comparators? Compared to the US, the proportion of crimes in the UK involving a firearm is pretty small, I think - I will look for figures.
However, what we do not really have is precisely this kind of crime - crime in which people who are not career criminals, but who do have a sudden or accumulated urge to kill, are able to get hold of firearms and use them on their peers. On the rare occasions that there have been these kinds of incidents in the UK - where a single person attacks a group of civilians without any broader criminal intent (that is, they are not doing it as part of a gang war, or for financial gain) using firearms, the perpetrators have been gun enthusiasts who had acquired firearms within the law. Even then, however, doing so was significantly harder than it is in the US; after Hungerford, gun laws were tightened, and after Dunblane they were tightened again, and I do not believe there has been any such incident since in the British Isles.
Elijah
What are the statistics for crimes foiled by gun-toting citizens (genuine question)?
This is a very difficult statistic to get your hands on. The reason for this is if no shots are fired then the fact that a gun was involved is not always reported. There could be a lot of reasons for this, I would imagine the 2 top are cops who don't want to fill out the paperwork needed when a citizen brandishes a firearm and citizens not wanting to report the incident for fear that their gun will be taken by the police (this is not totally uncommon). Unfortunately, because the THREAT of a firearm is often enough to scare away an attacker, because nobody got shot the incident is not necessarily included in reports.
In 1993 Gary Kleck, a criminologist at Florida State University published this paper. The summary, from his wikipedia page:
He has done statistical analysis of crime in the United States and argues that while in 1993 there were about four hundred thousand crimes committed with guns, there were approximately 2.5 million crimes in which victims used guns for self-protection.
This would obviously include situations where a gun scared off an attacker and no shots were fired. Despite what it may seem like on the news we really aren't in constant running gunfights.
[Some discussion of mental illness and the Kreck statistics, at the end of which Elijah says]
Someone asked for statistics, I found one study that also mentioned others over the years.
If it is true that 5 times as many crimes are stopped by citizens with guns then are committed with guns then maybe it will change someones mind.
Worth note, for the purpose of the discussion, is the Appalachan Law School shooting. The gunman was tackled by three students to end the assault. What is left out of the CNN (and most other news sources) story is that two of the people who subdued him had guns pointed at him, ordering him to drop his. As far as I know this is the only school shooting which was ever stopped by a civilian with a firearm, also the only case I know of where a student or faculty member had a weapon handy.
Kirk Ultra
Boboss - I do wish you'd stop going on about how making guns illegal only makes sure that criminals have guns, Kirk.
And I wish that people would stop pretending that having the government declare something illegal will magically make that thing go away. I guess we'll both have to be sad today. Also, I didn't say "making guns illegal only makes sure that criminals have guns," I said "making guns illegal insures that only criminals have guns." Unless I mistyped earlier but I don't think I did.
That may be true as a matter of definition, but the broader point which I suspect is embedded in your argument - that making guns illegal won't really do anything to prevent and lessen gun crime - is at worst complete bollocks and at best highly debatable.
Why is it complete bollocks? You do realize that's a large part of how organized crime makes money, right? By giving things to people the government won't let them have? I agree that it's debatable, but complete bollocks? I don't think so. Also, how can something be true and untrue at the same time? What are you talking about?
Fraser - And Kurt, when you say that guns are OK as it offers the people a means to mount an armed insurrection against the Government is they get out of control it doesn't inspire much confidence in your reasoning.
Why? I said over and over again that it would never happen, that it was a bad idea anyways, that it wouldn't work, and that it would be morally wrong, that it was just a political statement. I'm not a fan of the whole mentality. And I only brought it up in the first place in response to to the second post in this thread, "Why doesn't the US pass tougher gun control laws?" The possibility of insurrection against a corrupt government (as well as defense against invasion, which hasn't been a possibility since we got the atom bomb, and self defense) is the reason the second amendment was put in the bill of rights. At least by some of the people involved in writing it. It's also a major part of the reason why gun control is such a touchy subject. Most Americans, at least in the region I grew up in (California) are raised with the belief that loosing the right to own a gun is one of the major signs (the other being loss of free speech) that the government has become totalitarian and oppressive and "the kind of thing our forefathers fought against." Obviously that's flawed, since there are a lot of other signs of a totalitarian government that we are not taught to look out for or care about, but that's why the gun debate is where it is in the US right now. That's why so many Americans are so intense about it (that and all the other ignored reasons in my previous post about people obsessing over them as a form of cognitive dissonance to keep themselves from thinking critically about what's really going on).
So, again, just to be absolutely clear - I do not support armed insurrection or violence of any kind against the government. I do not think it is right, possible, or likely. The closet I came to saying that was "physics allows for it, as does stupidity," and "Well, in broad philosophical sense, yes. Though "vs" is a pretty loaded term. I just think of it as a political line in the sand." Personally I think self defense is a much better reason to keep them legal. Everything else was a response to the clearly asked question, "Why doesn't the US pass tougher gun control laws."
Protection of the public should be entirely in the hands of publicly funded Police with responsibility to the public.
I agree with the part about "with responsibility to the public," but how do you reconcile that with this and this, not to mention things like Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib, and the fact that there's pretty much no right to trial in this country anymore? Again, I don't believe in armed insurrection, people just need to educate themselves more and vote, but if history has taught us anything, it's that the people building the internment camps all over the country shouldn't be the only ones with the weapons.
Government should be based on the principles of democracy, not the threat of armed insurrection.
I agree completely. I think self defense is a much better reason for keeping them legal.
How about psychological tests for gun licences? Like driving tests for driving licences? Just an idea.
I think it's also worth mentioning that the gun debate in America usually just ends up dividing people who would otherwise agree on other issues, and I'm sure that's why politicians like to throw it around without actually doing much about it one way or the other.
Also, we should probably take this to a gun control thread.
Myself
The possibility of insurrection against a corrupt government (as well as defense against invasion, which hasn't been a possibility since we got the atom bomb, and self defense) is the reason the second amendment was put in the bill of rights.
I don't think it was, though. It was to provide for militias to defend primarily against invasion by the English. The role of a state-mandated militia has now been taken by the National Guard. Ergo, there is no Constitutional protection of the right to bear arms as a private citizen.
If you are not actually suggesting that a popular uprising against government is a good thing, or a good reason to bear arms, then your comments about the actions of the current government are irrelevant. Much of this discussion, however, was already had quite recently in Scarlett156's introduction thread. The bottom line seemd to be that many Americans found the proximity of guns comforting, and do not really care why they should be allowed to keep them around as long as they _are_ allowed to keep them around, even if they were far more likely to be used by their male children to commit suicide than for any other purpose.
Kirk Ultra
Tann - I don't think it was, though. It was to provide for militias to defend primarily against invasion by the English.
Right, the English who up until recently had been their government. I don't believe there is any one interpretation of the second amendment, because it is vaguely written. It was put in for different reasons by by the many different people involved in writing it. That's why nobody has been able to agree on it's meaning since it was written.
The role of a state-mandated militia has now been taken by the National Guard. Ergo, there is no Constitutional protection of the right to bear arms as a private citizen.
Then why didn't they go and round up all the guns after they constitutional convention ended? Why didn't they round them up after the national guard was formed?
If you are not actually suggesting that a popular uprising against government is a good thing, or a good reason to bear arms, then your comments about the actions of the current government are irrelevant.
Let me clarify: It is a good reason to bear arms, even though it would not be a good idea to do anything even resembling armed insurrection because the problems in this country could very easily be solved by people educating themselves, motivating themselves politically, and voting in secure elections. The type of situation that would require that kind of armed resistance does not exist at the present time, because there are so many better options available. And if people can't educated themselves enough to vote correctly, then they certainly can't educate themselves enough to overthrow a government and form a new one. What would or would not qualify as a situation in which armed resistance was necessary is a subject of debate for another thread. However, I do maintain the position that ONE reason people should be allowed guns is in the incredibly rare billion to one chance that such a situation would arise.
Now that's ONE reason. Not the main one. Not the best one. A very small one. In my opinions the best reason is self defense. I talked about people caught in Hurricane Katrina. Elijah mentioned some stats. There you go.
Much of this discussion, however, was already had quite recently in Scarlett156's introduction thread. The bottom line seemd to be that many Americans found the proximity of guns comforting, and do not really care why they should be allowed to keep them around as long as they _are_ allowed to keep them around, even if they were far more likely to be used by their male children to commit suicide than for any other purpose.
My bottom line, in describing the type of people you talk about here, the type of people who just want guns because it makes them feel better, is that those people are stupid and I don't care about their opinions. Just because they happen to be on the same side of the fence as me on this issue doesn't mean their reasons are the same as mine. But I think looking at people like this is a good way of looking at what's going on in everybody's head. Denial, a lifetime of action movie energy and revolutionary beliefs with nowhere to put them. A lot of people own guns and don't think twice about them. Some people like shooting cans off fences, some people use them for protection, and some people go completely insane and start killing. I'm curious about what it is in American culture that makes so many more people go nuts than in other places like Canada. That's why I brought up their psychology so much, American psychology.
But it is not fare to lay the "it just makes them feel better" line on anybody who doesn't agree with you. Some people live in dangerous places and need to protect themselves. I think I could safely refine my argument down to just that one point.
Me
Well, I think it might be useful to hold:
Then why didn't they go and round up all the guns after they constitutional convention ended? Why didn't they round them up after the national guard was formed?
and
I'm curious about what it is in American culture that makes so many more people go nuts than in other places like Canada. That's why I brought up their psychology so much, American psychology.
up next to:
Some people live in dangerous places and need to protect themselves. I think I could safely refine my argument down to just that one point.
If we are talking about the Bronx, say, rather than Sierra Leone, that's quite an interesting statement. Especially as the National Insitute for Justice (the research arm of the DoJ) found in a 1997 report:
Gun ownership was highest among middle-aged,
college- educated people of rural small-town
America.
Link to the report here.
Incidentally, Kleck's findings have been criticised by a number of other reports, so it isn't quite as simple as:
Elijah mentioned some stats. There you go.
But that's a discussion for another time.
Boboss
Kirk, I just want it noted that my criticism of your position hasn't altered in the slightest. I am of the opinion that you have failed to engage properly with what I have written. I will however respect Id's request to keep this debate out of this thread.
Kirk Ultra
I'VE failed to engage in what YOU'VE written? The only thing you wrote is this:
I do wish you'd stop going on about how making guns illegal only makes sure that criminals have guns, Kirk. That may be true as a matter of definition, but the broader point which I suspect is embedded in your argument - that making guns illegal won't really do anything to prevent and lessen gun crime - is at worst complete bollocks and at best highly debatable.
On the incident itself. Horrible horrible business. I wonder if the guy was angry or whether he wasn't just dead inside. Numb. Trying to feel something.
I can't make sense of it at all and it makes me feel sick.
That's 100% of what you'd posted in this thread so far, unless I'm missing something. Are you posting under multiple names? All you said was that you wished I wouldn't talk about making guns illegal encouraging black market gun sales, and that it was bollocks. You couldn't possibly have said less. I responded to what you wrote in the same post that I responded to Fraser in. How have I not engaged in your incredibly nuanced, intricate post? I've been bending over backwards to respond to every argument directed towards me, and I've been trying to explain my position very carefully, even though pretty much half the responses to my posts have been sarcasm and personal attacks. You wrote a single paragraph based around the word "bollocks," and some how I'm the one who's not engaging?
The position that gun control doesn't work because of black market gun sales is a perfectly legitimate position to take. Illegal guns are very easy to get in most big cities. In an earlier post I even named a street in San Francisco where people walk up and down the street all day selling them. You may not believe that guns would be available through a black market, that's perfectly fine, but you can't just declare it to be "bollocks," declare that it shouldn't be discussed, and then claim I'm ignoring you when I've responded directly to you. Please explain to me how I haven't engaged in what you said.
Tann - Gun ownership was highest among middle-aged,
college- educated people of rural small-town
America.
That's a good point, but the presence of gun lovers in small towns doesn't really preclude the existence of people who live in dangerous places and might need a weapon to protect themselves.
Incidentally, Kleck's findings have been criticised by a number of other reports, so it isn't quite as simple as:
Elijah mentioned some stats. There you go.
Sorry, I didn't mean for that to come off as "Elijah mentioned some stats, there you go they're absolute proof of my case." You can't win arguments like that based on one case and I figured the numbers would be shaky anyways. I meant it more as "There you go, here are some examples of that side of the argument." But then again, this guy's studies being criticized doesn't really mean that there are no people anywhere with a need to defend themselves.
Tann also mentioned a school shooting which had been stopped by a group in which two people had guns, and I talked a tiny bit about how a lot of people needed weapons to protect themselves after things went bad in Hurricane Katrina, when the US government essentially abandoned a chunk of the country to anarchy and chaos.
If we are talking about the Bronx, say, rather than Sierra Leone, that's quite an interesting statement.
Very very good point. Most debate about gun rights in the US usually completely leave out the international gun trade which, in its legal form and illegal form, is contributing to huge amounts of conflict all over the world. The guns-for-self-defense argument becomes a lot trickier on this level. If you're looking at it from the global perspective of wanting to keep the peace and stop the wars and genocides going on, ending the gun trade (as well as ending the war on drugs and fixing/dismantling the WTO and world bank, fighting globalization, cutting down on oil, etc) would be the way go. Though if I was an individual person living alone in some place as crazy as Sierra Leone, I'd probably think anybody trying to disarm me was a maniac. Worldwide weapons trading happens on a lot of levels too. Governments sell them too each other, mafias sneak them across borders, intelligence agencies give them to rebel groups. It becomes a much much more complex issue, but as a quick response I guess I'd say I think international weapons trading on all levels should be slowed down, if not stopped, as quickly as possible (along with all the other things I listed above), and whether or not its a good idea for people to own guns would vary from situation to situation and region to region.
It might be weird speculation, but couldn't the problem of people snapping and going on these rampages be more attributed to a collective mentality of fear and distrust rather than the gun-culture itself?
I think so. The America/Canada comparison keeps coming up, and I think that's a pretty good example. I feel like Americans culture really winds people up and then doesn't give them anywhere to go. Now that his multimedia package has shown up his specific psychology will become a matter of study, which is very important, but these events usually bring up a lot more denial about the state of our culture than it does a desire to examine ourselves (outside of message boards like this of course). But that's not really a surprise.
[Note to me - Kirk has, I think, missed the point of my Sierra Leone comparison, and has missed it in quite an interesting way - come back to this]
Elijah [in a thread about why the US and Europe have different policies on gun ownership, by and large]
Why doesn't the USA outlaw guns?
I am going to be as honest as I have ever been about my own gun ownership right now.
The USA will never outlaw guns because we are afraid of each other. If the law came down and I had to turn in my guns I would be inclined to keep at least one, because I would be scared that my neighbor would also keep one.
Living in a city where guns are easily obtained legally or illegally is pretty fucking scary at times. I have had guns pointed at me, had friends robbed at gunpoint, and driven through a parking lot on my way home while guys were pulling guns on each other.
All the statistics in the world showing accidental death and injury being more likely if you own a gun will not take away the fear. Washington DC was the murder capital of the USA, they banned guns within city limits. Now the only people carrying guns in DC are politicians, who are exempt from the laws because of their status.
The black market gun trade is already illegal, and it still takes place. Haus said in another thread that in the UK most young people don't have the criminal contacts that would be needed to purchase guns. I would argue that in most urban areas you don't need any criminal contacts to buy a gun illegally. Right now it is cheaper in the USA for a criminal to purchase a fully automatic AK-47 then it is for a law abiding citizen to obtain one.
I don't want to make this too long, but really, it all comes down to fear. "If I give up my guns that won't mean the Bob will give up his, and when he decides my music is too loud and kicks in the door I won't be able to defend myself".
People will use the 2nd amendment to prove that they should be allowed guns or use it to say that only the army should have guns. The fact is that it is so poorly written that if I wrote that sentence in 6th grade I would have been held back. The 2nd is secondary (ha...) in my mind to the human right that people have to not be afraid, and if a gun gives them that feeling (false or otherwise) I am not going to blame them.
ibis
The 2nd is secondary (ha...) in my mind to the human right that people have to not be afraid, and if a gun gives them that feeling (false or otherwise) I am not going to blame them.
I don't think the freedom from basic human emotions is a universal right but maybe I missed that memo.
Elijah
I don't think the freedom from basic human emotions is a universal right but maybe I missed that memo.
So you DON'T think that human beings have the right to feel safe in their own home?
Me
That's not what was said, Elijah, by you or anyone else. Is that what you would actually like to argue?
****
Right. I am now off to change the summary of the Virginia Tech thread again. Further discussion on gun control can go here. If you could keep a degree of civility (Bobiss, Kirk, I'm looking at you here), that would be lovely. Ta. |
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