Citizens and Weapons

[Kulindahr]

Democrats were not always anti-gun. In many Blue states including one of the most liberal states Vermont has one of the most laxest gun laws in the nation. The anti-gun mentality from Democrat elites started from large urban cities in the North-East where urban violence was difficult to control. Inner city gangs were plaguing communities with drug related gun violence. Even look at California where certain sections of LA had more gang on gang homicides than California National Guard sustaining causalities in Iraq.

I have been to states with strong gun cultures and you get used to it very fast. Legal gun owners do not commit homicides or armed robberies or run around raping people. It is the thugs who get weapons illegally for criminal purposes. Responsible citizens should have freedom to chose whether they want to take the burden of legal responsibility to protect themselves with fire arms. All CCW owners take courses and learn laws about when and how they can defend themselves. I was shocked to read an article about legal gun ownership in NYC. Basically all Wall Street execs, Democratic political elites, NYT chief editor and many celebs here hold gun licenses and have weapons (including Bloomberg and Shumer) but they are the first ones to deny everyone else the option to defend themselves because "we are small people" who can't be trusted with guns.

Quite so -- the movement has always been driven by desperate ideas ("We don't know what to do, so let's do something stupid"), and elitism ("We importnat people should have guns, but not those little people").

<clears throat>

Harke, the Nazis took the guns away from the Germans.

There is the biggest failure in the movie Schindler's List: Schindler ARMED 'his' Jews.

I have nothing really against gun-ownership despite not having one. All I really want is some gun-protection laws (background checks etc.). Do we really want former felons and "mentally unstable" people with firearms? No.

Um... ever tried to buy a firearm? You go through what's laughingly called an "instant check", for those things.

There's a sad lack of input in some few instances on the mentally unstable part, but otherwise... the system errs on the side of not giving guns.


edit: besides that, legislators are too willing to turn peopke into felons these days -- the limitation should be VIOLENT felons, i.e., the burden should be on the state to prove that the individual can't be trusted with a gun.

 

[MoufOfKhaos]

^Because one man that lives in a rural area speaks for all men, right?

Why not ask people that live in a ghetto the same thing; there, gun violence isn't so rare.

 

[Kulindahr]

i live in a heavy gang crime area in south florida. every other night there is a story about a few people getting shot.

i still never felt the need to carry a gun though, i have my knife in case i get mugged by someone i can actually fight. this is because when i think about it if that bastard is going to shoot me, i probably won't know it until I've been shot.

But the point is that if you had a firearm, a guy with a knife would leave you alone (except in cases of drugs, where all bets are off).

And if a bad guy comes at you with a gun, his purpose is to intimidate. If you show one, the intimidation is gone, and the transaction just entered a new cost/benefit analysis: in roughly nine out of ten situations, if a citizen merely shows a firearm and an evident willingness to use it, the bad guy decides the pickings are better elsewhere (again, excepting drug situation; if you're facing a guy on drugs there IS no good course of action).

Don't see the reason on why anyone would want one, but people find their reasons.

To me this is no different than the Tea Party folks at that debate hollering "Let him die!" It's hateful.

Odds are, I wouldn't be alive today if I hadn't been carrying a firearm on an occasion or two. The scariest: a guy twice my size was coming at me with a two-by-four. I didn't even have to draw my weapon; merely turning so he saw it and I could have drawn and shot in one move "pacified" him.

 

[Lefty]

It must be awful to live in a country where one feels the need to arm oneself against one's fellow countryfolk.

Dear Rat,

First we need to note that Flash is talking pure trash.

Second, we are in America...all these people are not OUR 'country' folk.
Our Immigration system is archaic and too even so, too often ignored.
Butt, that is a separate issue.

Third, in my 'rural' area I have 3 law enforcement people as neighbors.
I have 4 weapons.

2 of those weapons were selected with the assistance of one of those
neighbors. (Mr. Liberal Democrat and a FED as a matter of fact)

All of them encouraged/insisted I get weapons to protect hearth and home.

I don't like weapons but can shoot the head off a timber rattler at 20 feet...
without my glasses. Two of my other neighbors have been invaded.

I guess the NRA stickers on my cars/trucks and front/back screen doors
give unwanted visitors a pause to reflect.

My choice of having weapons is POLITIC in nature and has no bearing on my
politics or party affiliations.


JMHO as I live it.

 

[star-warrior]

Old man Cheney owns a gun, and a good shot too, according to his former friend.

 

[Kulindahr]

I abhor guns not used for war or hunting, and even then I'd wish for the feudal age of swords and other handheld close range weaponry.

Now. I grew up in the "the gangs are invading our suburbia!" era(mid-80's to mid-90's), so gun violence was either in music and movies, or plastered all over the 5 o'clock news - both glorified and horrified. In short, it painted my sordid hatred for people that wield them as a way to gain or project a sense of power. This by no means is to say I don't agree with the right to own them - it just says I won't. Nor does it suggest i'm thoroughly anti-gun - true, I'd love a world where they didn't exist in most, if not all forms, but i'm just not a fan of them(i'm flawed that i'll watch movies and tv shows with them, however won't wear anything with a gun on it).

I own a knife(and if it wasn't a gay pride knife, I may not own it actually - but it's symbolic and I bought it for a reason); it's not as indiscriminate in the wrong hands.

So you'd rather have a situation where an elite -- the strong and skilled -- have total control over the means of violence? and the weak and unskilled have no defense?

The thing about the era of swords was that it took a very long time to become much good with one -- the equivalent to an in-depth course of study in a university, like four years of eight to ten hours a week. So anyone not wealthy enough to afford such a course of study was powerless.

It's been said that the Declaration of Independence called all men equal, but Samuel Colt made them equal. There's serious truth to that: old ladies, the crippled, even kids have overcome malicious violence directed against them by use of firearms.

. . .^

I know a few people who hunt, one will only use a cross bow. I feel comfortable with them owning firearms. IMO, anyone who doesn't feel that there needs to be responsible, effective and enforceable way to control and monitor the sale of firearms is mentally unstable and shouldn't be allowed firearms....and the god given "right to own automatic weapons"...really?

I've always thought that the day I feel threatened enough to need or want a firearm is the day I move somewhere else. So far so good!

If you count all the people who have felt that way, who would still be alive if they or someone else in a crowd had been armed, were counted, the number would be astounding to most people.

BTW, I see you regard the American Founding Fathers as "mentally unstable".

 

[Kulindahr]

Looks like there's a few hundred million guns in the US [cite whatever].
Does that mean most are never actually used?

Yes -- most people with firearms don't even practice. That has to be qualified; there's actually a fairly significant population who own them as collector's items, and have no intention of ever using one.

That, sir, is a crock. Millions of Americans are born, bred and live out their lives in rural areas of the United States and don't need guns to do it. You are simply spouting more of the fear rhetoric always resorted to to justify an archaic "right". Guns are simply an excuse to intimidate those without them, and arming everyone is hardly a justifiable solution. I would suggest to you that in the current political climate of the United States, those very people proclaiming the right to bear arms may very well be roundiing up people like homosexuals because equally archaic thinking will let them justify it.

Well, of course. To the tune of a couple of million times a year, they are used by honest citizens to intimidate (usually violent) criminals into leaving them alone, or not infrequently into surrendering. They keep society much safer by intimidating those who would prey on the innocent a bit more wary, and a bit more at bay.

Your last sentence is why I can't understand why Democrats aren't encouraging liberals to arm and organize. Gay, for example, shouldn't be satisfied with the Oink Pistols; we should have the "Rainbow Rifles".


edit: Yes, millions of Americans will never need firearms. But liberals for years employed the call, "If it saves just one life...." for many issues. The fact is that owning guns saves the lives of innocent citizens, over and over. There have also been instances where gun control laws cost lives -- so by the rule "if it saves just one life", those laws need to go.

 

[Kulindahr]

Kulindahr, I believe that people who live in rural areas who're unarmed are sitting ducks. "Rural crime is rare but there", I said.

Flash thinks this is all baloney.

Kulindahr: you live in a rural area. With whom do you agree?

^Because one man that lives in a rural area speaks for all men, right?

Why not ask people that live in a ghetto the same thing; there, gun violence isn't so rare.

Crime in rural areas is rare -- but partly because of that, those who are unarmed are sitting ducks: there isn't the police coverage, because there isn't the crime.

Of course it isn't as rare as it used to be; meth users love to steal metal, and metal sitting unattended in rural areas is pretty common (not too far from here, someone tried to steal fence wire (from the fence!) by hooking it to a clamp hooked to a cable hooked to a car. Stupid mistake: the clamp was metal, and it was an electric fence... the guys were caught because the one with the clamp collapsed from the shock when he connected it, and his friends tried to help him) -- irrigation pipe, metal barrels, and such. And if I'm going to face a meth user who's high and trying to steal, I'm going to want a gun -- maybe two.

I've had guns in the house almost always, always when in the country. Only once did I come close to needing one -- when there was a warning that two violent convicts were on the loose, and the entire countryside loaded up and stood watch.

As for the ghetto -- that's a whole different ball game, and most of the deaths there are not innocent. In fact, most inner city deaths are generated by government programs that make killing others profitable. Want to reduce firearms deaths in the U.S., there's the place to start.

 

[Kulindahr]

I guess the NRA stickers on my cars/trucks and front/back screen doors
give unwanted visitors a pause to reflect.

Well, yes -- those and "Fraternal Order of Police Officers" are an established deterrent. And last year I read that a "USMC" sticker on a house window sorta encourages criminals to try elsewhere, too.

 

[Kulindahr]

I can see your point brother, and it's a valid point.

But here's another viewpoint:

Ranchers near the Mexican border have to live in constant fear of their lives. Illegal immigrants who're ferried across the border are brought by "coyotes", who're really just gangsters, who rape, pillage, and burn at will. The bottom of the human food chain.

Those ranchers need those firearms!

Those ranchers need the frakking U.S. Army.

Since the feds are being neglective, the local governors should order their National Guard folks home from the Middle East and put them to work.

 

[star-warrior]

We don't carry guns in the UK normally. Anyone who has one and roaming the streets with them is usually suspected to be a criminal. Gun violence here is amongst the lowest in the world.

 

[MoufOfKhaos]

So you'd rather have a situation where an elite -- the strong and skilled -- have total control over the means of violence? and the weak and unskilled have no defense?

No. I'd rather have a situation where people knew how to defend themselves without the ability to instill panic; and nothing says panic to me than a person that fires a gun into the air - and that's just for starters. If i've got to bog myself down in specifics, I'll be here on the net all day.

What you've inadvertently just told me, btw, is what I hate about guns in the first place - any joe or jane schmoe can wield one and feel powerful for doing so. And on that same side of the coin, be reckless in doing so as well.

The thing about the era of swords was that it took a very long time to become much good with one -- the equivalent to an in-depth course of study in a university, like four years of eight to ten hours a week. So anyone not wealthy enough to afford such a course of study was powerless.

ALL weapons, regardless of whether it's a gun or a basic knife, would take proper time if you plan to use them right. It doesn't take a lot of money to enroll in a basic self defense course these days, in some form of martial arts, to go to a gym - it costs NOTHING to work out at home(barring the cost of a... home).

It's been said that the Declaration of Independence called all men equal, but Samuel Colt made them equal. There's serious truth to that: old ladies, the crippled, even kids have overcome malicious violence directed against them by use of firearms.

And we've also got senseless, sometimes even tragic, violence because of them too - not just because of criminal empires, gangs/militias and media either. It's nice to see the good in them, but some pro-gun owners love to gloss over the bad.

As for the point about the border, that's more or less given to my "war" portion. That's a volatile cocktail of chaos, one I'm glad not to have to deal with.

But then again, if they didn't have the guns(and the drugs to fund the running of those guns), who knows if it'd be such a hell down there?

 

[star-warrior]

If I was beset by weakness in my hand, maybe old age and a lack of dexterity, wouldn't having a gun that I can't point in time and without the strength to pull the trigger incense a burglar or would be robber for the audacity more?

If one believed having a gun was being safer, but the other guy kills you under so called self defense since you aimed your gun and missed, what have you profited from this illusion of safety?

There are plenty of frail and old folks with guns out there. People with a mission to harm you generally will, if they are intent upon it.

 

[Lefty]

Seems like I am hearing a load of non-realist rhetoric and political cant.

Some of what is being stated as 'fact' here is more left wing and non

realistic than I (lefty) am.

My non collection type weaponry is for physical not fiscal protection. Try

to rip me off.....we will probably fight... try to hurt me, my family or friends

then, I will use what is necessary to terminate your activity. First drive-by

or whatever best be good..or it may be your last.

Civility is for the civil............ pro cultu civili

 

[star-warrior]

No.

Facing an old man with a gun makes it worse—you don't know what he'll shoot off.

I think I'd rather face Mouf with his knife, than an old man with a gun.

You don't need to be old to be a poor shot.

 

[MoufOfKhaos]

Take a look at this scene. It's only a few seconds long:

And in the same vein, I could show you Star Wars and prove just as little.

 

[zoltanspawn]

Our senior citizens carry guns because they're too young to die and too old to take an ass whoopin'.

 

[zoltanspawn]

But seriously, although ^that lady is charming as heck I've never felt the need for a gun. Never the fear that's so palpable, apparently, in our hinterlands. Really, the idea of gun ownership is rather foreign to me.

Although it's not my cup of tea, the most convincing appeal of owning a gun is blowing shit up. I have a couple friends who like to do that.

 

[alfaPA]

Kulindahr:.... It's been said that the Declaration of Independence called all men equal, but Samuel Colt made them equal. There's serious truth to that: old ladies, the crippled, even kids have overcome malicious violence directed against them by use of firearms.

..and this is the point of a democracy?

Kulindahr:... If you count all the people who have felt that way, who would still be alive if they or someone else in a crowd had been armed, were counted, the number would be astounding to most people.

BTW, I see you regard the American Founding Fathers as "mentally unstable".

Had our founding fathers known the reckless abuse and advantage taken by gun manufacturers and sellers and the attitudes of people like you (don’t take this personally), they no doubt would be scrambling for responsible, effective and enforceable way to control and monitor the sale of firearms. And Mr. K, how do you justify anyone having unlimited weapons, especially automatic weapons and ammunition and no accountability? This is effectively what the NRA wants.

Kulindahr: Odds are, I wouldn't be alive today if I hadn't been carrying a firearm on an occasion or two. The scariest: a guy twice my size was coming at me with a two-by-four. I didn't even have to draw my weapon; merely turning so he saw it and I could have drawn and shot in one move "pacified" him.

However have I managed to live my life without big burly guys threatening me with two-by-fours

Lefty: First we need to note that Flash is talking pure trash.

This, from the queen of indecipherable trash talk??

Lefty: I don't like weapons but can shoot the head off a timber rattler at 20 feet...
without my glasses. Two of my other neighbors have been invaded.

....by Aliens? .....and I don't think there are timber rattlesnakes in CA, so without glasses that might have been one of your skinny neighbors you shot??


......and speaking of mentally unstable:

Lefty? ..need I say more?
State / Province: California
Gender: Male
Orientation: Curious < you call that curious??
Status: Open Relationship <but still married to a woman?
Are you out?: No one knows. <??

Kulindar, Thinking that all gays should carry and flaunt weapons in order to ingratiate us to, and earn us the respect of our nation?

In concl. You may feel safer when all college kids are required to take their concealed weapons to bars on Saturday night or to national forests, along with their kegs and coolers of beer, but for some of us ― not so much.



Why hasn’t anyone put the “America, fuck yeah” picture in this thread, yet??
disclaimer: IMO

 

[Kulindahr]

No. I'd rather have a situation where people knew how to defend themselves without the ability to instill panic; and nothing says panic to me than a person that fires a gun into the air - and that's just for starters. If i've got to bog myself down in specifics, I'll be here on the net all day.

I'd rather have mature people who weren't so un-selfcontrolled as to panic at the sound of a weapon being fired -- take precautions, obviously, but panic? That's just immaturity, and I don't like catering to immaturity.

Got any accounts of someone panicking and firing a gun in the air? I know of one where someone panicked and shot himself in the leg... and the gun shot scared off the criminal, who didn't stop to find out more than that someone had a gun.

What you've inadvertently just told me, btw, is what I hate about guns in the first place - any joe or jane schmoe can wield one and feel powerful for doing so. And on that same side of the coin, be reckless in doing so as well.

So, you don't like the victims being able to be on an even par with a criminal? That's scary.

I think if you studied the research, you'd conclude that the kind of people who go for carrying a gun for protection don't "feel powerful" and don't get reckless.

ALL weapons, regardless of whether it's a gun or a basic knife, would take proper time if you plan to use them right. It doesn't take a lot of money to enroll in a basic self defense course these days, in some form of martial arts, to go to a gym - it costs NOTHING to work out at home(barring the cost of a... home).

A course in effective home defense with a firearm generally costs about fifty bucks and takes under eight hours.

A basic self defense course is worthless against a determined criminal.

Martial arts, to the point of being useful, is EXPENSIVE! A gun and a weekend course are cheaper.

And working out? So what -- one guy with a moderate understanding of how to fight with a knife will disable you in thirty seconds no matter how fit you are, and a bullet won't care. In order for working out to do any good, you have to commit to doing the one thing that will increase your chances of getting dead astronomically: get into physical contact with the bad guy.

And we've also got senseless, sometimes even tragic, violence because of them too - not just because of criminal empires, gangs/militias and media either. It's nice to see the good in them, but some pro-gun owners love to gloss over the bad.

As has been said here, they're a tool. Misuse can be dangerous with any tool -- for example, almost every year, kids drown in five-gallon buckets.

Personally, if we didn't have the massive deficit problem, I'd favor a tax credit for the purchase of one's first self-defense weapon, IFF the person submitted a certificate showing sound training, and a credit available no more often than every other year for re-training or advanced training.

As for the point about the border, that's more or less given to my "war" portion. That's a volatile cocktail of chaos, one I'm glad not to have to deal with.

But then again, if they didn't have the guns(and the drugs to fund the running of those guns), who knows if it'd be such a hell down there?

And the government keeping drugs prices high so it's worth the trouble in the first place. Better than four-fifths of violent crime in this country is generated by government programs, just like during Prohibition. Want to decrease gun violence? Drop all laws against drugs people can grow at home (not manufacture), and let family businesses (i.e. the majority of people involved are family) sell them.