Guns, the NRA, the constitution and senseless shootings

Only morons believe that the self-styled militias of our time are acting under the mandate of, or even in accord with, the Second Amendment. It's impossible to sort out all the extraneous, irrelevant, partial and misinterpreted material that has been carelessly shitpiled onto the debate.

 

being a strong leaner to the left, i have a hard time understanding my liberal friends when the discussion turns to gun ownership. it's like roles reverse. liberals want to restrict rights and right-wing freaks want to expand them.

for me, owning a gun is no different than owning a computer. i don't blame computers for child porn. i don't blame guns for killing people.

a lotta lefties believe decriminalizing drugs would help the problem with drugs in our nation yet will then take a gulp of air and attempt to rationalize legislating gun control.

if you're going to argue to outlaw guns, then get right on fucking board with criminalizing every item in the world that ruins lives, because if you don't, you're a hypocrite.

one man's thoughts ... i could be wrong.

 

I don't know, LJB, you never can be too sure when those "One World" black helicopters might make their way into the Montana hinterlands.

Can you really ever have too many assault rifles for such an impending occasion?

 

I saw Red Dawn as a kid, but I'll still take my chances.

Apparently, our Constitution is so clearly understood by the gun folks that it identifies the most heinous crime a war upon itself -- treason -- and later instructs its citizens to try this all out for fun in the Second Amendment.

 

Wow... so many good thoughts here. One of those times I'm thrilled I came across SJ.
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Well said. One of the reasons I can't get behind baning guns is that it just goes against my libertarian grain.

Some variant of this has been said a lot in the 8 pages i just read through. And I'm sure it's very, very true. But my question on this has to do with sampling. While I believe that this is true for the US as a whole, I wonder if it's people in gated communities who skew the numbers. If you're living in El Bario are you better off keeping a gun for your own protection? My guess would be yes.

I really liked this post. A lot of good stuff in it, but I cut it down to what's left in there, because, quite frankly this is my favorite argument for keeping guns legal.
Seems like a good time to throw this in:
Amendment II

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.
Even if you accept all the other arguments about guns: that the danger they possess is greater than the safety they provide. That no one NEEDS to hunt to survive. The fact remains that Amendment II is in there because the founding fathers saw that it was because every Tom, Dick and Harry owned guns that they were able to overthrow a tyrannical government, and felt that the citizens of the new United States should be able to own guns in case their government became tyrannical. But who's to say what happens 1,000 years from now, or tomorrow. If we don't have guns, we can't rise up against an unjust government, and dissolve the contract through which it was formed.
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As far as Writing Irish's point about culture goes. I don't want this taken the wrong way, but could part of the problem (if you want to call it that) be that we're all so diverse culturally? What got me thinking about this was the comments about Japan, which isn't exactly as diverse as America. I don't mean this as racist (culturecist?) but maybe having trouble understanding the various cultures that inhabit our country, or, more likely to me, the lack of a unifying identity that comes with a more homogeneous society leaves America as more of a free-for-all than other countries?
This isn't a theory I've fully fleshed out yet, but these are some starting blocks. Comments?

That's all for now. There are probably a lot of other good points on this thread that I have thoughts on but forgot by now, but this is long enough as is.
Peace, all.
(Oh, I remember that I wanted to add, re: do people hunt for food? A co-worker told me that half the meat from a moose he killed lasted his family (him, wife, 2 young kids) for a year. I can see where that'd be good for a lot of people.)

 

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The NRA = 10 p.m. I don't get it.

 

i also agree with that thought as well, ski.

 

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That should make it clearer, amr.

 

thanks for the help.

 

No prob. The first post with the cuckoo clock was a little ambiguous.

 

Here's where that breaks down: A sociopath without a conscience is going to get a gun, no matter what the laws are. Gun control does not affect hardcore criminals, one way or the other.

What gun control does ... more specifically, what getting rid of the uber-violent automatic and assault weapons that have no place in any legal or accepted behavior like hunting does ... is help limit the thousands of accidental shooting deaths every year, and even many intentional ones. It can help limit many "crimes of passion," where if a gun is readily available to a person not in control of his emotions, that gun can be used for a violent criminal act. It helps limit violent acts of road rage (or other types of rage.) And yes, sometimes, it might help deter spontaneous crime. If your down-on-his-luck neighbor, who just lost his job and his wife, has to go through a lot more hoops to possess a gun than a background check from Wal-Mart and a three-day wait, maybe he'll calm down enough not to hold up that convenience store on the corner ... or your house when you're sleeping ... or a school at a 9 in the morning.

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Protection is all fine and well, whether it's against criminals or a tyrannical government.

The Second Amendment gives "a well-regulated militia" the right to bear arms against domestic despots. In an era when tyranny reigned, and the people had just overthrown an inept monarchy ruling them from across an ocean, that right needed to be clearly spelled out.

And when the time comes to form "a well-regulated militia" against another tyrannical government, then we will have that right in our Constitution.

It doesn't give every Tom, Dick and Harry the right to protect the womenfolk and chit'len with a rifle in the closet and a 9mm in the glove compartment.

But we obsess over protection in this country, we obsess over security. Hell, we even gave up a shitload of civil liberties to gain more temporary security when the Patriot Act was passed ... and then passed again.

There is no such thing as 100% protection. It's impossible to foster, it's especially impossible to promise, and it's simply foolish to believe that your government or your gun-owning head of household can provide it.