Aren’t Brits still subjects?
The “free” Britons cannot post pictures of burning poppies on the Internet.
So styled, like any citizen of a monarchy. It doesn’t matter.
I guess we can debate in good faith how important gun ownership is when determining how “free” someone is.
However, is it at all debatable that there is some degree of freedom associated with gun ownership?
Let’s take two hypothetical countries. They have the same laws, government, economy and constitutions. The only difference is that one of them has England’s gun laws and one of them has the USA’s. Is there any disagreement that the pro-gun country is more free?
IMHO, right to own guns is essential for freedom in any meaningful sense. If a government doesn’t even trust you to own firearms to defend yourself and your family, then you aren’t very “free” at all. That’s why any politician that wants to take my guns away will never get my vote. It’s not just about gun rights, but the lack of trust that position betrays on the part of the politician.
Is there, in your view, a freedom to live one’s life without a real possibility of being randomly killed by someone else practicing what he believes to be his own freedom - one not constrained by any responsibilities to others?
S.A.F.E. (Sheep Always Fear Everything)
Of course a “random killer” isn’t exercising freedom. That’s why we have things like an armed populace to stop him, police, courts, prisons, etc.
Tell us the difference between him and a yahoo with a CC license yapping about the Second Commandment. Is it more than whether or not he’s fired yet?
The armed populace *in a military base *isn’t enough to do shit, as we have just been reminded. The rest of the people you’ve listed come into it after the killing has already taken place. Lotta good that does the victim, huh? Or do they come into it for you at all?
But if you carry something with a big shaft on it near your hip, that makes you a man, huh? :rolleyes:
Not everyone needs a strap-on.
Warnings to both of you for personal insults. Take this stupidity to the Pit, and if you’re unable to discuss gun laws without resorting to this kind of stuff, you shouldn’t post about the issue unless you’re in that forum.
The populace “in a military base” is not armed.
My personal opinion is that when you have a right, you shouldn’t toss it away without understanding why you are doing it and what the consequences would be.
If you are anti-gun, that’s your POV and that’s fine. No one is requiring you to own one. However, lets say one night you are robbed, or your family is put in jeopardy by someone with a gun, or.a knife if you prefer. Wouldn’t you at least want the option to own a gun to protect yourself and your loved ones?
Making guns illegal in no way will stop criminals from having guns. There will always be a demand for them here in the US, and someone will meet that demand. It will just go to the black market. This won’t make it harder for someone that doesn’t care about gun laws to get a gun… It will make it harder for the law abiding citizen to get one. I personally like the idea that I can choose to own a gun or not. I don’t want the government taking away that right. Once it is gone, it will never return. I like being able to make that choice for myself.
You are letting your personal bias and passion for this issue cloud your judgement. All I’m asking for is a legitimate, academic source on the subject, not something written for a left-wing website/blog/e-zine or whatever that is. Just looking around the website for 10 minutes, looking at the ads as well as the articles tells me who it caters to.
I’m looking for something a bit less politically biased from today’s point of view and
That isn’t it, I’m afraid. do you have a federalist paper? How about notes from the debating of the BoRs? Something that takes us back to the writers of the document. Also, do you know if every other country who permitted slaves permitted their citizens to own guns? So when slaves were outlawed, so were gun ownership laws? That would help.
If you have questions about whether or not a quote is real, just Google it. It’s easy to find sources that attribute those words to Patrick Henry. Here are some other examples.
In many countries, it does. There are still criminals, but they have to use other weapons or none.
For the record, I wasn’t questioning the veracity of the quotes.
Did these countries have 250 years of uninterrupted gun production and ownership? How on earth would the US government go about collecting all guns in private hands? Unless there is a record of purchase and an address attached to the owner, or you could somehow scare people into turning in their guns, it would be a hopeless task… Sort of like the drug war.
And gun owners are, in general, people who don’t want to give up their guns. I see a lot of ugly confrontations between private citizens and the ATF. (They would have to hire a shitload of new treasury agents).
Not exactly. Drugs are easier to hide.
It would take a while, yes. But guns do get lost, and wear out, and get confiscated. With time, the number of guns, and hence also the number of guns in the hands of criminals, would decrease. Consider: If guns don’t go out of circulation for various reasons, then why do the gun manufacturers keep making and selling more?
How do you figure?
You can’t very well smuggle guns in your rectum.
How did this turn into a discussion of banning guns? The representatives who got recalled voted for things like background checks and a limit to the size of a magazine. Banning guns, AFAIK, has never so much as been suggested. Quit playing slippery slope extremism with us!