# Guns and the defense of liberty. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 12, 2013, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002 "2013-01-12T22:47:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![LinusK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@LinusK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LinusK)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2013, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/81 "2013-01-16T16:39:59Z")
> [@Dave\_Hartwick](#): > > Is it guns? Yeah, I’m not following. I guess Argentina doesn’t have enough guns? ---
**Author:** ![Dob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b2d939/32.png) [@Dob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dob)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2013, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/82 "2013-01-16T19:10:23Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Yeah, they did such a good job of disarming Iraq and Afghanistan, I’m sure that would work in the US … Well yeah, actually they did (and are doing) a pretty damn good job when you consider the people they are fighting against. But we aren’t talking about a country with a different language, hardly any infrastructure, etc… We are talking about the the US armed forces including National Guard, police, FBI, AFT, DEA, etc… in a country they grew up in deciding to take your gun. If they decided to do that, its done. They may take it from your “cold dead hand” but they will take it. So stop thinking the right to bear arms keeps government in line, it doesn’t. Laws we have all agreed upon, grew up with, and believe in, and our ideals that we are better than “that” help keep us together and constrain the government into the roles prescribed them by our Constitution. Support that, fight for that and you make us all safer. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2013, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/83 "2013-01-16T21:03:20Z")
> [@Dob](#): > > Laws we have all agreed upon, grew up with, and believe in, and our ideals that we are better than “that” help keep us together and constrain the government into the roles prescribed them by our Constitution. Magical thinking- the citizens of the Roman Republic probably believed the same. Sooner or later the armed forces or some portion of them will decide they’re the biggest and best armed tribe in the nation, and that words are nothing but hot air and paper. And you expect they’ll obey a cease and desist order. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2013, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/84 "2013-01-16T21:39:21Z")
> [@Dob](#): > > We are talking about the the US armed forces including National Guard, police, FBI, AFT, DEA, etc… in a country they grew up in deciding to take your gun. If they decided to do that, its done. Why do you think this is such an open and shut case? The DEA decided to take everyone’s drugs, but somehow it’s not just “done” yet. ICE decided to seal the border and turn back illegal immigrants … and yet the problem persists. Why do you think guns are so much easier to ban and eliminate than these things? During prohibition the government tried to eliminate alcoholic beverages and failed. It’s not as easy as you seem to think. There’s no magic wand to wave, and we’re a country of 300+ million people. Guns won’t disappear overnight even if you threw the whole weight of the federal government behind a confiscation effort, just like drugs, booze, and illegal immigrants haven’t. ---
**Author:** ![emacknight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3ec8ea/32.png) [@emacknight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emacknight)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2013, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/85 "2013-01-16T22:19:10Z")
> [@Dob](#): > > We are talking about the the US armed forces including National Guard, police, FBI, AFT, DEA, etc… in a country they grew up in deciding to take your gun. But we’re also talking about the US government right? I just assumed all of those groups would be disbanded, you know, like they did it Iraq. ---
**Author:** ![artemis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/91b2a8/32.png) [@artemis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/artemis)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2013, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/86 "2013-01-16T22:22:36Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Magical thinking- the citizens of the Roman Republic probably believed the same. Sooner or later the armed forces or some portion of them will decide they’re the biggest and best armed tribe in the nation, and that words are nothing but hot air and paper. And you expect they’ll obey a cease and desist order. :rolleyes: And I think the danger of that eventually occurring has gone up with the rise of the volunteer military. The military isn’t composed of a representative cross-section of the general public any more, and that difference may grow more and more stark over time. I worry that we may be evolving the sort of “military class” that many South American countries have historically had (or the Prussians, with the Junkers). Not something that’s going to happen any time soon - but many years down the road, who knows? ---
**Author:** ![LinusK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@LinusK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LinusK)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2013, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/87 "2013-01-16T22:29:17Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Magical thinking- the citizens of the Roman Republic probably believed the same. Sooner or later the armed forces or some portion of them will decide they’re the biggest and best armed tribe in the nation, and that words are nothing but hot air and paper. And you expect they’ll obey a cease and desist order. :rolleyes: I’m still not following. So now the Roman Republic fell for lack of guns? Is there any problem they _can’t_ solve? ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2013, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/88 "2013-01-16T22:36:01Z")
> [@XT](#): > > The assertion is that guns played no role at all, not that IEDs were effective. Exactly. I don’t agree with the whole DoL line of thinking, but Der Trihs’s claim of > [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > IEDs and RPGs. And the guns had essentially nothing to do with it. is specious at best. Artillery has historically inflicted ~70% or more of the casualties in major conventional wars this century, but that fact hardly makes it a sound argument that militaries should have abandoned issuing rifles to the infantry. > [@Kable](#): > > If you want a happier ending I encourage, you to read up on the Bielski partisans. [Bielski partisans - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bielski_partisans) Perhaps you should. > [@](#): > > In the summer of 1944, when the Soviet counteroffensive began in Belarus and the area was taken over by the Soviets, the Kalinin unit, numbering 1,230 men, women and children, emerged from the forest and marched into Nowogrodek. > > Despite their previous collaboration with the Soviets, relations quickly worsened.[11] The NKVD started interrogating the Bielski brothers about the rumours of loot they had reportedly collected during the war, and about their failure to “implement socialist ideals in the camp”.[11] **Asael Bielski was conscripted into the Soviet Red Army and fell in the Battle of Königsberg in 1945**.[11] The remaining brothers escaped Soviet-controlled lands, emigrating to the West.[11] Tuvia’s cousin, Yehuda Bielski, was sought by the NKVD for having been an officer in the pre-war Polish Army, but managed to escape with Tuvia’s help and made his way to Hungary and then to Israel. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2013, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/89 "2013-01-17T00:16:13Z")
> [@LinusK](#): > > I’m still not following. So now the Roman Republic fell for lack of guns? > > Is there any problem they _can’t_ solve? ha-ha. > [@Lumpy](#): > > So let’s say that we evolve into a society where guns are solely the province of the government. Then what? It might take fifty or a hundred or even two hundred years, but eventually someone in authority is going to realize that what the masses think _doesn’t matter_ anymore. That having 3/4 of the army on your side counts more than any number of votes from the proles. That the people’s “purpose” in society is to work, pay taxes, obey the law, and shut up and do what they’re told. \*\*That’s the inevitable result of creating a society where the people at large and the weapons bearers become segregated. \*\*It’s a fair description of the Confucian society of China, an example of what George Orwell called “\<\>horribly stable \<\> slave empires of antiquity”. You only have to look at the history of how the ancient Roman _militia_ was replaced by the professional permanent Legions, and the decay of what the right to vote meant (literally, _suffragium_) to see a worrying analogy. Once the _original_ proletariat became irrelevant to power politics, the end of republicanism was forgone. Mao Zedong said it best: “political power comes out the barrel of a gun”. ---
**Author:** ![LinusK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@LinusK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LinusK)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2013, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/90 "2013-01-17T03:44:51Z")
People have used weapons to oppress each other since forever. What was feudalism? It was a protection racket. Give us your stuff, and we’ll protect you. Don’t give us your stuff, and we’ll kill you. Sometimes the oppressed overthrew the oppressors. What happened then? Did they free the peasants? No. They switched sides. They became the new oppressors. So what’s changed? Is it that weapons are so evenly distributed? That no one is willing to use them? That everyone is equally matched? I don’t think so. What’s changed is things like education and literacy and concepts like democracy and the rule of law (rather than the rule of the biggest stick). Those are the things that are protecting you - not the gun in your closet. Which could not stop even the Coast Guard. (OK, maybe them.) ---
**Author:** ![artemis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/91b2a8/32.png) [@artemis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/artemis)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2013, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/91 "2013-01-17T04:41:53Z")
> [@LinusK](#): > > What’s changed is things like education and literacy and concepts like democracy and the rule of law (rather than the rule of the biggest stick). Those are the things that are protecting you - not the gun in your closet. Which could not stop even the Coast Guard. (OK, maybe them.) Rule of law? Have you seen any bankers going to jail? I certainly haven’t, though they stole far more money than the pathetic loser who does serve serious prison time for holding up a Qwikie-Mart. Democracy? That’s where we get to choose between voting for Kang or Kodos, right? Education and literacy are nice, but on their own they do not result in power. Only the successful application of force does that. ---
**Author:** ![SirGalahad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/71c47a/32.png) [@SirGalahad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SirGalahad)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2013, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/92 "2013-01-17T04:48:47Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > So let’s say that we evolve into a society where guns are solely the province of the government. Then what? It might take fifty or a hundred or even two hundred years, but eventually someone in authority is going to realize that what the masses think _doesn’t matter_ anymore. That having 3/4 of the army on your side counts more than any number of votes from the proles. That the people’s “purpose” in society is to work, pay taxes, obey the law, and shut up and do what they’re told. That’s the inevitable result of creating a society where the people at large and the weapons bearers become segregated. It’s a fair description of the Confucian society of China, an example of what George Orwell called “\<\>horribly stable \<\> slave empires of antiquity”. You only have to look at the history of how the ancient Roman _militia_ was replaced by the professional permanent Legions, and the decay of what the right to vote meant (literally, _suffragium_) to see a worrying analogy. I don’t think you’ll have to wait that long. I think we’re witnessing these events unfolding as we speak, but you left out one important part, maybe the most important. You didn’t mention the role of propaganda and, frankly, mind control. The clever folks who look on us as cattle, and they’ve always been with us, in one form or another, have had generations to improve and perfect all sorts of brainwashing and subliminal hypnotic suggestion. The amusing part of all this is … the citizens arguably smart and perceptive enough to see through the religion, patriotism, commercialism, TV, computer, smartphone methodologies are blinded by raw arrogance, and honestly, still capable of being manipulated, despite their over-confident bearing. Somewhere along the line, there was a disconnect between the keen minds of the brash realists, and the reward/punishment knee-jerk response programmed into them, in defiance of their expectations. At heart, most of us are as children, afraid of the dark, and willing to be very compliant in exchange for imagined security; and the “parent” image the industrial/military/government complex dangles before us promises security, if we just follow the rules, work, pay taxes, and go quietly to be shorn as sheep, albeit sheep with nifty toys and lots of video games and football. For now. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2013, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/93 "2013-01-17T05:03:44Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Because the Brits and Americans came with their guns and kicked the Nazis out? Epic fail. No one’s talking about disarming **soldiers.** ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2013, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/94 "2013-01-17T05:13:17Z")
> [@LinusK](#): > > I’m still not following. So now the Roman Republic fell for lack of guns? Well, it fell mainly because the [Marian Reforms](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marian_reforms) replaced what amounted to an amateur citizen-militia, with legions formed for every war and disbanded when the war ended, with a regular army of standing permanent legions and professional long-service soldiers, who were much better at winning battles and wars, but, as it turned out, were more loyal to their own generals than to the Republic. But, it’s rather a red herring to try to apply that lesson to the U.S. We have **always** had a professional regular army from the beginning of the Republic, but any general who tried a coup would be quietly arrested by his junior officers. It’s a matter of military culture and political culture. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2013, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/95 "2013-01-17T05:25:24Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Once the _original_ proletariat became irrelevant to power politics, the end of republicanism was forgone It was the essence of the Marian Reforms that military power was **based** on the proletariat, the _capite censi_ or “head count” (Rome had five classes of citizens for property-tax purposes (and for voting-purposes in the Centuriate Assembly), plus the propertyless who were simply counted in the census, thus, “head count”), who previously had been legally debarred from legionary service – which up to then had been limited to landowners who could afford to provide their own weapons and armor (expensive things, then). I hope you don’t mean to suggest that America should have a property-qualification for military service – or for voting. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2013, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/96 "2013-01-17T13:38:32Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > It was the essence of the Marian Reforms that military power was **based** on the proletariat, the _capite censi_ or “head count” (Rome had five classes of citizens for property-tax purposes (and for voting-purposes in the Centuriate Assembly), plus the propertyless who were simply counted in the census, thus, “head count”), who previously had been legally debarred from legionary service – which up to then had been limited to landowners who could afford to provide their own weapons and armor (expensive things, then). I hope you don’t mean to suggest that America should have a property-qualification for military service – or for voting. Sorry, I was misusing the term proletariat, your analysis is correct. ---
**Author:** ![Kable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed655f/32.png) [@Kable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kable)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2013, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/97 "2013-01-21T15:47:59Z")
> [@Dissonance](#): > > Perhaps you should. I did, the Bielski partisans saved 1236 Jews from extermination. That’s a good thing, isn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2013, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/98 "2013-01-21T17:06:07Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > But, it’s rather a red herring to try to apply that lesson to the U.S. We have **always** had a professional regular army from the beginning of the Republic, but any general who tried a coup would be quietly arrested by his junior officers. It’s a matter of military culture and political culture. The peacetime army was always minuscule until after World War 2, and only stopped relying on drafted citizens after 1975. So we’ve had a career army for about one generation so far. The good news is that we’ve structured our armed forces so that most of the military’s support capability is farmed out to the National Guards, which are more representative of the population. ---
**Author:** ![DragonAsh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/db5fbb/32.png) [@DragonAsh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DragonAsh)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2013, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/99 "2013-01-21T17:11:16Z")
> [@artemis](#): > > Rule of law? Have you seen any bankers going to jail? I certainly haven’t, though they stole far more money than the pathetic loser who does serve serious prison time for holding up a Qwikie-Mart. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Dave\_Hartwick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7feea3/32.png) [@Dave\_Hartwick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dave_Hartwick)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2013, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002/100 "2013-01-21T17:19:17Z")
> [@Kable](#): > > I did, the Bielski partisans saved 1236 Jews from extermination. That’s a good thing, isn’t it? Sure, that’s great. However, seeing how I’ve been a sport about your questions in the defensive gun uses thread, mind answering mine from earlier? Why, if guns are a threat to tyrants, did the Nazis loosen gun laws? Why did the Germans not overthrow the Nazis with their guns? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/guns-and-the-defense-of-liberty/647002.md?page=6)