In general, the winners get the naming rights. If the insurgents win, they tend not to call themselves criminals or terrorists. If the insurgents lose, they get called criminals or terrorists. And before a clear winner is decided, whether you are called a criminal or terrorist depends on who is speaking.
Woops, I was just giving a quick hijack answer to a hijack. Didn’t mean to start a whole debate on it.
In any case, the sentiment of my statement was basically: If a state can’t “trust” its citizens with something as fundamental as arms, then I don’t believe it to be treating them as free citizens, but rather as subjects. YMMV, I guess.
Well our state doesn’t tromp round the place with guns generaly speaking. Police are mostly unarmed, there are not armed military stationed all over the place, there are not armed guards at banks etc. Therefore we don’t feel the need (or want) to arm ourselves to the hilt.
Guns can be obtained and liscenced for hunting, but your average householder doesn’t feel the need to own a gun.
If gun owning is a criteria for freedom then you have wayyyyyy more freedom then we have. If gun ownership is not a major criteria then you are no freer then we are.
We “trust” our state not to play with guns too 
And I can not see how guns can ever be considered “fundamental”. Must just be a cultural thing I spose.
What does that mean, the state “trusts you with arms”? May you acquire bombs? Grenades? Are you allowed to purchase an armored tank? Can you launch an armed jet aircraft from your driveway? Can you store nuclear weapons in your cellar? Biological weapons?
If the answer is no, shall we conclude YOUR state treats you not as a free citizen, but a subject?
Or, instead, shall we conclude this whole citizens’ militia idea is something of a furphy, and that the reason Americans continue to bear firearms is merely an accident of history? (One which, fortunately, has not perpetuated in other equally free nations.)
Indeed, for all this talk of “liberty” and “freedom”, it would be easy for a stranger to believe there are no controls in United States on the ability of private citizens to acquire weaponry. Rubbish. Your state places restrictions on the “liberty” of citizens, just as ours does.
Incidentally, I must confess I do not understand this rigid distinction between the “state” and the people. I suspect it is something of an American mode of thought. Here, I would not view the state as a separate entity which independently acts to deprieve us of firearms or samurai swords or what have you. Rather, the people we elect enact laws which we support, which say that we as a nation will not countenance civilians bearing deadly weapons. It’s not a matter of the state deprieving us of an essential “liberty”; it’s the will of the electorate making itself known through self-regulating laws.
Oh and Princester, sorry but I made my break for freedom and I’m never turning back! Never!
I thought that was obvious from context, but I don’t mind expanding. I was using the term to refer to people who use armed force their own legitimate government. I can’t see a fundamental distinction between someone who does it with a bomb, and someone who does it with a gun. Shooting police or presidents is just as unacceptable as blowing them up.
The obvious answer to that is determined by which side of the fence that you sit on. But consider something too when using the words “War of Independance” - because in 1776 the 13 colonies were far from an overwhelmingly popular sentiment. Indeed, George Washington was hard pressed to sign up just 19,000 men when the first amada of British soldiers arrived to storm the Jamaica Pass onto the Brooklyn Heights. New York remained largely loyalist and was far more concerned with what happened in London (over 6 weeks sailing away) than they were with events just a short distance away in Connecticut. It’s said that the Declaration of Independance effectively forced the new colonies into a state of civil war - whether the colonists wanted it or not - so as I said, be careful when you use the “War of Independance” as a yardstick to this debate. Many, MANY colonists wished to keep the New World as part of the British Empire and the British Army was more than welcome in certain parts. The Declaration of Independance was NOT voted in - it was forced upon the colonists via civil war - and the British Army hardly invaded another country when they arrived.
Indeed, the cynic in me rather thinks that more than a few Americans believe that the USA already existed in full force and the British arrived to try and do an Iraq or something - at least, that seems to be the tone I hear when people talk about “defending liberty” etc. Let’s be quite frank about this - the War of Independance was a nasty piece of work, especially after the French arrived to make it an even more partisan matter. It was a nasty civil war which was forced upon the local population whether they wanted it or not, and it was NOT an effort to fight off an invasion.
Sheesh. Try again.
“I was using the term to refer to people who use armed force against their own legitimate government.”