BULLSHIT! You’ve used the term at least going back to the first Bush admin (Bush the Younger); it may have even been under Clinton, still. So quit blaming Obama for the gun scare. The anti’s have been boldly announcing their intentions since the first Clinton administration.
Kimstu has always been fairly thoughful and reasonable. Always. Wrong, of course, but reasonable.
Charley Brown, Lucy, football…
Could we at least do away with all those absurd comic-book fantasies about a citizen army revolting against tyranny, every time there’s a disagreement with what the majority of fellow citizens want to do via their democratically-elected representatives? Would it really be too much to ask for a bit more responsible adulthood than that in the discourse?
So that’s how it works, eh? History means nothing. Every conversation is to start with no baggage, completely fresh, as if the last decade never happened. What you said yesterday, a month, or a year ago has no bearing on the matter, because we can’t “point out, at any time in this thread” anything specific, just a general unease in dealing with your “innocent” questions. What a great out, “I didn’t say anything specific this time!”
Hell, here’s your very first post in this thread:
This is a “have you stopped beating your wife” type of question. It absolutely smacks of agenda, and we know what yours is.
I don’t think you truly understand the ill will you’ve generated among gun owners here. We simply don’t believe you, and your innocent-question-who-me? routine doesn’t go over here. Earlier it was said that you’re not nearly as clever as you think you are. It’s true, you’re not. Every one of us have pulled the innocent routine before, we know what it looks like, and if you are genuinely sincere this time and you are asking innocent questions you have established a reputation such that nobody believes that, for which you have only yourself to blame.
Being pro-gun or pro-self defense on this message board isn’t a minority position as far as I can see, but it’s certainly an embattled position, which is subject to a disproportionate amount of both emotional and dishonest attack form the anti-gun side. And this isn’t from people who are dumb - the person who is perhaps the most mendacious, vile, and I would almost say poisonous person on this message board has proved in other threads he clearly has intelligence, and yet in gun threads he behaves like a colicky 5 year-old.
What amazes me is the large number of non-US residents on this message board who wander into gun control threads and express shock and horror that people are actually permitted by their government to have a firearm of any kind. They come in and ask some of the most butt-fuckingly stupid and leading questions, as if somehow they woke up this morning and realized that over in the land of the Great Satan in Clouds of Sulfur people had firearms. And yet they aren’t stupid people. They either don’t fucking care about the question, or they’re baiting.
You know, I actually travel overseas a bit and talk to people about these issues. And since I’m almost always with paying clients, I don’t take positions unless I know them well enough to be friends with them; it’s not my place to jeopardize my bread and butter. I let them talk and see what they think. And they’ll tell me what they think - I’ve been berated by the French about the US policy with Cuba, mocked by the Spanish over US foodstuffs, picked on by the Italians over US air bases, and castigated by the Polish, French, Greeks, and others over innumerable policies of ex-President Bush. But any time the subject of firearms comes up - throughout Western Europe, South America, Asia - I’m surprised by the intelligent quality of the questions and debate. The IRL interaction is never even close to “OMFG you must be a psycho baby killer” like you see on the SDMB. They’re honest, polite questions and discussion, even from people who are very much opposed to firearms ownership.
The worst thing about the gun control debates was the very long practice of allowing posters to use the whole “metal penises” and related sexual slurs in GD. If people had been saying Christians had “tiny silver penises” (referring to a crucifix) the warnings would have been handed out like flyers for a new Chinese take-out. There is one now banned member who gloatingly and gleefully dropped sexual slurs involving gun owners in GD and got away with it for years. I’m glad things have changed but it’s too little too late, as it drove me away from wanting to enter any earnest debate. It deeply poisoned the well.
It’s important to keep the Second Amendment discussion, with its fundamentally-religious nature for one faction, separate from the OP question, about why one would want to own guns.
Just as it’s important not to be a childish little coward about saying who you’re criticizing for a stand, or what that stand is, or where it’s been made.
Which just showcases his ignorance. Everyone knows the proper term (per Bruce Campbell) is “BOOMSTICK”.
You’re right. It does pay to remember that anti’s are fundamentally religious in nature. They believe that if they can ban guns, the world will magically become a place where they can “feel safe.” They also have that religious attitude that they are entitled to tell me what I can own or do because they are good and I am bad. Further, since they want what is best for everybody, any amount of dishonesty can be accepted. It is no sin to lie to enemies of humanity, after all. Anti’s and fundies are two cheeks on one ass.
I am happy you understand.
You know the gun ban is going to be VERY strongly worded, so even the most hardened criminal will think “Damn, I need to turn in my guns”.
The penis substitute thing is hackneyed, but there does seem to be an inverse proportion between number of firearms owned and sense of humor. Unless you don’t own any, in which case you probably have no sense of humor.
This occurred to me recently as I was cleaning my one gun.
(bold mine)1. Are you implying that statements like these are commonplace in gun debates on this board?
2. Are threads asking about gun owner motivations automatically “gun control” threads?
There’s all sorts of humour; some of it isn’t very funny.
My specialty!
I don’t own a gun and never have, but I might justify owning one for the sake of defense. I would interpret any attempt to strip me of my weapons as a potential for future impingement. It’s about control. Taking away my guns legally won’t stop people from acquiring them illegally, so it would make me feel like a sitting duck.
I’ve been called a “killer” by anti-gun posters on here - one time it garnered the offender two warnings in GQ, of all places. I’ve also been called weak, a coward or words to the effect of, scum, anti-social, criminal, insane, etc. in gun-related debates innumerable times. But commonplace is hard to judge. I’ve been in gun-related debates for nearly 12 years on here; I do not have the time nor the ability to provide an annotated bibliography of thousands of interactions.
A thread asking about “gun owner motivations” is very often such, or turns into such, but does not have to be. It’s no major error to say that in areas outside of GQ it’s prima facie a gun control thread, or soon will be despite the wish of the OP.
I’m utterly shocked that this thread wound up in the pit.
Why don’t you want the cops to search your house without a warrant?
The Bill of Rights does not guarantee those rights to the people “if they have a good reason”. Nobody has to explain why they exercise any of their rights.
Which poster are you responding to?