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Originally Posted by ShaniFaye
ok...so far so good
JinnKai, I will ask you since you're the last one that posted....when a politician says they are in favor of/not in favor of gun control...what exactly are they saying? (the reason I put it this way is because you say "some people", and I'm interested in knowing what the government really means by it
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If someone is in favor of gun control, it means just that--they are in favor of governmentally controlling (aka restricting in some way) a citizen's ability to purchase weapons. Things that a person 'in favor of gun control' could be in favor of are any combination of the following:
- Making it illegal to buy or own certain types of guns (which could include any combination, roughly in descending order of how common it is to want to ban them: 'assault' weapons, .50 caliber 'sniper' rifles, tactical shotguns, pistols, non-hunting rifles, any rifles)
- Making it difficult or expensive to own certain types of guns
- Restricting how many bullets a gun can hold
- Restricting how powerful guns can be
- Requiring lots of traceable paperwork to purchase a firearm
- Requiring a waiting period before purchasing a firearm
- Requiring technological advancements that would allow bullets to be traced to the gun that fired them
If you are anti-gun control, you wish to eliminate many of the previous items.
The absolute extreme pro and anti gun control stances can be simplified to :
For gun control: Make it illegal for anyone to own any guns
Against gun control: Make it legal for everyone to own any gun you want.
Those are the absolutes, but I'm not sure anyone actually holds those beliefs. I don't want to hear anyone tell me I'm wrong, those two stances are not up for debate. If you are pro gun control, you want to bring us closer to noone owning guns, if you are anti gun control, you want to bring us closer to anyone who wants them owning guns.
Full disclosure: I'm in Arizona, where it's basically legal to own and carry any gun you want without permits, if you're 21 and you're not concealing it. Concealed carry permits are easy, cheap and common, I own several guns, and go shooting with my wife regularly. I have friends who are gun smiths, and others who legally own automatic pistols and rifles, and I've shot everything up to an AK-47 and an AR-15 (the civilian M16).