Quote:
Originally Posted by dksuddeth
It's a very simple 3 step process to follow. why are you asking a question about it?
first, governments mandate registration
second, governments mandate bans on specific weapons
third, government confiscate
how hard was that to follow?
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The slippery slope fallacy is called a fallacy for a reason.
Things like mandatory waiting periods, the registration of fire arms and owners, etc seem perfectly reasonable as crime prevention measures, and specifically doesn't infringe the right to keep and bear arms. (You could make some privacy arguments here, and I'd be open to listening to them).
Bans on specific weapons also seem reasonable, up to a point. To take an extreme example, no sane person would extend the right to bear arms to nuclear weapons. So there's a limit somewhere. I haven't researched the question much, but from what little I know offhand, I think the current limits are about right, but could maybe be cleaned up and simplified a bit. IIRC, most gun violence is from hand guns anyway, and we aren't going to ban those anytime soon.
How exactly would government confiscation of handguns work in this country? I'm not saying it couldn't happen, ever - eternal vigilance is necessary for a democratic government, and all that. But if it gets to the point where the gubmint comes for our guns, I think we're pretty deep in the shit already. Let's say Osama ordered the army/police to go round up the guns tomorrow. Imagine how well that would work out. You send the police door to door, to houses of people they *know* are armed...you get the idea.
So, like a lot of other advocacy/rights groups, the NRA + co do a lot of important work, but also engage in a lot of fear mongering, and storm-in-a-teakettle type activities.