dksuddeth

It's easy to ignore the question when the question is irrelevant. who cares how high the crime rate is or even how fast it's rising when the only effect the gun ban has had is disarm otherwise peacable people who need to defend themselves from the criminals who had no intention of following the 'ban' and are using it to full advantage against the people that did.

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"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Willravel

When the question is "how effective are gun bans", you think it's irrelevant to study crime rates in a country that recently banned guns? That means you're biased and you don't care about evidence to support your beliefs.

Like Bush.

Like I said, there's very little unbiased information online. It's difficult to find decent statistics on any crime in the UK. That's the best I could do.

dksuddeth

since the supreme court arguments are less than a month away and 'gun control' is becoming an ever volatile subject because of it, I wanted to put up this 1 hour video to show why gun control isn't about preventing or limiting crime, but about control of people.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

dc_dux

LOL.....now that is one piece of twisted propaganda!

The Turkish genocide of Armenians --> Nazi Germany --> Communist China --> Khmer Rouge in Cambodia --> reasonable gun control in the US since the 1990s, supported by an overwhelming majority of the public!

dk....perhaps you can explain the connection?

...or why you believe it is such a volatile subject for most Americans. According to most polls, gun control doesnt even register on lists of issues of concern to most americans. (Polls - Problems and Priorities)

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

dksuddeth

Laugh all you like and call it propaganda. If you can't make the connection between disarming the civilian populace and 'reasonable' gun control as making sure that the government will always be stronger than the people, then there is no help for you at all, whatsoever.

I just did. Statists, like yourself, would rather entrust your protection and lives to a political body instead of retaining that which is rightfully yours and all because you distrust your fellow man. Is the fear of the responsibility of protecting your freedom and liberty so great that you would rather take the risk, however small, that what you see in the linked video could be your fate as well?

gun control is the 800 pund gorilla, nobody wants to talk or discuss it. I'm not surprised that it doesn't even register, yet i'm sure it would be as bright as a thousand suns if there were even talk about opening up the machine gun registry to the 'people',....after all, americans are not to be trusted with weapons of mass destruction and shit.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Baraka_Guru

I stopped at "gun control = enslavement".... but that could be because I'm a slave.

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Willravel

ROFL

DK, no one in the world is totally responsible with any weapon. It's unreasonable to believe that anarchy via armament is a viable solution. MAD is not viable equilibrium and if you don't believe me look at how militarism and politics has evolved since everyone got the bomb. Imagine MAD not just involving every nuclear-capable nation, but every member of the population.

Anarchy only works when there is one person; one man with a gun. 2 men with guns is adversarial. 300 million with guns? Think about it.

dksuddeth

head in the sand. typical.

and yet, 200 million are dead, by their govenrments hand, because they had no guns. what do you want? government sponsored population control?

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"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

debaser

I won't threadjack beyond this, but If you wanted to start another thread I think a compelling case could be made that MAD was/is an extremely effective deterent to large scale conflict.

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Willravel

And there's quite simply no way to be sure that it couldn't have been 300 million had the population been armed. You can guess, with bias, but you'd be kidding yourself if you really thought that you knew beyond a reasonable doubt. That's really where this topic always gets unhinged.

You lay out scenarios, and I lay out scenarios. You lay out stats and I lay out stats. You get pissed and I get pissed. You link articles and I link articles. Blah blah blah blah.

Just wait until the damn verdict.

Debaser, if you'd like yo make a thread I'd gladly chime in with my two cents.

dksuddeth

but what pisses me off will is that i see your arguments stating that you'd rather have 200 million dead by nobody resisting than to have 300 million dead by people defending themselves. is there any limit to pacifism? or is life really not that important to you?

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Willravel

Is there any limit to pacifism or my pacifism? My pacifism probably does have an eventual limit, but that's not really relevant. What does seem relevant is that you seem to be okay with an additional 100,000,000 deaths so long as they're following your philosophy. Can you think about that for just a minute? You've essentially said, "More can die, but it's okay so long as everyone agrees with me."

Besides, I've already explained how an "armed" populace doesn't mean shit. You having a glock isn't going to stop 'them'. You following my hypothetical advice and carrying out covert bombing missions would really be the only way to protect yourself from an invading or domestic force that seeks to hurt or kill you. All you need are things such as silly putty, candle wax, corn starch, and yarn (I won't post the full list online, if I can even remember it).

Have you ever fired on SWAT members? Military officers?

Baraka_Guru

You really don't know what you're talking about, do you? What sand? Typical of what?


Spoiler: "Gun control = enslavement" is a rather serious logical fallacy.

Spoiler: Outside of ideology, perhaps, I don't think I'm a slave.

Spoiler: Are you a slave to anything?

Spoiler: You shouldn't use a metaphor unless you can both understand and explain its tenor and vehicle.

Spoiler: Canadians aren't slaves.

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

dksuddeth

you're right will. we peon civilians are probably too weak. can't stand up to anything. Thats why we NEED the government to protect us. to hell with freedom if we are too scared of terrorists or anything like that. it's not like if people ever pulled their collective heads out of their asses, they could figure out that 15 million will beat 4 million any day of the week. but god no, we can't have that because that would be way too many more dead. it's better just to live as servants to the government instead of all the death and destruction that having everyone armed would do.

I'm with you buddy. I'd rather have the government tell me what i'm allowed to do instead of think for myself. where do i turn my guns in?

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Plan9

You've obviously never seen a Jet Li movie.

__________________
Whatever you can carry.

"You should not drink... and bake."

dc_dux

What gorilla?



When we arm gorillas. lets talk.

There is a reason no one wants to talk about gun control anymore.

Its simple....over the last 20 years, the government has generally acted to reflect the will of people for sensible gun control. Why is that so hard to understand?

You're certainly not to going to win any converts with a video that suggests links between the actions of the Young Turks of 1910s, Nazi Germany, Mao's China... and the US.

It is highly probable that the USSC will uphold the unconstitutionality of the DC gun law and that the right to bear arms is an individual right. The only issue of interest is if the Court will issue a narrow ruling or address the broader issue of whether the right is absolute or subject to reasonable restrictions as the Appeals Court ruled.

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

Willravel

That's just it. I'm living proof that you're 100% wrong. I'm anti-gun AND I'm anti-establishment and a free thinker. Or have you not seen the 9/11 threads? Have you not seen me go on and on regarding the Bush Administration? Have you somehow missed the fact that I am a free thinker and have come to my decision regarding guns completely on my own?

When the government tells me what to think, I usually tell them to go fuck themselves and figure it out on my own. I'm living proof that you're 100% wrong.

Lebell

Finally some judges saw some damn sense.

__________________
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." – C. S. Lewis

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dc_dux

dk (and others)......the Post has an audio of the arguments at the USSC today:

<embed src='http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/mmedia/player/wpniplayer_viral.swf?thisObj=fo981705&vid=031808-5s_title' bgcolor='#FFFFFF' flashVars='allowFullScreen=true&initVideoId=&servicesURL=http://www.brightcove.com&viewerSecureGatewayURL=https://www.brightcove.com&cdnURL=http://admin.brightcove.com&autoStart=false' base='http://admin.brightcove.com' id='fo981705' name='fo981705' width='454' height='305' allowFullScreen='false' allowScriptAccess='always' seamlesstabbing='false' type='application/x-shockwave-flash' swLiveConnect='true' pluginspage='http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash'></embed>

Is pretty clear from the questioning that the Court will rule that the 2nd amendment is an "individual" right rather than a "collective" right for the purpose of a militia.

It will be interesting when the ruling is released in June to see if they take on the broader issue of the right of the "state" to impose limitations on that individual right.

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

samcol

The way I understand it is that they are saying yes it's an individual right that can be regulated at the federal state and local level. Doesn't seem like a victory for the right to bear arms imo.

Sounds like a ticket for regulating the guns out of everyone's hand slowly over time. The supreme court looks like it's taking the easy middle, vague, road again.

__________________
It's time for the president to hand over his nobel peace prize.

Willravel

SCOTUS is stacked with conservatives. Is it just libertarians who are fighting on the front lines (so to speak) of this issue? I was under the impression that the second amendment was a staple of conservative politics. Was that one of the things tossed out when the NeoCons arrived on the scene?

The_Dunedan

The Neo-Cons are gungrabbers in sheeps' clothing. Bush promised to renew the Ugly Gun Ban if it hit his desk; only intense lobbying by GOA, CCRKBA and the Johnny-come-lately NRA kept that from happening. And any gunowner who thinks Hillary and her ilk wouldn't just LOVE to turn the USA PATRIOT Act and other such monstrosities loose on gunowners is deluding themselves. The Neo-Cons not only sold out gunowners themselves, they handed the gungrabbers a whole plate full of extra-Constitutional and -Judicial powers with which to harass the gunowning community.

The Neo-Cons are traitors on the gun issue, as on so many others.

Willravel

Well jesus, at least you guys know where I stand. I hate liars, whether I agree with them or not.

The_Dunedan

Perzacktley. That's why I'd almost rather have Obama or Hillary, much as I detest them both. At least they fly their colours openly and don't hide behind a false flag and false words.

To paraphrase Edwin "Fast Eddie" Edwards; they're crooks, but they're honest crooks!

samcol

That's pretty much where I stand too. I mean of all people the GOP is going to nominate John McCain in light of what has happened over the last 8 years.

I agree Will, this is an issue the 'neo' conservatives really don't care about at all. However, they will campaign on it to get the significant gun rights vote.

__________________
It's time for the president to hand over his nobel peace prize.

The_Dunedan

This truly is a disgusting election from a gunowner's perspective. We had one chance, just one, and we blew it. Unless the every other gunowner in the US is planning a write-in campaign and I missed the memo, we totally botched (or allowed to -be- botched -for- us by hostile interests) Ron Paul's primary run. There's eighty-friggin-million of us, for Christ's sake, and we couldn't get this man the GOP nomination. The -only- progun candidate in the field, the only such candidate in God-alone-knows HOW many years...and we fucking blew it. And now we get Bad (McCain), Worse(Obama), and Terrifying To Contemplate(Hillary). I feel like I came back from Prague and found that Kafka had beaten me home. That's what doing in a free-ish country will do I suppose; their politicians still get in fistfights over the budget.* Whole country lacked a working national government for seven months; got along just fine. Hunters all over the place. Folks thought the photos of my folks' shop and my Mom shooting her .50 were hysterical: not perhaps as far as they'd take things, but nothing repellent or frightening. One of the gun-friendliest countries in Europe, surplus hardward all over the place if you knew where to look, and all legitimate. Machine-guns in surplus shops that you could take home for about $1,200 with the proper paperwork. Getting the "B" license seems somewhere between getting a CCW and a Form 4 in US in terms of expense, time, and difficulty. Oh, and ammo's about $.03 per round over there. Now, this is for Czech citizens only, mind; no foreigners. But for those with a mind, it could be quite simple. A client of mine hunted wild hogs with an M1-A...she a female lawyer in her mid-late 30s with a child.

And I come home to find the U.S. sinking into precisely the morass that Europe spent most of the last century killing itself in. Europe, having experianced both Fascism and Socialism first-hand, are appalled and darkly amused (and sometimes deeply frightened) by the way the U.S. seems to be sliding into some unsavoury hybrid of the two.

McCain. Obama. And the She-Clinton. It's enough to put a man off his whiskey.




*The willingness of politicians to assault one another is always a good measure of their honesty, especially when done over arguments of principal.

Willravel

WHOA, WHOA, let's not get crazy.

The_Dunedan

The problem is, it puts a man back onto his beer.

dc_dux

Do you really think a Paul presidency would have made a difference? The issue is equally under the purview of acts of Congress and the COurts

Look at his attempts to "restore" the 2nd amendment while in Congress:

Second Amendment Protection Act of 2007 - No Cosponsors

Second Amendment Protection Act of 2005 - No Cosponsors

Second Amendment Protection Act of 2003 - Four Cosponsors

Second Amendment Protection Act of 2001 - Three Cosponsors

Putting the legal question aside, there is no support in the Congress or the country for the removal of all reasonable gun control legislation.

And back to the legal issue, it would be shocking to see the USSC declare that individual rights under the 2nd Amendment are absolute and subject to NO government regulation or restriction.

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

pan6467

I really don't see how they can confiscate guns from the owners. I just don't see it happening, it would be impossible to.

I know several people that collect guns and I really don't see them peacefully just handing them over. Quite a few are veterans and to tell them after serving in the military for this country that they could not own guns.... I think we would most definately see the makings of a revolution.

I would hope even the most ardent anti-gun visionary would understand that to start going and taking people's guns would create more problems than just allowing legally owned guns would ever create.

I also believe that people like myself who never really cared much about the gun debate because it wasn't really an issue for them, would stand up for gun owners and make sure that the confiscation of such would not happen. I would without doubt.

I think that it has been a non issue for me because I always felt that the government could nor would ever be able to take guns away from their owners.

I do have issues with the extremist gun owners that believe with their CCW they can carry their guns on properties that wish not to have guns. I truly believe and always have if you want someone to respect your right to carry, respect their right to say not here.

Other than that, I have no issue with people owning guns and in fact I am leaning more towards supporting the right to own.

__________________
I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"

dksuddeth

The second amendment was neither a liberal or conservative 'staple'. It was written specifically to allay the fears of the anti-federalists over the alarming power the constitution gave congress over arming the militia, thereby guaranteeing that congress could not disarm the militia.

Quoted for truth.

Dune, the nominations were already stacked against us simply because of clinton and obama. With the 'angry white man' demographic, all it took was the spectre of a black man or a clinton woman in the whitehouse to unabashedly support mccain, leaving true conservatives pissing in the wind.
It also doesn't help that we have our own internal problems between the 80 million of us, such as little elmer fudds who will believe the bullshiat lies about nobody wanting to take away their huntin' gun and that nobody NEEDS an 'assault weapon'.

We are our own worst enemy because we can't come together.

new orleans after katrina.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Willravel

I'm not getting into this again. You know that I, as well as many other liberals (Dems) would prefer that guns were at least more controlled. Conservatives (you know, conservatives like John Roberts, Samuel Alito, Anthony Kennedy, David Hackett Souter, Clarence Thomas) traditionally are less for gun control and more for gun liberty.

dksuddeth

which of course stands to reason why liberals(dems)are quite comfortable redefining 'shall not be infringed' to mean 'reasonable regulations'.....as long as only they get to define whats reasonable for everyone.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Willravel

INCREDIBLY comfortable, yes. Of course now the conservatives have been heavily split since the introduction of the neocons. Now there are conservatives like you, or libertarian conservatives, and fascist conservatives (a contradiction in terms, yes) like Bush and several of the conservative justices I listed above. With conservatives fractured, it's not a good time for people with a libertarian view of firearms.

dksuddeth

and this position gives you no pause at all, knowing that your manipulations could be turned against you later by polar opposite political groups using the same methods?

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Willravel

It doesn't give me pause because, unlike you, I am in support of gun control. It has nothing to do with the government or totalitarianism, but rather simply about public safety. I know you like to equate people who dislike guns with sheeple, but I think you know that we both are highly critical of the government (albeit in different ways), and neither of us could ever be called pawns or sheeple. We're free thinkers who differ strongly on an issue or two revolving around guns and the ability to protect one's self from an oppressive government.

What I was getting at in my previous post is that if you really want to start having victories in Second Amendment cases you need to kick the neocons out of the republican party for good. Just as it's my responsibility to get the corrupt bureaucrats out of the Green Party... wait.... actually our problem is mostly that people are getting stoned on the couch watching The Price is Right when they should be voting. I do what I can to help the Dems because there are a lot fewer neocons in their party, but shoot if the conservatives can week out the fascists I'd be fine going back to some of the ideals held by traditional conservatives.

dksuddeth

That's not what I was getting at. Yes, I know you support gun control, therefore any/all measures to remove/restrict/regulate firearms, especially in civilian hands, however, what I was asking you was would you be this incredibly comfortable with a politically bent group simply redefining constitutional terms to fit their agenda to impinge upon liberties that you yourself might value highly, by using the same methods and manipulations you advocated because of your support for gun control?

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

dc_dux

dk....do you think the framers intended the rights outlined in the Bill of Rights to be absolute?

Who should define and interpret these vague Constitutional terms ?

What is an "abridgment" of free speech in the 1st Amendment.

When does search and seizure become "unreasonable" in the 4th Amendment?

What is "just compensation" in the 5th Amendment?

Who defines a "speedy" trial in the 6th Amendment?

When is bail "excessive" in the 8th Amendment?

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

Willravel

Honestly? It depends on what they were trying to fix. If I agreed with them and found their logic sound, and felt that their requests or demands belonged in the Constitution, I'd back them. If not, then I'd fight them. That's generally how a constitutional democracy/republic works.

I don't hold the Constitution in holy reverence, so changing it in order to help people is just fine with me. Bear in mind that the Constitution was just fine with slavery when it was originally signed. At the time, it was a "liberty" of white people to own black people. I'm sure there were quite a few people who were adamant that their right to own slaves was being taking by an oppressive government that was seeking to steal their valued liberties.

j8ear

Will, are you familiar with the 13th amendment? You know, the one which was enacted using one of the methods outlined in article 5 of the constitution, required ratification by 27 states I believe (2/3rds at the time) and abolished slavery in 1865.

Do you have a problem with the perscribed methods for "changing" the constitution?

What does "helping people" mean? Can that have limits?


-bear

__________________
It's alot easier to ask for forgiveness then it is to ask for permission.