Unique freedom? No. Unquestioned ability to meet an abusive government with armed resistance? Definitely.
What are good basic skills for our domesticated life?
- Thread starter Tony
- Start date
Why do I carry? Ex cons that remember me (either from being the street deputy that put them away or from being the corrections officer that kept them under control) gangs, common criminals, carjackers, and assorted other threats to my personal safety. But the main reason is I have two grandsons and a duty to protect them. The real question is, why would a grown man or woman NOT carry? Why would they abdicate their ability (and responsibility) to provide their own defense and the defense of their families and loved ones? Why would anybody commit such an act of denial?
Why under the seat? Well that's where I put it when I go somewhere I don't want to carry on my person. Probably much less easily stolen there than the rifle I used to keep in the gun rack on the back windshield. Why loaded? Well, an unloaded gun ain't much more than a very poor club.
You carried and felt unsafe for the people around you? Why? Was your technique, skill, or judgement that bad?
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Why have loaded guns stashed everywhere?....because they are scared
America is governed by fear and paranoia that they brashly pass off as freedom.
Sorry santaman, but Call of duty swat killing, numerous peoples of all ethnicities shot in cars by police for no other reason than tw8tching, australian tourist in night dress shot by police after she called them her self. Stand your ground laws people shooting people left right and centre. And these are justified legal shootings.
I was afaid that I would use it in a situation that really did not need a gun to be solved.
After I lost the need to carry a hidden gun I have been in situations a few times where I probably would have drawn it.
But not having a gun, those siuations went well anyway.
An armed citizenry is protection against government excesses isn't a valid argument. States (as in sovereign countries not sub divisions) have more money and more guns or at least more powerful guns than your armed citizenry. Are you telling me that whenever an armed citizenry has come up against an armed government forces they've won it more than lost?
AFAIK any cases I've heard of (living in the UK not that many) the cases of armed citizenry confronted by government forces hasn't gone well for the citizenry. Usually the citizenry gets surrounded then surrender or a lot of deaths in the citizenry ranks.
I'm sorry but my POV (possibly coloured by British attitudes to gun control) is that armed citizenry has very little effect on limiting government. A thing called democracy has a greater effect. Governments are elected. That's your main power not your guns.
BTW are you a Texan by any chance? I'm not meaning offence but that loaded question. It's just that my old country did a lot of business with a Texan company. Employees were Texans or Mexican immigrants. Among the Texans I spoke to (senior management who were highly educated engineers who were worldly wise) had no concept of what gun control was. One example was a lead engineer who had a bad week when I spoke to him on the Friday. He was looking forward to kicking back, having some beers and shoot a few cans in his back yard. I'd been sympathising with him because the project we worked on was having issues so my week was bad. He asked me if I was doing similar. I made a possibly lame joke about paramilitary SWAT style police having something to say about that. He didn't understand even after ten minutes of explaining the principle of gun control.
I believe you know the idea behind gun control but you possibly don't understand it. Or at least you don't accept the idea at its heart. That is the big problem with your second amendment. It creates a right a lot of nations don't believe should be an automatic right. If you start from the POV that you can't own a gun without a good reason then gun control control is understood. If you can't get past the idea that owning guns is a right then gun control isn't understood. It's a deep mindset that would be very hard to change. It'll change one day of that I have no doubt.
AFAIK any cases I've heard of (living in the UK not that many) the cases of armed citizenry confronted by government forces hasn't gone well for the citizenry. Usually the citizenry gets surrounded then surrender or a lot of deaths in the citizenry ranks.
I'm sorry but my POV (possibly coloured by British attitudes to gun control) is that armed citizenry has very little effect on limiting government. A thing called democracy has a greater effect. Governments are elected. That's your main power not your guns.
BTW are you a Texan by any chance? I'm not meaning offence but that loaded question. It's just that my old country did a lot of business with a Texan company. Employees were Texans or Mexican immigrants. Among the Texans I spoke to (senior management who were highly educated engineers who were worldly wise) had no concept of what gun control was. One example was a lead engineer who had a bad week when I spoke to him on the Friday. He was looking forward to kicking back, having some beers and shoot a few cans in his back yard. I'd been sympathising with him because the project we worked on was having issues so my week was bad. He asked me if I was doing similar. I made a possibly lame joke about paramilitary SWAT style police having something to say about that. He didn't understand even after ten minutes of explaining the principle of gun control.
I believe you know the idea behind gun control but you possibly don't understand it. Or at least you don't accept the idea at its heart. That is the big problem with your second amendment. It creates a right a lot of nations don't believe should be an automatic right. If you start from the POV that you can't own a gun without a good reason then gun control control is understood. If you can't get past the idea that owning guns is a right then gun control isn't understood. It's a deep mindset that would be very hard to change. It'll change one day of that I have no doubt.
Am I the only one wondering whether this thread is following the line Tony envisaged?
I suspect more people were murdered in Baltimore last year with handguns than in all of Europe.
Not 100% sure though.
I think the problem is the mindset of people. Not enough Christian basic values.
One country in Europe has very liberal laws, and is unique in that 'self protection' is one of the ways to get a handgun permit.
Czech Republic.
Still, if you read the stats I posted above, the murder rate is way below the US.
Mindset? Upbringing? Values? I do not know!
I know one thing for sure:
Better beer! Good beer makes you mellow and happy. Bad beer gives you heartburn (reflux) and you feel irritated.
Not 100% sure though.
I think the problem is the mindset of people. Not enough Christian basic values.
One country in Europe has very liberal laws, and is unique in that 'self protection' is one of the ways to get a handgun permit.
Czech Republic.
Still, if you read the stats I posted above, the murder rate is way below the US.
Mindset? Upbringing? Values? I do not know!
I know one thing for sure:
Better beer! Good beer makes you mellow and happy. Bad beer gives you heartburn (reflux) and you feel irritated.
Like stopping Lincoln, Garfield, several Kennedys, trying to stop Roosevelt and Reagan?
Those Governments were Ok?
No, you guys need to teach some fundamental things in your schools and families. The ones this thread is basically about!
Has an armed citizenry come up against an armed government and won?
-Well, that's exactly how the US came to exist.
-That's exactly what happened in the Battle of Athens (Tennessee) By the way, our individual States are semi-soveriegn (not just a political subdivision)
-That's exactly what happened in Nevada just a couple of years ago when Clyde Bundy and a group of ranchers and supporters took on the federal government
-That's exactly how their still kicking our butts in the Middle East
Am I a Texan? Not by birth. Born and raised in Mississippi, but I did live 3 years in Texas while stationed at Bergrstrom A.F.B. in the mid 1980s. I loved it there but Texas has too much gun control and not enough public hunting land. It's far, far too developed and urbanized.
Apparently your POV is that the 2nd Amendment created the right to keep and bear arms. Actually it didn't create any right whatsoever. Rights are by definition intrinsic in and of themselves. All the "Bill of Rights" did/does is to enumerate pre-existing natural rights and assert that government has no power to interfere.
Democracy is a better effect at limiting governments? An armed citizenry is exactly what guarantees said democracy will always survive.
You have no doubt that our views will change? LOL
We need to get kids to actually GO to school. Hard to motivate them to even stay in High School, much less go to university when the drop out down the street makes more money in a week selling drugs (tax free!) than the university graduate makes in a year legally. Or the stripper dancing on a brass pole.
Your post (this one anyhow) touches one our real problem: a violent under-culture, not the prevalence of guns.
I don't know the stats for Europe but here's a chart of all homicides in Baltimore last year broken down by weapon used (although it doesn't break down what type gun) and what month (and Baltimore is in Maryland; one of the strict gun control states)
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Technically you are right, it is not the gun that kills, it is the person.
I must sound like a 100 year old dude, but I have seen a huge change how people behave towards each other. even my 23 year old son tells me the difference between London and Toronto. Manners, how individuals react upon friendly approach, behavior on Friday and Saturday nights, in bars and restaurants, on public transport. In traffic, both on roads as in parking houses.
London unfortunately draws the short straw.
I must sound like a 100 year old dude, but I have seen a huge change how people behave towards each other. even my 23 year old son tells me the difference between London and Toronto. Manners, how individuals react upon friendly approach, behavior on Friday and Saturday nights, in bars and restaurants, on public transport. In traffic, both on roads as in parking houses.
London unfortunately draws the short straw.
I believe you have lost the point of this thread - I suggest you start one with the title "Guns - for or against" and then the rest of us can ignore it.
Sorry, I just think you've turned the thread into something that cannot now be recovered and will be no use to Tony at all.
Sorry, I just think you've turned the thread into something that cannot now be recovered and will be no use to Tony at all.
This line of posts started as one member posted that self defense would be a good skill. Now we can also add the ability to debate.
Broch, the skills, or lack of, this thread is about, are root of many of the problems we have in our society.
The ability to discuss and debate is something starting to be absent. The next way to solve problems is using your fists, or worse, an implement.
The ability to discuss and debate is something starting to be absent. The next way to solve problems is using your fists, or worse, an implement.
Broch, the skills, or lack of, this thread is about, are root of many of the problems we have in our society.
The ability to discuss and debate is something starting to be absent in our society. The next way to solve problems is using your fists, or worse, an implement.
The ability to discuss and debate is something starting to be absent in our society. The next way to solve problems is using your fists, or worse, an implement.
Oh, I don't disagree with debate, and I can wax lyrical about the pro's and con's of guns (I own a few
) but I do not think that the majority of people that would like to add to Tony's original request will wade through pages of this kind of discussion (for want of a better word) - this is purely thread hijacking IMHO. As I said, if you want a debate that is off topic it is (normal) forum manners to start a new thread.This is the last I will say on this otherwise I am guilty of the same
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