Since the gun debate thread ran wayyyyyyyy off topic.....

posted on April 14th, 2011, 11:27 pm

Ok, since so many people seem to think people should not be allowed to own something unless police/military (Firearms, despite the fact that police/military also have been known to go nuts with firearms on occasion .... ) answer me these question three.

Or, well, one.....


If you WERE able to get guns in private hands made illegal, how would you go about enofricing it.

posted on April 14th, 2011, 11:31 pm

well, just thinking here, when somebody does something illegal and we want to stop people doing this thing again how can we (the state really) punish them. maybe we could lock them up in a prison?

srs: thats what we do in the uk, people get caught with guns, they (usually) go to jail. uk has far less gun crime.

posted on April 14th, 2011, 11:47 pm

well, just thinking here, when somebody does something illegal and we want to stop people doing this thing again how can we (the state really) punish them. maybe we could lock them up in a prison?

srs: thats what we do in the uk, people get caught with guns, they (usually) go to jail. uk has far less gun crime.

So how would you propose to do that in the US ?

posted on April 14th, 2011, 11:57 pm

So how would you propose to do that in the US ?

how to throw people in jail in the us? how do you guys usually throw people in jail? unless law and order has been misleading me a lot, you can already throw people in jail for violating the law.

posted on April 15th, 2011, 12:08 am

how to throw people in jail in the us? how do you guys usually throw people in jail? unless law and order has been misleading me a lot, you can already throw people in jail for violating the law.

When you suddenly declare a vast ammount of the law abiding population criminal you get problems.

From what I recall, between at LEAST 25% to 30ish% of the population legaly own guns that are registered.

How will you take property from 1/4 of the population ?

posted on April 15th, 2011, 12:20 am

When you suddenly declare a vast ammount of the law abiding population criminal you get problems.

From what I recall, between at LEAST 25% to 30ish% of the population legaly own guns that are registered.

How will you take property from 1/4 of the population ?

you wanna know about a transition period, thats different from your original question of enforcing firearms laws.

transition periods are always trickier. a possible solution would be an amnesty. most of these law abiding citizens who legally own a gun would surrender them rather than violate the law. you act like these legal owners are gonna keep their guns in some mass protest.

and talking of "suddenly declaring" anything is stupid, as laws arent sudden, there would be debate after debate in your equivalent of the house of commons (the one thats not the senate) and it would be years after the discussion started before any law took effect.

its never likely to happen in your country because it would require editing a serious part of your constitution, a big thing, and i dont think with modern day politics that is likely to happen.

posted on April 15th, 2011, 12:41 am

It's never likely to happen because there are less than a million cops.

Aside from the fact that a vast majority of them would refuse to enforce such a law, those attempting to do so would be short for life.


As for me, I'll let Jefferson and a few others, far more eloquent,  speak for me.......

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government"
-- Thomas Jefferson, 1 Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-- Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759.

"I hold it, that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical."
-- Thomas Jefferson, Letter to James Madison, January 30, 1787

Are we at last brought to such a humiliating and debasing degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our own defence? Where is the difference between having our arms in our own possession and under our own direction, and having them under the management of Congress? If our defence be the *real* object of having those arms, in whose hands can they be trusted with more propriety, or equal safety to us, as in our own hands?
-- Patrick Henry, speech of June 9 1788

An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.
-- Robert A. Heinlein, "Beyond This Horizon", 1942

You know why there's a Second Amendment? In case the government fails to follow the first one.
-- Rush Limbaugh, in a moment of unaccustomed profundity 17 Aug 1993

As for Jolly old England......... (with commentary from me noted with a * and a few profound quotes)

When only cops have guns, it's called a "police state".
Love your country, but never trust its government.
-- Robert A. Heinlein.


"Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act of depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest."
-- Mahatma Gandhi

*When even Mahatma freaking GANDHI mocks your countries gun laws, you have a problem

"One of the ordinary modes, by which tyrants accomplish their purposes without resistance, is, by disarming the people, and making it an offense to keep arms."
-- Constitutional scholar Joseph Story, 1840

"Taking my gun away because I might shoot someone is like cutting my tongue out because I might yell `Fire!' in a crowded theater."
-- Peter Venetoklis

No kingdom can be secured otherwise than by arming the people. The possession of arms is the distinction between a freeman and a slave.
-- "Political Disquisitions", a British republican tract of 1774-1775

And england today ?

Ex-soldier faces jail for handing in gun

Royal Army veteran finds a sack tossed over the fence into the back of his yard, with a sawed off shotgun in it.

He, not wanting a swarm of cops at his place, goes and turns it into the local chief of police.

He nearly got 5 years in jail for that, simply because he touched it. (hey brits, if that happens to you, turn the bullets over first... may as well EARN that jail time ).

posted on April 15th, 2011, 1:38 am

A shotgun uses shells not bullets.

posted on April 15th, 2011, 1:49 am

Well I didn't really want to get back into this but Tokra most of the people agreed with your perspective on gun control 
Plus those cops wouldn't have short lives because most people don't want to kill people but I guess your just a special case of being willingly to kill people over stuff like that. But still I think if they wanted to get rid of it they would do something like this......

posted on April 15th, 2011, 1:52 am

Now I have said all that to say this why do you have a problem with people owning a firearm or carrying it in public.

I think this is as good an argument as any:
Dutch gunman used semi-automatic weapon  < Dutch news | Expatica The Netherlands

I've been in the military and handled firearms (Uzi, FAL and Glock) and I've also had the displeasure of having to duck for cover because a nut job decided to combine drugs and firearms.

No matter how many regulations you put in place to safeguard private ownership of firearms there will always be nut-cases. Firearms should be reserved to military personnel and law enforcements.

posted on April 15th, 2011, 2:30 am

No matter how many regulations you put in place to safeguard private ownership of firearms there will always be nut-cases. Firearms should be reserved to military personnel and law enforcements.

Are we at last brought to such a humiliating and debasing degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our own defence? Where is the difference between having our arms in our own possession and under our own direction, and having them under the management of Congress? If our defence be the real object of having those arms, in whose hands can they be trusted with more propriety, or equal safety to us, as in our own hands?

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

posted on April 15th, 2011, 3:01 am

It would be practically impossible to ban guns here. To begin with it would require a Constitutional amendment (like Prohibition did), but that requires that it not only be approved by 2/3 of both Congressional houses, but be approved by 3/4 of the states. In our history, this has only happened, in practice, 17 times (the first 10 don't really count as they came about differently).

But, assuming that actually happened, it police would have to, somehow, round up all the now illegal guns. The government would probably have to force people to turn their weapons in, only to see that it would be a futile effort. People would break the law just as readily as they defied Prohibition. The illegal gun trade would explode and now the government would have even bigger problems: stopping illegal gun sales, traffic, etc. And, even if you ban guns, people will just switch to something else like knives or stun guns or sharpened sticks. It won't work.

Besides, guns aren't the problem, it's the people who view them as symbols of power rather than tools for protection. I personally believe that America will never be sucessfully invaded because so many people own guns. I don't know if there's any truth for that, but I think it's true.

posted on April 15th, 2011, 3:09 am

I personally believe that America will never be invaded because there are not any major powers on our continent and the logistics of a full invasion across either ocean is enormous, that and these things called thermonuclear weapons that would turn any invasion into barbecue, nukes these days are very tactical after all   

posted on April 15th, 2011, 3:12 am

Yeah, then we would nuke them back and it would become nukapalooza.

I personally believe that America will never be invaded because there are not any major powers on our continent and the logistics of a full invasion across either ocean is enormous

Don't forget Canada. Of course if they tried we could just point our guns at them at they would start apologizing. 
(No offense to Canadians, just making fun of stereotypes)

posted on April 15th, 2011, 3:18 am

Haven't you ever played Fallout 3 we annex Canada