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POSTED BY: Dayve
UPDATED: Thursday, March 27, 2025 23:01
VIEWED: 4183
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FREMDFIRMA

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 7:31 PM

Bah, it's a common sense issue.

Not packing heat makes you an easy victim.

Packing a piece without the damn good sense to learn how to use well makes you an idiot, a danger to yourself and those around you.

Packing a piece without the damn good sense to know when, and when NOT to use it makes you a contributor to the problem.

The weapon itself is a tool, a thing, an object.
Why fear a mere object ?
For sure people are much scarier than mere things.

Think on this, and think well.

You have a fire extinguisher not because you think you can totally handle a fire, but to mitigate the situation until the cavalry, in the form of the local fire department, arrives.

A weapon should be viewed exactly the same.

Neither the Fire Dept nor the Police is gonna follow you around specifically protecting YOU, in fact they are not even legally obligated to protect you at all, specifically in the case of police.

Pistol in one hand, cell phone in the other, back against the wall, it's called self-defense, but the police despise it because when people do so, eventually they might start wondering what the police actually DO.

That being said, I prefer the Fire Dept, at least they won't show up with a flamethrower and torch your place in response to your hubris in attempting to control the fire yourself.

When it comes right down to it, living in fear of an inanimate THING is just plain silly - fear the people, not the tools.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

KANEMAN

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 7:42 PM

I agree that a firearm is just a tool and we should not fear or HATE inanimate objects. Think about the maniacs who chop people into refrigerator sized pieces with a knife. Do you fear the knife or the lunatic? Shit, I would rather be shot to death by a crazed bastard than hacked into bite size morsels anyway...I say we take the knives out of the hands of these people and give them guns instead, it will make it easier on those unfortunate enough to be on their menus. Come on show a little compassion.

RUE

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 7:58 PM

"Depending on how you define "violent crime", rates in England and Wales seem to be about equal or higher than the US, just doing a little Goggle search."

But HOMICIDES are much lower in England - 5.9 US v 1.62 England and Wales in 2005. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_homicide_rate

Would you prefer to get slugged in the face or shot in the gut?

DAYVE

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 8:11 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by kaneman:
Come on show a little compassion.

Aww, a compassionate K-Man, how sweet.. (I kid the Kman)… I know what you guys are talking about – the gun as a tool. After all, the Winchester repeater won the west, right… guess it depends whose side you were on.

The gun is a weapon. It is intended for killing. Self defense? Well yeah, because you are defending yourself against someone else with a gun. Ok, knives are scary, too, but I doubt if Samuel Colt intended his invention to be used as a nutcracker.

As Geezer points out, the culture of guns in America revolves around the hunter and sport shooter. I can’t argue with that. Guns, rifles in particular, were an integral part of survival, and the colonization of North America (maybe it still is in some of the more remote areas), but the handgun is primarily a tool for criminals and as a result, a deterrent to criminals. I know a man who hunts feral hogs with a scoped .357 mag, but when you get right down to it, IMHO, a handgun is for one thing. To kill – man, beast, Alliance Blue Hand dude, whatever. Bullet in the brainpan…squish….

GEEZER

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 8:23 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by rue:
"Depending on how you define "violent crime", rates in England and Wales seem to be about equal or higher than the US, just doing a little Goggle search."

But HOMICIDES are much lower in England - 5.9 US v 1.62 England and Wales in 2005. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_homicide_rate

Would you prefer to get slugged in the face or shot in the gut?

Citizen mentioned violent crimes, so that's what I responded to.

Trying to correlate crime rates to gun laws is tempting, but it works about as well as playing the stock market based on skirt length. Check out the gun laws of the countries highest on the list, and you'll find they're generally much stricter than the US, with some strickter than the UK. Plenty of other factors to factor in.

"Keep the Shiny side up"

CITIZEN

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 9:34 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Geezer:
Depending on how you define "violent crime", rates in England and Wales seem to be about equal or higher than the US, just doing a little Goggle search.

Oddly enough I define "violent crime" as a crime where violence is perpetrated. Specifically in this case murder. The UK's murder rates are somewhat lower than the US's, and gun crime specifically in Canada (where there is more guns) is much lower.

We had this debate here a few months back, where we found that the UK has more "crime", final proof that you need a gun to be safe, save if it wasn't for the fact that the UK has more scratched cars and light bruising to the US's getting shot to death.

Quote:
BTW, the Gun Culture in the US is the guys who go hunting or target shooting, and are seldom involved as perpetrators of crimes. Now if we could do something about the Crime Culture, who do carry illegal weapons and do shoot(or stab, or hack, or firebomb, or...well you get the idea) someone for looking at them wrong.

Of course, which eloquently explains why a place with more guns, for instance Canada, has fewer violent gun crimes (by rate, before some 'smart arse' decides to point out Canada's lower population) than the US. Or not of course, because such a fact actually rather goes against the idea that there is nothing wrong with the US's culture of gun ownership.

Whenever gun ownership is mentioned in the US it seems someone is talking about their right to shoot another person if that person is engaged in taking what is theirs or threatens them in some way. Given that hunting is usually relegated to the "oh yeah, erm and hunting is fun too" long after the "I have a right to operate as State militia" defence I think perhaps the assertion that all the US's gun culture boils down too is hunting is somewhat incorrect.

It seems to me that Canadians generally fall in to you're somewhat idealised (and might I say misleading) assertions regarding US gun ownership, in other words primarily hunting. Perhaps the fact that Canadians do fall into you're ideal of US gun ownership and Americans do not goes some way to explaining the differences in the Gun crime rates, which would lead us back to the idea that maybe there is something wrong with American attitudes toward deadly weapons:

Quote:
Originally posted by FREMDFIRMA:
Not packing heat makes you an easy victim.

EDIT:
It seems there is a peculiar fondness within America for the hand gun. It further occures that a 9mm pistol is rather useless for hunting game, but rather better for concealing to be used as a weapon against another person.

More insane ramblings by the people who brought you beeeer milkshakes!
No one can see their reflection in running water. It is only in still water that we can see.

GEEZER

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 10:33 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by citizen:
Oddly enough I define "violent crime" as a crime where violence is perpetrated. Specifically in this case murder.

Okay. If you'd said "murder" then maybe I'd have addressed that. Violent crime is defined several ways in several studies, but never as only murder.

Quote:
Of course, which eloquently explains why a place with more guns, for instance Canada, has fewer violent gun crimes (by rate, before some 'smart arse' decides to point out Canada's lower population) than the US.

Err. "Overall gun ownership rates are significantly higher in the United States 41% of households vs. 26% in Canada (1998), and even to greater extent, handguns. Most Canadian weapons are rifles or shotguns owned by rural property owners, hunters and target shooters, and are less likely to be used in crimes. More types of weapons are banned or restricted in Canada than the United States. The two biggest provinces, Ontario and Quebec have had a long history of strict gun controls."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Canada

Quote:
Whenever gun ownership is mentioned in the US it seems someone is talking about their right to shoot another person if that person is engaged in taking what is theirs or threatens them in some way.

Provide a cite for this assertion, please.

Quote:
EDIT:
It seems there is a peculiar fondness within America for the hand gun. It further occures that a 9mm pistol is rather useless for hunting game, but rather better for concealing to be used as a weapon against another person.

Carrying a concealed handgun is either illegal or subject to background checks, training requirements, and licensing most anywhere in the US. Folks who carry illegally are the folks who don't obey gun laws anyway.

I like handguns because I can go to the local indoor range and shoot them anytime, as opposed to having to drive a few hours to get to a high-power rifle range. I've been punching holes in paper for 35 years, and never shot anything living with a handgun.

"Keep the Shiny side up"

FLETCH2

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 10:47 PM

So what you're saying is that it's not guns that kill people, it's Americans with guns that kill people?

CITIZEN

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 10:54 PM

So for some reason my graphics tablet can't tell the difference between a right click and a submit. I'll be back.

CITIZEN

Tuesday, March 20, 2007 11:02 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Fletch2:
So what you're saying is that it's not guns that kill people, it's Americans with guns that kill people?

No, I'm saying that Americans have some of the worst incidences of violent gun crime and murder outside of warzones and somewhat less civilised areas of the world, and that this most likely stems from the (IMHO rather immature) idea that Americans have that they are entitled to use deadly weapons at the first sign of trouble. But if you'd like to continue to assert that I just hate Americans go for it, so much easier to attack the messenger rather than the message

More insane ramblings by the people who brought you beeeer milkshakes!
No one can see their reflection in running water. It is only in still water that we can see.

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