U.S.A Gun Control

No they wouldn't. Essentially America has equated liberty to being able to do whatever the hell they want and no on else can say anything about it. It's interesting to see. If the founding fathers were alive to day I bet they would be ashamed with people using their name for political gain, especially Washington who advocated a nonpartisanship.

 

Your first statement is flawed for two main reasons as I see it. 1) Whether certain types of guns are legal or illegal, they will still be around in the United States, and will still be traded. Making a gun illegal will not stop illegal trades. 2) Statistics show that in 2010 between 70-80 million adults owned a gun, while less than 9,000 people were murdered due to firearms. So you're asking all 70 million Americans to give up their right to bare arms because 0.00013% of the gun owners use them for evil purposes (assuming one gun owner killed one person in each of these 9,000 instances, which isn't true)? The logic just doesn't add up. Stop the criminals, not the law abiding citizens.

 

Can you prove it'd make it a safer place? You make assumptions, but I have yet to see any basis to the claims.

Absolutely nothing you just said relates to the topic at hand, I'm impressed.

 

I was answering his question that he had posted. Refer back to his post and read it. He asked if Americans would be willing to give up their guns to be safer, and I said no.

 

How does creating strict gun laws ensure less people will die? Look at marijuana, or any other drug, people still use it, and people will still get their hands on guns, and people will still shoot people. You are neglecting an entire side of the gun control debate.

No more illegal trade/blackmarket if it becomes legal; that's the beauty about removing embargoes.

Self-defence. If a man tries to rob your home, would you rather have a gun or a knife?

You're right, a gun probably won't help you in day to day life, nor will a security system. You get one to secure your possessions in the off chance that someone tries to steal them. As for the other citizens part, even IF there are strict gun laws, there will STILL be GUNS, and only CRIMINALS will have them. You are DEFENSELESS in this situation.

Where do you live?

Let me put it the proper way.

What right do you have to put a gun to someones head, and force them not to use guns? You are a hypocrite, how do you stop people from 'bearing arms'? By using guns against them. It's a blatant hypocrisy, and it is ultimately immoral.

 

I don't think it's an "against the people" to ban arms if you're in a republic. Elected officials represent the people, and can make political decisions on behalf of the populace. It is not immoral for the representatives of the people to decide that only government authorities should have the right to bear arms, as representatives in much of Europe have decided to great effect.

 

I'm just pointing out that it doesn't matter for diddly squat and is completely irrelevant.

 

Mala pretty much hit the nail on the head with countering all your points... but let me leave you with one last thing.

Alcohol kills people, should we ban alcohol? There are bad people in the world who abuse alcohol then get behind the wheel of a car. Should we ban driving too while we're at it? No matter which way you look at it, there will be bad people in the world doing illegal things. No matter the regulation - guns, alcohol, and drugs will all still be part of our culture no matter what the government decides.

 

If you ban something, in order to enforce the ban, you must force people to doing/possessing/whatever the thing that is banned. So, if you ban guns, you must force people to not have guns. Otherwise it would just be words on paper (which is all a law actually is).

That's one side to it. You are forced to have an official represent you, are you not? You are forced to choose between which official represents you, even though you consent to neither representation. Also, there is a tyranny of the majority at play here, elected officials have been elected by the majority, as for the minority...

Representatives of the majority of the people*

This is all good and well, but let's back track. The only way to enforce a ban effectively is through force (unless the everyone consents voluntarily not to do x). That in my opinion is immoral. Now, you could say that o, but these people elected officials to represent them which decided to ban x.

Again, officials represent a certain group of the populace whether the populace likes it or not. Sure, they may choose who represents them out of a bunch, but they are ultimately forced to be represented. This is not a voluntary thing.

In addition, the elected officials representation is only a representation of the majority - the minority is largely ignored. This is already being very generous to you however. How often do officials truly represent there people? We have a two-party system in Australia, and the 'voting along party lines' is so strong that it really distorts this so called 'representative government'.


Ultimately, just because the majority of citizens do vote to ban x, does not justify the banning of x, nor detract from its immorality. If the majority of x voted to kill Jews, this is not a justifiable reason. The fact is that killing is immoral, just as to me, the fact of initiating force (to enforce the ban) is immoral, and it's hard to find people who prima facie think initiating force is not immoral.

 

Yes, if the majority's representatives decide on a ban, then the ban will be enacted as long as it is in keeping with the other checks and balances of the government (which in this case, it is not). I see nothing unfair about that.

Yes, through the cumulative effects of human nature and our environment since the beginning of man, we are now in an anarchic international system of nation-states. Due to humans' strong proclivities towards power and our tendencies to disagree on specific issues, there will always be some people who are "forced" to do something against their will. That is how the world works. In a social situation with more than one person, politics are at play to decide who gets what and why. The general consensus is that this "majority rule" in a democratic republic is one of the most fair and unbiased ways for a population to construct a nation's laws.

I think I can change your mind fairly quickly on this one. Individuals' opinions will always conflict, as we are by nature self-interested. Therefore, we must be able to set boundaries for ourselves so we can live in social contexts. For example, if a sexually driven man lives in a social setting with a hot female, he will try to fuck her. However, the female has no desire to fuck the man. Therefore, to protect the rights of the female, the community decides to "force" the man not to fuck the female. By your logic, this prohibition of rape is immoral. Do you truly believe the prohibition of rape is immoral?

This argument makes no sense. Say the majority votes that the individual does not have the right to kill other individuals. Is this immoral, as it is forcing the individual not to kill?

Here's what you fail to comprehend by proposing your idealistic rejection of force:
1. When there are multiple people in an area, they interact
2. All these people will have desires to do things and have things, based on their nature and nurture
3. Certain peoples desires will inevitably conflict with others desires
4. Therefore, certain desires must be curbed to maintain a civil society
5. People naturally will obey power, so the curbing of the desires must be done by force, to maintain a civil society

Please try to reject that logic...

 

So, if the majority of x decide on y, then y will be enacted as long as it is in keeping within the ... Does that sound like your position?

So, if the majorty of x decide on killing Jews, then killing Jews will be enacted as long as it is in... keeping within the.

I think some revision must be done here.

So it's ok that some people are forced to do things against their will, so long as the needs of the majority are satisfied. I understand that people have differences and that somethings got to give, but that still doesn't detract from the fact that it is immoral to force the minority to do as the majority pleases.

Hardly my position. Rape is an initiation of force ergo it is immoral. The question you really want to ask is how can we stop the man from raping the girl without initiating force. If you want to know the answer, then ask.

Your argument is that the community decides to force x not to do y. This is obviously immoral!

Yes, it is immoral specifically when incidences of self-defence arise.

You are asking me: is it immoral to initiate force on individuals to not do x.


With your scenarios on both murder and rape. Let me clarify. Both should be prohibited. Your solution: initiate force. My solution: voluntary association (I haven't explained it yet, ask if you want).

1: When there are multiple people in an area, they interact if they want.
2: Agree.
3: Agree.
4. Agree - Note, I agree that certain desires, such as rape, murder, theft (all the initiation of force) should be curbed (not with force though)
5: Disagree. Why can't they be done via contracts? I agree that people naturally need a leader; the typical man is like a sheep. I'm simply disagreeing that THEREFORE the curbing of the desires must be done by the initiation of force.

To clarify, I think you mistake me having a problem with force in general. I'm not a pacifist; I'm against the initiation of force.

 

This post concludes the debate. You may close the thread now.

Guns are already regulated. For example, there has been a ban on automatic assault rifles for decades. If you're not from the US, frankly you don't know wtf you're talking about and just wish you could own guns in your country.

Gun control is about taking away your rights slowly to see how much the government can get away with, when everyone is so emotional... baby steps

 

Revision WAS done...224 years ago. The legislative body in the US, Congress, has its power balanced by the executive (the president must approve the bill passed by the majority), the supreme court (which may rule against the bill on legal or constitutional grounds), and the constitution itself, which protects key rights from such legislative overstepping.,,

As I said before, as long as people have differences, some people will be "forced" not to do things the way they most prefer. That's the nature of politics.

I do want to know the answer. In a large enough society where not everyone has personal ties to everyone else, some people will always violates others' rights for personal gain. That's how we're built. Without an force-bearing authority, nothing will stop certain men from violating others' rights. i.e. rape, stealing, and other crimes will occur rampantly without the presence of force.

Please extrapolate on this; I am not familiar with that phrase.

A contract is worth nothing in an anarchic state (where force is not present). Just look at the history of international relations if you need proof of this. States are in an anarchic system; there is no overarching, hegemonic authority to control them and punish them with force. Therefore, agreements between states through international organization and international law are tenuous at best. Almost every agreement in history between states has been violated when it has been for the advantage of one state to do so, as there is no hegemonic force to stop the state.

The same dilemma would arise in a system of social contract that was not backed by a police force.

 

So true. I understand banning automatic assault rifles and maybe more background checks but taking our guns will never happen.

 

That image demonstrates nothing. All of Europe manages to survive with much less gun crime. Why? Because guns are banned. For the very few, sophisticated criminals who are able to obtain guns (and most likely arent going to use them against random civilians), the European governments have police forces with guns to deal with those crooks.

This an absurd statement. First off, the federal assault rifle ban was allowed to expire by Congress during the bush administration, and is no longer in effect. Anyone outside of the US has just as much of a right to their opinion on this issue, and I bet a lot of them are very happy guns are banned in their respective countries.

This statement makes no sense. The United States government is "of the people, for the people, by the people". It is not a totalitarian regime of the nobles. How would taking away the guns of citizens at all benefit those in congress, or for that matter, the president.

Reagan, while a great president in many respects, caused great harm to this country in spreading the ideology that the government should be small and restricted as it is inefficient and out to get you. Now we have all these tea-party wackjobs running around like we're being ruled by Hitler and thinking the governments going to imprison us or some shit if we give up our guns and beer.

 

I like this post.

Most people on here don't even know how to read a court opinion or how it is even relevant to the argument at hand. Before the 1960's - 70's guns were for militia use and hunting and it was ruled as such by the court in a few cases. Then in the period I pointed out the NRA rose to prominence.

Here are a couple of cases that prove my point:
http://www.constitution.org/2ll/bardwell/presser.txt
http://www.constitution.org/2ll/bardwell/miller.txt

The site I link to is completely biased, but the cases remain completely intact and unedited for you to read and draw your own conclusions.

 

That's nice, but I think the amount of gun crimes is completely irrelevant. You guys seem to completely neglect the fact that the only two things that matter are murder rates and violent crimes in general.

Maybe he meant fully automatic weapons? You could theoretically obtain those legally but it's quite difficult.

Why?

A weaponless population is far easier to make sweeping decisions without threat of huge uprising you know. But, that never happens right?

I think you'd be better off not making uneducated statements... If you actually did any research you'd know that most Americans don't subscribe to that kind of hype. We can all be attentive of government decisions, but we aren't off our rocker paranoid about it.

If you were to ask most people, you'd probably find more people who didn't have much issues with guns as opposed to having lots of issues with them.


From New York to Florida I have talked to plenty of people about gun issues, you'd be surprised how many just want to see better licensing. No bans, no taxes, just slightly better licensing and distribution.

 

We wouldn't have a problem if everyone were to carry a pistol. The majority of shooting are stopped by citizens with license to conceal, carrying a pistol. The 2nd amendment gives us "Americans" the ability to bear arms. The 2nd amendment is also apart of something called the Bill of Rights. The U.S. Constitution is what defines the American Goverment, without it there would be no America. This means every U.S. Citizen has the 'right' to bear arms by the U.S. Constitution.

I don't believe we should change the 2nd Amendment nor do I think it will ever be changed.

We will no longer be free if we keep banning things.

 

Ok, have it your way.
United States murder rate: 4.8 (per 100000)
United Kingdom murder rate: 1.2
France: 1.1
Germany: 0.8
China: 1.0

We are by far the worst of the Western European superpowers (and even China!) in murder rates, aided by the easy access to guns, which are very viable killing machines.

I do not understand this point. Please rephrase.

I'm American. I'm highly educated. I've done the research. Obviously most Americans don't subscribe to the idea that government is out to get us, but Reaganism and succeeding right-wing movements have definitely embedded that idea way more into our culture than it used to be, for better or for worse.

Completely depends on where you are. Most in cities and universities are pro gun control, most in rural areas are anti gun control.

That's an idea I subscribe to. Maybe guns should be regulated like cars are regulated: written and physical test, as well as vision test, proof of age, and proof of mental stability to obtain a license.

 

@RSACCOUNTTRADER,

You seem like you're educated and know your stuff.. but obviously you're pro gun control.

Let me ask you this? Will a 10 round magazine vs 14 make any difference? probably not.

Will any of the proposed regulations resolve anything? again, probably not. I've even heard some government officials say this won't stop any gun violence.

So why are they doing this then? I understand that the president is under alot of pressure after some tragedy to come up with answers... but is it also an opportunity for nubjobs in office to push their own agenda for more control. We have seen that lately with SOPA.

/nuff said