Simons comments are consistent with his general negative view of the US culture. I understand, but you can't put the toothpaste back in the tube when it comes to firearms. Bad people can always get guns. It is the unarmed, law abiding people who have to deal with that reality. It is what it is. Perhaps the prospect of robbing an armed person might cause a thug to think twice. I personally had a concealed weapon permit several years ago and found it to be a mental burden I did not want to carry. But I have confidence that there are many level headed people who can handle it responsibly. If I were a night shift convenience store clerk in some areas I would definately be armed.
Would you support "Open Carry" legislation in your state?
by Glander 71 Replies latest social current
-
-
blondie
I hunted in my day but no longer do and don't own a gun. I don't think many people have the training, mental or physical, to shoot someone. Law enforcement and military personnel go through detailed and careful training that is kept up to date. There is a concealed carry law here but many of the ones that told me they wanted it now hesitate to even put one in their purse, are now realizing the danger to their children and grandchildren that visit them, and even realize how much a decent handgun costs as well as proper storage.
I grew up around guns, could shoot very well from eleven years old on up. I was taught that it was not a toy, how to clean a gun properly, how to shoot accurately, and how to make sure of my target.
While the law allows concealed carry, many businesses, churches, schools, government buildings, bars, clinics, hospitals, have it posted legally, not to bring firearms into the premises. But then there is no machinery or frisking at the door.
-
NCO
I live in Georgia, which is a licensed carry state. With a Georgia Weapons License, one can carry openly or concealed. I have carried a sidearm for many years and have only had to draw it once. It was a 4-on-1 encounter. Had I not moved to cover and drawn my sidearm, I would have been robbed and likely put in the hospital or even killed.
That was back when I used to only carry concealed. For the last 4 years I have joined the open carry movement. I openly carry my sidearm everywhere I am legally able to. It's a Springfield Armory XD .45 5" tactical. Not a small sidearm at all. I have yet to have one single person object. On the contrary, I have had people come up to me and ask questions about the law and how they can also legally (emphasis on legally) carry. More often than not, it has been a woman who has approached me to ask. I've sent each and every one to the county probate court to obtain their license and then to the local gun range for instruction.
The right to keep and bear arms is uniquely American so I don't expect those who don't live here to ever understand or even agree with the tradition. Good luck with the horrible anti-self-defense laws in your own country and I hope that you and your families are never victims of the criminals who ignore gun laws the same as they ignore the laws that prohibit robbery, assault, and rape. The tired old arguments that dredge up Hollywood visions of the wild west and predict blood in the streets are intellectually dishonest in that they assume immediate lawlessness on the part of citizens who are trying to obey the law.
A dead body robbed of hard-earned property, shot/stabbed/beaten to death and/or raped is NOT morally superior to a law-abiding citizen with a dead criminal at their feet and a smoking gun in their hand.
-
talesin
Simons comments are consistent with his general negative view of the US culture.
What's your point? Racism, gun slaughter, the ludicrous 'war on drugs' that feeds the prison industry, poverty, xenophobia, people dying for lack of health care. Okey-dokey.
I understand, but you can't put the toothpaste back in the tube when it comes to firearms.
You do have a point here; there are so many illegal firearms loose in the USA, thanks to the gun culture, and places like gun shows where dealers sell indiscriminately, that it would be hard to stop criminals from acquiring guns.
Bad people can always get guns.
Not in *this* part of Canada. It's hard to get a hand gun, unless you live in Toronto, Vancouver or Montreal, or a similar 'big city'. Of course, we have the Blue Steel Highway (I-95) continuously running guns up from the SE USA, so the influx is, unfortunately, now constant.
If you care to look at the statistics for the UK, you will see that you are dead wrong (pun intended). Simon's attitude is based on reality, and also, I believe, from living in nations that do not promote a gun culture.
I agree with Blondie.
tal
-
talesin
The right to keep and bear arms is uniquely American so I don't expect those who don't live here to ever understand or even agree with the tradition.
That "right" was established so that isolated settlers could protect themselves. It also relates to the militia, and the fact that private citizens may have necessarily be called upon to defend their communities in the absence of a federal military and/or police force.
I suggest you 'bone-up' on American history. Ignorance is bliss.
t
-
botchtowersociety
The simple reality is more guns = more gun deaths. The notion that more people walking around armed prevents gun deaths is a little silly.
Simon, in the US violent crime (including murder) decreases wherever/whenever more permissive gun laws have been enacted. This has happened time after time after time. It is statistically irrefutable.
-
NCO
Talesin, have you personally purchased a firearm at a gun show?
I have.
What the media tells you about gun shows is a load of crap. The owners of gun shows are not fools, they are well aware of the liability involved. If you want to buy a gun at a gun show, you go through the mandated background check or walk empty-handed. At the last gun show I attended, private individuals selling firearms was a no-go. Not only does that steal business from the licensed vendors who have to fill out ATF form 4473's on every purchaser and run background checks at their own cost, it also opens the promoter up to liability issues.
Before you attempt to inform the board at large regarding gun shows, I'd suggest you educate yourself first.
Now with that said, if I were not legally permitted to own a firearm, could I get one? Of course I could! I'd go get one on the street same as I could get crack and meth on the street. Notice that in this case, I'm flagrantly violating the law which also prohibits me from buying crack or meth. It wouldn't be the fault of any gun show or licensed gun dealer (well except for the Fast And Furious fiasco) who sells me a firearm I'm not legally allowed to buy or possess, it would be the criminal element in society that regards gun laws with the same contempt that they regard the laws prohibiting illegal drugs, robbery, rape, murder, etc.
Gun laws in Canada do a great job at stopping firearms traffic up 95, don't they? I'm sure all those illegal firearms are getting into the hands of law-abiding citizens who just want to protect themselves and their families, aren't they? Oh wait, no, of course not. Law-abiding citizens are disarmed because THEY OBEY THE LAW.
-
botchtowersociety
I openly carry my sidearm everywhere I am legally able to. It's a Springfield Armory XD .45 5" tactical.
Great choice. I've long considered an XD.
http://www.mcrgo.org/mcrgo/view/news.asp?articleid=1015&zoneid=100
Canada's gun registration failure: Violent Crime rate double that of U.S.
2006/01/18Jan 17th
BELLEVUE, WA – Canada's billion-dollar boondoggle – the national gun registration scheme – has proven itself an abysmal failure, as that country's violent crime rates are double those reported in the United States, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) noted today.
"We looked at violent crime rates per 100,000 population in both countries, using the most recent available data," said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb, "and we were not surprised at what we found. Since Canada started this ridiculous and costly program, violent crime has gone up dramatically, at the same time that crime in the United States has declined. Yet, there are people in the states who think Canada's gun legislation should be the model for America.
"By comparing the data," he detailed, "we found that the violent crime rate in the United States was 475 per 100,000 population, while up north, there were 963 violent crimes per 100,000 population. The figure for sexual assault in Canada per 100,000 population is more than double that of the United States, 74 as opposed to 32.1, and the assault rate in Canada is also more than twice that of the states, 746 to our 295 for the population rate."
Noted CCRKBA Executive Director Joe Waldron: "What happened in the states to actually contribute to a reduction in our overall crime rate is simple. We've got 38 states with shall-issue, right-to-carry concealed handgun laws. While Canada has clamped down on its citizens' gun rights, our citizens have been empowered against criminals by passage of these laws. The disparity in crime rates between the two countries says it all about how well gun registration works to stop crime, as opposed to actually carrying guns to deter criminals, and fight back if necessary."
A Jan. 3 story in Canada's National Post by writer David Frum confirmed CCRKBA's independent finding. Frum wrote, "Canada's overall crime rate is now 50% higher than the crime rate in the United States." Later, Frum added: "Gun registries and gun bans…do not work."
"Instead of promising to ban legally-owned handguns in Canada," Waldron observed, "Prime Minister Paul Martin should be urging citizens to arm themselves. He should encourage Parliament to scrap gun registration and replace it with a gun ownership and training program."
"Since going on the warpath against guns, Canada's Liberals have presided over the sharpest rise in violent crime in the nation's history," Gottlieb said. "There are more rapes, more robberies and more murders. If that tells Canadian citizens anything at all, it's that Paul Martin and his Liberals have literally been ‘dead wrong' on guns." -
botchtowersociety
That "right" was established so that isolated settlers could protect themselves.
I think you need to bone up on our 2nd Amendment history. It is about a lot more than "isolated settlers."
-
NCO
That "right" was established so that isolated settlers could protect themselves. It also relates to the militia, and the fact that private citizens may have necessarily be called upon to defend their communities in the absence of a federal military and/or police force.
I suggest you yourself "bone up" on American history and read the writings of the Founding Fathers who wrote the Constitution and Second Amendment instead of trying inadvertently to contradict yourself with the militia clause followed by the "fact that private citizens may have necessarily be called upon to defend their communities..."
It has been ruled that the right to keep and bear arms is an individual right.
The Second Amendment was passed in the aftermath of a war fought against a tyrannical government that passed laws disarming the citizenry and sent troops to enforce that disarming. Among other things, of course.
If private citizens are to defend themselves and their communities, as you acknowlege, with what are they to defend themselves if not equal or superior force against whatever threat they face? That sounds to me like you realize that private citizens face the threat of firearms, so why should they not have the right to meet that threat with equal force?