A gun AND cops thread :)

[The Straight Story]

I have defended cops in the past on the whole taser issue as I used to be a cop and can understand the need for something other than clubs and guns.

HOWEVER I have also known really bad cops (and I am sure we have all seen the strip search video from Ohio already) and to be fair I have not really posted about them much. My bad.

I may do so later :) but for right now I am wondering - do we want cops and the military to be the only ones with guns?

Do we TRUST THEM with guns and not each other??

Do you feel comfortable with the idea that the only people with guns should be people in power?

I don't.

I know that there will be a few idiots with guns that do really bad things. Just like I know there will be cops who abuse their power, and people in govt (hello..bush and Iraq war) who abuse their power.

Guns don't kill people, our government does.

[cloudbase]

1. I'm with you on this issue. n/t

[Redstone]

2. Uh-huh. You're going to fight off the Evil Totalitarian Government with your .357 Magnum.

We've been friends for a long time, so this is as far as I'll go in discussing this issue, but I'd ask you to think for a moment: This isn't 1776, when the British Army had the same muskets that the Colonial farmers had. Is it?

You having a gun, or six, or ten of them, isn't going to accomplish jack shit to stop the government from doing whatever it wants to do.

Guns aren't the answer. The vote is.

Redstone

[Djinn]

4. Millions of Vietnamese will argue with that

Peasants in pajamas, living in tunnels and using ancient rusty rifles beat the might of the US empire.

The government also had the upper hand in terms of numbers and armoury when strikers defended their picketlines with guns in the late 19th century.

Only someone who is ignorant of history could possible take the line you have.

[Redstone]

5. And how well did those strikers make out in the end? I do know my history.

Redstone

[Djinn]

8. who won the Vietnam War?

and plenty of the gains won by those strikers are STILL in effect so you may want to brush up your history.

[karlrschneider]

7. Like it was in 2000 and 2004?

And who knows how the votes will be diddled this year?...:eyes:

[The Straight Story]

10. Fight the government? That is the vote and I agree with you BUT

fight off the government when they come for me? A gun will go a lot further then a lever on a voting machine :)

I don't want THEM to be the only ones able to defend themselves.

[Djinn]

3. I'm not personally comfortable with owning a gun

but that's purely related to my hair trigger personality and (getting better as I get older) self destructive tendencies.

Being Australian I have to admit I never spent much time thinking about it, it's just not an issue here, but I completely agree, when the government disarms then lets talk about disarming the citizenry.

You'll get people here appalled by any suggestion that we'd need to defend ourself FROM the cops however their posts will make it abundantly clear why that is. Respectable middle class people don't have anything to fear from the cops, things loko a little different from the cheap seats.

Fred Hampton would have ended up dead even if he had managed to wake up and reach for gun but at least he'd have had the chance to take a few murdering fascist scumbags out with him

[karlrschneider]

6. I worked my way through college at the Tulsa police dept. and I agree with you

100%. But I think I would even if I hadn't done that - it's not only that I and most of my contemporaries grew up owning and shooting guns, anyone who wants to totally disarm the citizenry scares the shit out of me.

[wolfgangmo]

9. armed = yes. any gun, any time = no

I have no problems with people being armed. I like shooting and I am good at it. In the house I grew up in there is a small army of firepower. And not one handgun.


What I have problems with is people with a bad criminal history being able to get concealable weapons at the drop of a hat.


Guns don't kill people, but they make it a hell of a lot easier. I have always felt that less murders would happen if it had to be committed face to face. The statistics of countries that allow weapons but restrict handguns bear this opinion out. One could say that "gun's don't kill people, American's do."

[Djinn]

11. but is that a position anyone argues against?

What I have problems with is people with a bad criminal history being able to get concealable weapons at the drop of a hat.

Do even foam at the mouth NRA lifers advocate that violent criminals be able to get conceal carry permits, at all, let alone at the "drop of a hat"?

Seems a strawman.

I have always felt that less murders would happen if it had to be committed face to face. The statistics of countries that allow weapons but restrict handguns bear this opinion out. One could say that "gun's don't kill people, American's do."

Not sure the statistics actually DO bear that out. It's hard to find out because "gun deaths" often include accidents and suicides which is intellectually dishonest if one is discussing crime rates.

After the Port Arthur Massacre, Australia tightened it's already relatively restrictive gun laws. It is almost impossible now to have a legal handgun in your home. However it is widely acknowledged that the overwhelming number of gun crimes (including Port Arthur)occurred with weapons that were already illegal and were perpetrated by people without gun licences.

The state destroys 6000 illegal guns a year - imagine how many aren't being confiscated.

Seems odd to have a dividing line based on nothing more than the length of a gun

[The Straight Story]

12. You mean like the UK?

"The statistics of countries that allow weapons but restrict handguns"

I used to sell reloading equipment to folks all over the world, and to quite a few in the UK. The folks with money could get it and own firearms, the poor could not (loopholes).

We trust rich folks and people and power? Maybe you do, but I sure as hell don't :)