Originally posted by Dienekes
Someone mentioned the Brady Campaign earlier. Just wanna say that if you dig into their site hard enough, they have information depicting that stricter gun laws=more gun crime. They have a map displaying specific shootings across the US and you can select each individual state to bring up a list. (if i remember correctly) They also have another feature in which they "grade" each state on how "safe" they are based on their laws or something to that effect. If you use the two tools together, the map providing information regarding to states with high number of shootings and states with low number of shootings, and the state "report cards", it clearly shows that the states with the more restrictions and regulations on guns have a larger number of shootings.

Genius! I can't believe all the times I've gone to gather stats from other places to bolster an anti-brady bunch argument and their own stats and scoring system completely subvert all the crap they try to push on us.

Looks like the Brady people could actually be in support of more crime and death by wishing to impose on every state the laws that have made the strict states such crime havens.

I wonder if anyone has called them on it?

Seems to me that we gun toting, crass, ignorant, barbaric Americans are the one posting with references and well thought out responses (other than C.C., whose post was entertaining if nothing else).
I would have to say that the people I know that carry a gun, in my own observation, seem to be a bit better spoken, more aware of their surroundings, more confident, and more careful especially while carrying. We all know that breaking the law will result in the possible revocation of our CPL's and that is just not something were willing to do.
What we are willing to do is face the repercussions of having to use our weapon to defend ourselves or someone else. Not a one of us wants to have to draw our gun let alone shoot someone. Between the mental costs and the financial, it forces you to be absolutely certain that when you draw your weapon it's a damned good reason. We were told to expect to pay around $100,000 to defend ourselves if we pull the trigger and it isn't found justifiable by the ensuing investigation. $50,000 for the criminal trial and another $50,000 for the civil suit by the "victim" or their family. I'm willing to take that risk if someone is being raped or my life or another's is in jeopardy.

What I want to know is how possession and carrying of a gun by me will cause more crime? I never understood that logic. I know myself and I would never use any of my guns to commit a crime, yet there are people who will still spout that my ownership of a gun causes crime rates to increase regardless of the statistics that show otherwise.

I consider myself fairly intelligent and yet I can't comprehend the anti-gun types.

BTW Amen Redneck. Maybe there's too many metro-sexuals and not enough of us retro-sexuals. This country is being coddled into somnambulant apathy. The sheeple are everywhere.

[edit on 14-10-2008 by Supes]

I wanted to give props to redneck for his response to CC benjy also. I wanted to nominate Benjys post as the longest post which went absolutely nowhere in ATS history but I think there's a schizophrenic or two on the reptile threads who actually beat him by a line or two.

Today's society really wants to eliminate the "male" of the species. Via chemistry, the new feminism and social programming they are working overtime to make sure any hint of testosterone is perfumed over and fanned away furiously.

Despite an earlier post claiming the thread was descending into "flames" I had yet to see any of that until Benjy's post. All I can say is please stick to the topic at hand and debate the issue. When people are reduced to personal attacks (as hilarious as they are in this case) it's clear certain people have nothing solid with which to maintain discourse.

Another very scary and telling fact is the rise in violence in schools. There is a direct correlation to the declaration of these areas as being "gun free" and the targeting of them by mentally unstable individuals. Criminals want helpless victims. They don't want to get hurt and especially don't want to risk being killed.

The statistics for CCW states show that a huge majority of "incidents" where a criminal comes up against a gun owner the criminal is disarmed without any shots being fired. CCW holders are taught to shoot in the defense of life, period and to try to cause the criminal to surrender if at all possible. Most criminals do not want to get into a gun fight, they will flee or surrender in most cases.

And now for my detour into flames:
Where do the gun control people get all the disinfo from? Do they have huge meetings around a hugging tree where the women order the men to think up more BS for the next newsletter? Usually when there is this much disinfo floating around a subject you can bet the Feds are involved at some point.

Originally posted by nfotech
Where do the gun control people get all the disinfo from? Do they have huge meetings around a hugging tree where the women order the men to think up more BS for the next newsletter? Usually when there is this much disinfo floating around a subject you can bet the Feds are involved at some point.

I think it's as simple as just wanting to believe a thing is true. I've had plenty of back and forths on ATS and in everyday conversation where I've supported my point to the level of a mathematical proof, even gotten the other person to agree to virtually every single point made but as soon as it comes down to the "then you agree?" even if they clearly stated just moments prior to that question that they do indeed agree they revert right back to the same inane statement that got them into the conversation in the first place as thought the hour long conversation and all points conceded that occurred moments ago never happened.

I dont get it. But because I know people will do this I'm always on the look-out for when I should be the one who falls back on a bumper-sticker catch phrase even after being logically destroyed in an argument. I hope if that happens my head would just explode.

Ah it is a shame when the content of your message goes to waste because of elaborate presentation. I'm afraid neither TheRedNeck nor anyone else seems to have actually answered the points I was making.

I will not mask the point with humour next time, I will keep it simple, stupid (me)!

But that will have to wait until tomorrow, as I have just got back from, of all things, the circus (and no, I wasn't a performer...honest), and just watching those guys doing their thing has knackered me out.

If anyone else can spot what I've said and what they didn't get from my post, please feel free to fill in the gaps while I have strange, but not unpleasant, dreams of spinning women in sparkly outfits!

Originally posted by WatchRider
In the UK the gunlaw (pre Dunblaine Massacre) precluded the chavs due to the already stringent gun clubs which you needed to belong to. Also there was no CCW system allowed either.
So the chavs wouldn't be allowed or would just obtain firearms illegally (which they do anyway). Also you needed to have a room without windows as an armoury with a strongbox to put them in. Can't see many chavs even having the braincells for the (now illegal) old method.

If every household contains a gun, and they get burgled, does it not follow that it will therefore be easier for the chavs to get their hands on them? What about a chav kid who steals his dad's gun to be a hard-boy to his "mates"?

More guns around means easier access, regardless of how they are obtained.

Anyway, I'm supposed to be sleeping! Enough waffle for one night...

C.C.Benjamin,

You are thinking that a criminal can burgle an armed home and steal the firearms and not get shot. He might get away with it a few times but eventually he will be shot. Being shot he will not burgle any more homes for firearms. His pals on the street will eventually get shot as well. Soon your are introducing the possibility of on the job injury and even death into the employment path of a career criminal.

I read somewhere about a fanciful club called the "capital punishment
club."
On everyones eighteenth birthday they are given the once in a life time opportunity to join the "Capital Punishment Club." The one time membership cost is $25.00. If you elect to join the club you are issued an Orange Membership Card with bold letters stating Life Member of Capital Punishment Club.

Your membership in this club GUARANTEES that if you are the victim of a felony that if caught the felon will be given the death penalty. If not a member of this club and a victim of a felony the felon if caught will get the normal punishment.

So suppose you decide to not join and I decide to join. We are sitting together on a park bench at dusk and a mugger/robber/murder approaches us both and demands our money and tells us he is going to kill us both. We both open our wallet and the felon sees my Orange Capital Punishment Club Membership Card, and being somewhat bright he tells me to forget it and get moving as he is not interested in me.
I proceed to leave, and you look at me like "What the heck??" I shrug my shoulders and tell you that I will call the local police and report the crime.

I think the basis of gun control is largely shaped by cultural and political "identification" issues more than any genuinely strong belief that gun control will reduce gun crime.

Most gun control advocates I have talked to, after being confronted with the facts (which don't tend to support their case), boil it down to: "well the gun rights advocates are my political enemies and I want to thwart them any way I can."

They identify RKBA advocacy with a general right wing political mindset, and thus it's a way to get back at the right wing. Much like I've noticed many vocal gay marriage opponents apparently see it as a way to get back at "the left."

There are a lot of factors that play into this: the fact that the Democratic Party has until the last few years been the driving force between gun control laws: not because they have any truly strong conviction that it will reduce gun crime, but because it's a piece of political pablum that gets votes from frightened urbanites.

Similarly, the NRA has increasingly come to view itself not as merely a gun rights organization, but as a part of a larger conservative movement. They market themselves this way increasingly unabashedly, and they are increasingly partisan, exaggerating the anti-gun record of politicians perceived as "liberal" while at the same time ignoring intrusions on gun rights by conservatives - I call it the "lobbyist disease"

However this has led the public to identify RKBA advocacy with "the right" - despite the fact that there are many of us whose general political outlook certainly does not fit that mold.

Seen properly, Second Amendment rights are a civil liberties issue, not a left/right ideological one.

Unfortunately they have been framed that way for decades now, thus you'll find that many people will argue an anti-gun line not because they really care, but because it's a way to stick it to "the other side"...

There's hope though - the Democrats have become increasingly aware that gun control, nationally, alienates more voters than it earns them. Thus you see more and more Democrats dropping gun control entirely as an issue or adopting an "it should be left to the states" line - no doubt in part due to the influence of DNC chairman Howard Dean, who if you'll recall liked to brag about his "A" rating from the NRA.

1. No matter how many times I have seen TheRedneck's signature quote of "If one of us is chained, none of us are free," I still most often semi-consciously nod my head when I read it, because it's a concept that so many people seem not to get.

First they make laws about wearing seat belts, and you don't say anything because you wear yours anyway.
Then they chip away at smoking with more and more restrictions on where people can smoke, and you don't say anything because you're a non-smoker.
Then they make owning certain breeds of dogs illegal, and it doesn't bother you because you don't like big mean dogs anyway.
Then they put a lot of restrictions on commercial airline flights, and you don't say anything because you never fly.
Then they impose fines for parking cars on the street, and you don't care because you have a garage.
Then they restrict peoples' rights to own or carry guns, and you don't say anything because you don't like guns.
Then they finally pass a law that affects YOU negatively, and it's too late to say anything, and besides you can't get any support because the smokers and the dog owners and the frequent fliers and the former gun owners don't care about your issue because it doesn't affect them.

See how that goes? They are taking our constitutional freedoms in little bites and counting on the fact that, by taking those bites from people who are a minority of the population, the majority will ignore them because it isn't their concern. Today they are impinging on gun owners' rights, but the next rights they impinge on could be something YOU care about. We must all be concerned about the freedoms of all citizens, even the ones that don't affect us, or we will all eventually lose all of our freedoms.

2. I'm a female. I'm not petite by any means at 5'11" and well over 200 lbs. most of the time, but I wasn't so big when I was 8 years old and my Dad (career Army) taught me how to shoot the handgun that was always kept (loaded) in my mother's nightstand drawer and showed me where it was. I never touched it, but had an intruder broken into our house and threatened us while Dad was overseas, I was more likely to have gotten it and used it than my mother who feared guns.

Most of my life, there's been a gun in my/our house. I've never used one except to practice, never shot so much as a bird or squirrel, but I also live out in the country at least 20 minutes from the arrival of services if I called "911," and if we did have an intruder or burglar I'm quite sure that our guns (and the big mean dogs) would more likely save us than the police who might, if we were really lucky, get there before we were both dead and the criminal long gone.

Do I carry my gun? No, not usually. But there have been a few circumstances and situations in which I did put it in my vehicle or carry it, and I would prefer to have the right to do so if and when I feel the need.

When I was 10 years old, a girl stabbed me in the leg with a No. 2 pencil, and I still have the scar (and a dark visible remnant of lead) in my leg. Shall we ban No. 2 pencils? How about chainsaws? They're dangerous. Machetes? Pitchforks? Tire irons? Why not? They've all been used to kill people.

My point is, even if you somehow managed to magically remove every firearm from the face of the planet and make it so that no one could manufacture another one, we'd still have crime and people killing people. Big knives, farm implements, spears, slingshots, bows and arrows .. hey, people kill people with rocks! Shall we try to get rid of all the rocks, too? And don't forget pantyhose! How many people have been strangled with pantyhose?

Do you see how ridiculous this gets? A gun is no more dangerous than a rock in the hands of someone who is not a criminal, and criminals will always manage to have guns whether or not the law-abiding public does. And if they don't, they'll find other weapons to use. Crime won't stop - or even diminish, as has been proved in other countries - just because you take away guns. Some guy on a roof with a good modern high-powered crossbow could be the next spree killer, and his death toll might be just as high (or perhaps higher, since people wouldn't be warned by the sound of gunshots).

Now give me a GOOD reason to take away my guns, or the ability to carry them. Can you, really? I don't think so.

3. Like Redneck, I live out in the country and there are bobcats (I've had one of those within 4 feet of my house chasing my chickens!!), coyotes, foxes, raccoons, possums, mountain lions (supposedly, although I haven't actually seen one), and feral dogs around. These animals may not be a physical threat to my husband or I most of the time, but they certainly are a threat to my chickens, ducks, geese, dogs, and horses. A friend of mine who lives in the same general area lost a 3 month old colt to predators - probably a pack of coyotes or feral dogs. Do I not have a right to protect my livestock? Actually, I do prefer to trap the predators and release them alive on BLM lands when I can, but in a crisis situation (coon in the henhouse or a rabid animal) a gun is sometimes the only answer.

Just because YOU don't need or want a gun, please don't assume that I don't, and please don't allow your unreasonable fear of firearms and lack of knowledge to enable the PTB to endanger me or my chosen lifestyle. Thanks!