Originally posted by intrepid

Originally posted by VictorVonDoom
You're right, that does sound kind of lame.

But then, as I recall Hitler found it expensive to shoot six million Jews. He thought gas chambers were far more economical. So maybe if someone is determined to kill they will find another way.

edit on 19-12-2012 by VictorVonDoom because: (no reason given)

Uh huh. Equating gun laws to the Holocaust. I'm out. There's NO logic here.

Well there is a strong link between Hitler's gun laws and the Holocaust, but that wasn't the point.

The point was, if someone is determined to kill, they will find a way, and usually a way that best fits their purpose. A gold-digger might try poisoning her husband. A prisoner will make a shiv. A crooked businessman might hire a hitman. The hitman might use a car to make it look like an accident. If someone wanted to kill a lot of kids at a school, they could just as easily make a very powerful and effective bomb with things from a hardware store. Banning guns won't stop a determined killer.

Guns don't need to be banned, stupidity needs to be banned.

Granted, there's no good reason to own a rocket launcher or an uzi, but there are very good reasons to own hunting rifles and regular handguns. I don't want guns banned, but I'm perfectly willing to see restrictions on the "extreme" guns, not a problem with me at all.

BUT, I am very much in favor of banning stupidity and ignorance. It needs to be done. It's not just dragging down our country, it's dragging down the whole world. That movie "Idiocracy" is seeming more and more real every day. I see people who if breathing wasn't an involuntary action would suffocate. They're on both sides, but I've seen a lot more in the past few days on the side of "I want mah gunz, dis iz merca an i need mah guns!" They don't just want guns, they want military grade assault weapons and they want hundreds of them, thousands of them if they could get them.

It's psychos like that who cause others to want to ban guns. They are bat-crap crazy and make all gun owners look like morons who don't have enough sense to use one properly.

Just ban stupidity and the rest of us who have some sense can keep our guns, be responsible with them and go on with our lives.


rant portion is not about the OP or anyone else on the thread, I just wanted to find semi-intelligent people discussing it who could sympathize

Hello, this question perhaps an English person can answer. I only just realized that guns were made illegal in Britain, fairly recently. When this happened, were gun owners required to turn their weapons in somewhere? And if someone rather just kept their gun in the drawer where it had always been, is that person now a criminal?
Or was it simply that gun sales were banned, and those already in possession of a firearm could keep it?

Originally posted by Kryties
The closer we get to a serious conversation about guns in America the louder, and more whining, the gun advocates seem to get.

It can't hurt to have a deep look at the issue and statistics in a proper setting can it? Is it really that much trouble, to perhaps save another class of 20 kids getting turned into swiss cheese?

Indeed! Well said as always Kryties!

IRM

<sarcasm>Yep, guns are the problem. As long as they're around, people are going to be getting killed left and right.Lets ban them or make them hard to get. But they aren't the only thing we should be afraid of...</sarcasm>

Maybe they should move to ban detergent, adhesive remover, paint remover, chlorine bleach, chlorine pool tablets, ammonia, automotive battery acid, pesticides, lawn fertilizer, gasoline, motor oil, and a few other common household chemicals. Somebody with the right chemistry knowledge could use them to make explosives or some really nasty chemicals with a lot more potential to kill or maim a lot of people than some nutter with a gun.

(If you don't believe me, go look it up for yourself. Read on how nitric acid can be made and its derived compounds, or some articles about chemicals used in chemical warfare in WWI and their effects. Then realize what they're made of, and how it's not as complicated as most people think. It's almost scary.)

So far there hasn't been any chemists with mental issues that have problems with society, but there still a chance that it could occur. Therefore we should ban or heavily restrict access to the things they could use to cause great harm as a preventative measure in order to protect the children.

Honestly though... If things are used responsibly and kept in responsible hands, there are no problems.

Even with guns, the majority of people that own them or otherwise have them in their posession aren't going around randomly shooting people and causing mass havoc.

The real problem is how society puts the blinders on in regards to people most likely to cause problems. What society needs to do is see that people with mental issues get the help they need before they flip out. Pricing people out of the help they need, marginalizing them, and not taking prior attempts of friends or family trying to help people with psychological problems seriously is a big one. Being "PC" and saying "oh, he's just like that" doesn't help anything either. Drugging them up or locking them away isn't always the fix, sometimes it's counciling and therapy that they really need to get through their moments while allowing them to remain productive within society. Not everyone finds it easy to make friends, and those that feel like they're being [snip] on all the time may really need somebody to talk to in order to vent. Having mental health covered as a basic human need seems like something that a government should consider in order to prevent these kind of episodes.

There will always be a more efficient way to kill, it's just what our society has done since cavemen put a stone tip on the end of a pointy stick. Probably more devastating than the weapon used was the ammunition specially designed to cause more damage on impact by mushrooming out in size. So you can try to regulate the ammo too. Then someone sells a kit, or comes up with a way to tip them in something poisonous, it's just how our minds seem to work for some reason.

What scares me the most, whether you believe this government is "good" or "bad", is there are a lot of very nervous people around right now. I have heard more and louder talk over the past few years about the need for revolution. If they are right, the 2nd amendment was designed so that they could have a chance against a tyrannical government. If they are wrong, making them feel "under attack" and "undefended" will probably drive them over the edge. Either way I think there are many, many more precious babies put in harms way if we go too far with gun control.

There is good reason, from either "side" of the debate to go very carefully, very slowly, and pray that decisions are being made for the right reasons instead of bias or political points.

Originally posted by Propulsion

^^^that

It's never a big deal that a bunch of kids are dying from a war we are waging on 'terrorism'. No one wants that to stop. The media doesn't acknowledge their deaths. The president doesn't grieve over the children dying in those wars. When it happens in the United States, it's suddenly important.

When the government gives up all of their various 'weapons' of choice, I'll consider giving up the second amendment.