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This was hilarious, sad, but hilarious.
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I'm genuinely curious as to whether there is a line the gun enthusiasts would draw as to which weapons were and were not suitable for Joe Public?
Handguns - fine
Single-shot rifles - fine
Assault Rifles - fine
Flame-throwers - I'm guessing they'd be fine, shoot your deer and BBQ it at the same time?
Tanks - ?
Helicopter gunships - ?
Chemical weapons - ?
Nukes - ?
Andy B
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You'd probably have to clearly define assault rifle first. I see nothing wrong with semi auto rifles.
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So, for you, there would be a line 'somewhere'?
It's a question I've asked myself after one of JSOP's posts regarding maintaining a militia capable of overthrowing any despotic government. With the current US armed forces being the most powerful on the planet surely the militia would need to have aircraft-carriers, nukes etc?
Andy B
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Nukes do very little than ensure against invasion, not really a useful tool in overthrowing or taking over.
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LabVIEWstuff wrote: maintaining a militia capable of overthrowing any despotic government
of all the laughable excuses gun nuts use, that's my favorite.
what kind of rifle am i going to need to defend myself against the F-16s the National Guard currently has parked down at our local airport ?
it's self-aggrandizing idiocy.
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Chris Losinger wrote: what kind of rifle am i going to need to defend myself against the F-16s the
National Guard currently has parked down at our local airport ?
Specious.
The point is not about you defending yourself against a specific weapon in one specific instance of time.
It is about the population, ie everyone, preventing/stopping a government over time.
And although a F-16 might seem like a nice weapon the pilots still need to get out of them every once in a while, the plane needs to be serviced and fueled by mechanics. There needs to be cooks and nurses and officers. And supply lines to deliver food, fuel, parts, medicine, entertainment, etc. And that means lots and lots of people.
And every single one of those people can be shot using almost any normal handgun. The pilot is the sole exception and is only exempt when in the plan itself.
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jschell wrote: It is about the population, ie everyone, preventing/stopping a government over time.
well, it's your fantasy, so i guess you can dictate exactly how it will play out. but remember, even in the days when the ink on the original Constitution was still wet, the government was strong enough to put down multiple armed rebellions with little trouble at all (Shay's rebellion, Whiskey rebellion, etc). and these days, the military's firepower is so much greater than anything civilians can muster, there would be no battle at all.
jschell wrote:
And although a F-16 might seem like a nice weapon the pilots still need to get out of them every once in a while, the plane needs to be serviced and fueled by mechanics. There needs to be cooks and nurses and officers. And supply lines to deliver food, fuel, parts, medicine, entertainment, etc. And that means lots and lots of people.
it would all be over before any of that mattered a bit. an actual armed rebellion would be over in a matter of days. and if you're talking about sitting around stroking your barrels, grumbling about the government and talking big talk and not actually using your guns to force your way into power... well, that's not a rebellion, that's an NRA meeting.
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Chris Losinger wrote: the government was strong enough to put down multiple armed rebellions with little trouble at all (Shay's rebellion, Whiskey rebellion, etc).
And they had no trouble at Waco either, except for media coverage.
However neither mine nor yours were popular uprisings.
Chris Losinger wrote: it would all be over before any of that mattered a bit. an actual armed rebellion would be over in a matter of days
There are any number of recent examples that demonstrate that isn't true.
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LabVIEWstuff wrote: Flame-throwers - I'm guessing they'd be fine, shoot your deer and BBQ it at the same time?
Flamethrowers are completely legal to make/own in the U.S., in fact I don't think they've ever been regulated.
But let's look in the other direction too, should we ban all knives? Those are also weapons. Only criminals should be allowed to eat steak!
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Very good point, although like cars knives have other uses whereas guns are designed for killing prey (human or otherwise).
Maybe it's just the 'fighting chance' aspect of guns that make us lily-livered liberals queasy? This may be naive but I've always thought that if get a warning and you can run fast enough or hide somewhere you at least have a small chance against a knife attacker, or car, or baseball-bat, whereas against a gun you can't run, can't really hide so you are in essence an execution.
Hmm, maybe I'm coming round to the arm-everyone argument, but then surely we'd have to ban alcohol or anything else that impares judgement?
Andy B
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Would you argue for the banning of "assault knives?"
Also, anyone can get a car, regardless of criminal history, anyone can also buy booze, regardless of history. Do repeat offenders continue to drink and drive and murder innocent people who don't have a fighting chance? Yes, hundreds of times a year.
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LabVIEWstuff wrote: whereas against a gun you can't run, can't really hide so you are in essence an
execution.
Well you just stand there, because it will give the shooter something to aim at while I run away and hide.
War would be really short affairs if everyone just dropped dead when a gun was aimed in their general direction.
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Why stop at knives? Baseball bats and hammers can kill a person too. Cars kill more people than guns, as do poisons (accidentally ingested household cleaners, usually), so let's ban cars and cleaners! One death is one death too many!
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What you are forgetting is everything that you have mentioned has other predominate uses other than to kill people, and were designed to be, and are used in other ways than to kill people. Guns however are designed to kill people.
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Sorry don't think I'm understanding your point?
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I'd say that alcohol has about as many useful uses as guns, and leads to more deaths.
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That reasoning can be applied to other things as well: steak knives were designed primarily for cutting flesh. Sounds like a dangerous weapon to me.
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Yes, but it has the function of cutting up meat, which every house-hold will need. I cannot think of a situation where I would need a gun, apart from if I wanted to kill someone.
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There are a lot of households that supplement their diets with meat obtained by hunting. Yes, the point is still to kill something, but that is also true of bows and arrows, mousetraps and flypaper.
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The Reincarnation wrote: I cannot think of a situation where I would need a gun, apart from if I wanted to kill someone.
That's only a negative if you believe it is never justified to kill or injure another human. If someone breaks into your house and threatens you and your family with a gun of their own, would it be acceptable to shoot them first? And you are not even required to shoot to kill, you could shoot to disable instead.
Also, just because you own a gun, does not mean you have to use it. That would be like saying having health insurance means you have to get sick/injured.
I guess this is how I see it: a criminal does not care if the gun is illegal, so they will have it either way (because a criminal, by definition, has already broken at least one law, another one isn't likely to stop them), the question is, to me: do I want to be on equal footing? And I can't see a situation where I'd rather they had the advantage.
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But the fact that I live in a Country where it is near impossible for a petty criminal to obtain a gun, and if they did they would face a harsher sentence just for possessing the gun than they would breaking into my home. So the fact is I would be on an equal footing, and I live my life being less likely to be shot.
Lanza's Mum was a law-abiding citizen with guns and look what good that did her.
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The Reincarnation wrote: I cannot think of a situation where I would need a gun, apart from if I wanted to kill someone.
Of course the US Constitution doesn't mandate that you must own a gun. Nor does it mandate what you must do with it.
And others do of course see other reasons for owning one. Such as hunting, simple recreation, security and/or just a cool factor. But the US Constitution also says nothing about the reasons one might choose to own one.
Just as it doesn't mandate that you must make use of the the right of free speech, nor why one chooses to do so or why one chooses not to do so.
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The Reincarnation wrote: Guns however are designed to kill people.
Poisons exist solely to kill.
And there are guns that designed without killing in mind. At least to the extent that they are impractical for that purpose in the normal course of events. (Go look up competition level target pistols and look at how they are used.)
What about bows?
Or for that matter catapults. Which might seem funny but there are numerous competitions in the US every year attended by thousands (if not tens of thousands) of people solely to participate in those.
What about cars that are designed to go 150+ miles per hour and are marketed to consumers for public use despite the fact that there is no public place to go that fast?
And a bit more esoteric but in terms of why something must be practical what about people eating blowfish? Or whales (which occurs in Europe)?
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